Hello all. Taken the plunge and installed slackware 9.1 onto my laptop. I found the installation pretty easy on the whole thanks to the HOW TO INSTALL file.

Anyway, I am new to linux apart from a little tinkering with knoppix 3.3 so I will probably appear a buffoon with some of these questions, so apologies.

Right. I followed the install.txt that came on disc 1 of slackware to the letter. Full install, etc. I didnt configure the networking stuff because I'm unsure about what I need at the moment. Anyway, Lilo is working, KDE is the desktop.

Here are some questions:

1. Where are all the apps that should have been installed? The menu is pretty sparse. Do I have to somehow move them to there or load from a console window?

2. I would like to test Gnome out. How can I do this? I selected for it to be installed, by the way.

3. Where should I have the equivalent of 'My Documents?' Do I create a new folder in 'file:/home/ ?

4. Is there a manual hidden away in a directory?

5. Any resources for helping me set up an external DSL modem? Also, do I need to start any services to get it running?

6. There seems to be no indication on my machine that I'm running slackware. Is there a slackware help section hidden somewhere?


Thats it for now. Many thanks for any replies

when starting out with Slackware, the best place to look for initial help is the manual on the Slackware site.

www.slackware.com/book

regarding some of you questions:

1. What apps are you looking for specifically? KDE-specific programs are located in /opt/kde/bin. you could browse that folder to see if you find anything.

2. do you boot to a graphical login screen or to a console (then typing startx)?
If you boot to a login screen, then you should see something labeled "session", which you click on and select Gnome. then login.
If you boot to a console, then type in (as user) xwmconfig which will show you a menu of available window managers. Select the one you want, then when back at the command line, then startx per usual.

3. you're right in that each user's "my documents" is located in /home/user/. if you don't have anything like that , it sounds like you're running X as root (you typically shouldn't be doing that). at a command line, type adduser and you can create a new user account.

4. see above link.

5. search this site. there's a lot of threads on this topic (perhaps even specific to your hardware).

6. What sort of affirmation are you wanting? Slackware doesn't have a lot of "fluff" that other distributions include. You'll get used to it.

Good luck

the applications should have loaded during install. you might wanna check under package manager (or rpm package manager) to see what applications installed.
when you boot , at the CLI type in xwmconfig and select Gnome as your Desktop, and exit out, type startx , you should be in Gnome.

there should be the default help button on the KDE menu for help. also you can try the man command from the CLI on whatever command you're looking up.

if you go under Settings under the KDE menu, Config Manager (i think that's what is ) it'll give you the version for the kernel as well as the slack version.
for the DSL modem use adsl-setup it'll ask you some config stuff like username, password . try adsl-start after this

i hope this helps.

Thanks very much superbondbond and brokenflea.

QUOTE: regarding some of you questions:

1. What apps are you looking for specifically? KDE-specific programs are located in /opt/kde/bin. you could browse that folder to see if you find anything.

2. do you boot to a graphical login screen or to a console (then typing startx)?
If you boot to a login screen, then you should see something labeled "session", which you click on and select Gnome. then login.
If you boot to a console, then type in (as user) xwmconfig which will show you a menu of available window managers. Select the one you want, then when back at the command line, then startx per usual.

3. you're right in that each user's "my documents" is located in /home/user/. if you don't have anything like that , it sounds like you're running X as root (you typically shouldn't be doing that). at a command line, type adduser and you can create a new user account.

4. see above link.

5. search this site. there's a lot of threads on this topic (perhaps even specific to your hardware).

END QUOTE
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1. I was hoping that openoffice would be installed (plus other stuff I can fiddle around with). Not sure if it is though

2. When booting I login to darkstar as 'root' then type 'startx' as you say. I will create a new user account. thanks for the tip!

3. This should be sorted after doing what you said?

4. Will do

5. Will do too

6. Not really after an affirmation. Just very unusual to not have logos rammed in your face (whether you like it or not)! Might try and find a nice slackware background.


Many thanks

I saw a pretty slick Slackware logo splash screen for KDE over at KDE-Look.org

some pretty cool slack graffics here.

http://www.slackware.com/~msimons/slackware/grfx/