Just watched what looked like lots of really cool and useful files got loaded on my new slackware system! (annoying game show buzzer sound)

When I booted up the new system, I got a command prompt

darkstar login:

Nice.....

Now what? So I put in

root

Them the root password set up during install (by the way it never asked me for a user account to be set up with a regular password...?)

So now all I have is a command prompt black screen that has

root@darkstar:~#

sitting there mocking me!

Loads of fun; this!!

I was hoping that slackware was the one! I really liked the very helpful verbiage and step by step hand holding ( if you want to call it that) that the screen shots gave me during the install process. All i all it seemed like some very thoughtful individuals were involved in the code for this.

Anyway, I am still willing to get this up, but does anyone know what I may have done wrong?

Regards to all

Slackware always boots to runlevel 3 the first time you run it. You haven't done anything wrong. First, make a new user with the "adduser" command. Then, log out (type "exit", without quotes) and log back in as your new user. Try running "startx" (again, without quotes) and see if that starts X without problems. If it does, then edit /etc/inittab and look for the line that says

id:3:initdefault:,

change the 3 to a 4, save the file and then the next time you boot you should have a graphical login.

See, it would be so cool if they would mention this when the "installaton complete" dialog appears. Most everything else was rather user friendly, but if I had not been partitioning my hdd in the past, I would have been clueless at the partitioning stage.

Also, something that bears mentioning with LOUD BOLD TYPE

if you are running this on a laptop as I am and you get that little tiny default window where your entire screen is not being used, you simply press

fn f7

BINGO! full screen!

The tiny screen can be a real downer to newbies and serves to undermine confidence with the usage of Linux as an alternative to you-kinow-what.

There are distros out there that seem to be trying to create a one (1) disc, one (1) click install solution that auto-detects your hardware and comes up rather painlessly the way you-know-what does, but thay all seem to need tweaking of one kind or another. Once you have to bring up konsole, you are instantly "not in knasas anymore" which if you have messed around with dos might not scare you, but most people who's intro to computers was win95 on up will be put off by this and drop it like a hot potato.

I have tried on my dell latitude c600/c500...

ubuntu/Kubuntu, quick easy, but won't mount ntfs partitions until you get into Konsole and does not recognize optical mouse

Knoppix 3.7, quick easy, recognizes optical mouse, but when installed on hard drive, installs openoffice.org programs in german, and mounts ntfs partitions so that you can't browse to them using konsole to grant permission with chmod. The rest of knoppix distro higher than 3.7 make my curser jump all over the screen and I have no control of the mouse. I'd be using knoppix from my hard drive right now if it was not for the german openoffice issue.

vector linux, installs total garbage that flickers and recognizes nothing properly on my system

debian, small screen by default (fixable with fn f7...) but openoffice.org programs won't spawn after hard drive looks like it is working on it.

damn small linux, not so bad, but rather limited and esoteric, probobaly good for something rather I.T. in nature but not so soccer mom friendly


Right now, slackware seems to be the likable winner for my laptop, but I would prefer to have openoffice.org by default instead of the k apps.

Thanks for the come back.

The 'fn+F7' deal is specific to your laptop hardware/bios. Same key combo does nothing in mine. Not a Linux/Slackware deal, it's your hardware manufacturer.

Also, the 'Dump to CLI' is WELL documented. If you want a smooth running Slackware system, read Shilo's "How I Did it All" sticky in the main Slackware forum. It is STUFFED full of good info/tweaks/instructions.

And, Welcome to Slackware!

can't find this "how I Did it All" post. Do you have a link to it?

It is the first post in the Slackware forum. You are in 'Slackware-Installation'

Just curious, did you run xorgconfig at the terminal prompt, run level three when you were logged in as root? It would look like this

root@darkstar:~#xorgconfig

If you haven't run this command you need to do that to have KDE function.

Not necessarily. When I installed Slack on my desktop, I just did a "startx" and everything was ok. But yes, if something isn't quite right you'll want to configure X.

Thanks, I didn't know that. I've installed slack many times, I thought ou always had to write your xorgconfig file prior to typing startx.
I guess slack has a generic xorgconfig file in place after hardware is detected.

once I figured out that I have to enter

root

at the darkstar prompt, then my root password (entering root is not a natural thing to do for newbies. I intend to address this with any future distros I have anything to do with. It is such a simple thing, yet it is everything...) I entered

startx

and I was off and running.

once I figured out that I have to enter

root

at the darkstar prompt, then my root password (entering root is not a natural thing to do for newbies. I intend to address this with any future distros I have anything to do with. It is such a simple thing, yet it is everything...) I entered

startx

and I was off and running.

I have to say that the verbiage during the install process with slackware is exemplary. Very well thought out and straight forward; however, another little snafu that newbies won't know about is entering the name of their domain. Most people don't know it, and the install verbiage gives no hint as to what it is, and where to find it. I just happened to notice in one of the windows an "on-line" install attempt of debian what mine is....

Glad you got it figured out:-)