Hi, I just installed Ubuntu, and there is no console! Other then that it is great! I even like the themes, etc. And that is saying a lot coming from a faithful KDE enthusiast! So there are a couple things that need to be solved before I decide I want to keep this distro since this is a stretch already being gnome based and all. But I must say, Ubuntu actually makes gnome look good! Every other distro I have seen gnome on, it looked hideous!

So hear are my questions. How can I get a working console that I can access from the GUI? I don't want to have to switch to entire text mode to use the console. I am a cut and paste type of guy, and I can't do that using ctrl alt F1. If that is the only way to use the console, then that is a HUGE minus for me.

Secondly, I am having trouble installing packages. As cool as synaptic is, it doesnt have all the software I need in the repositories. I am trying to install Opera 8.5, and it isn't letting me. Well I like Opera, and I really want to install it. They (meaning Opera) in their infinite wisdom have even created a .deb package specifically designed for Ubuntu. I tried installing it using sudo dpkg -i . Well, it didn't work. It asked for dependencies... Dependencies which synaptic cannot locate! Why is this? Am I the first person that ever wanted to use Opera on Ubuntu? Seems odd to me. Pretty popular browser.

Finally, I am a big fan of soulseek. Fortunately, Ubuntu has nicotine soulseek client right in the application installer! Unfortunately, it doesn't work. I cant get on any chatrooms, browse any files, do anything for that matter except browse my own files which doesn't really help me much...

So if I can get some of these issues resolved, you can count me in as a Ubuntu user!

Thanks for everyone's help ahead of time!

Are you sure it doesn't come with a terminal? I looked to see what packages Ubuntu does come with and under GNOME, gnome-terminal is clearly there: http://packages.ubuntu.com/breezy/gnome/. If you can't find it in the menu, is there a "Run program" option? Try that and enter "gnome-terminal".

It should be under Applications > Accessories > Terminal.
You can enable extra repositories by following these instructions.
Unfortunately, Opera isn't in even the extra repositories. However, there is this:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/OperaBrowser

http://ubuntuguide.org/ although for a slightly earlier version will be helpful to you.

Okay... I just saw it... I feel stupid now... I don't know how I missed that, I went through all the menus...

I am still having the problem with getting opera and nicotine to work however...

Don't feel stupid. In Hoary, the terminal was in System Tools. For some reason, in Breezy, they moved it to Accessories. You were expecting to see it one place, and it was somewhere else.

Did you follow the instructions I linked to earlier? If so, what errors did you get? What problems did you encounter?

sorry this is not of much help

i couldn't get firefox installed as a stand alone program on the /home partition on breezy
that's using the FF installer and the konsole

so i wiped it re-installed kubuntu hoary and FF installed first time
so it seems im sticking to hoary for the time being ...

Couldn't install Firefox?

Typing the following at the Terminal should have installed Firefox on your machine.

I got Opera installed, but now my problem is that Opera and K3B fight over a dependency. So I can either install one or the other. That is pretty annoying. Opera and K3B are both favorite programs respectively. It may also be noted that I had to go find the dependencies myself and install them manually using sudo dpkg

I think you will be happy to know that there is a KDE based Ubuntu: Kubuntu.
I read Kubuntu will be the standard version of Ubuntu in the future (I believe they already planned this to happen in the next version).

If you need a terminal, just hit ALT+F2 and launch xterm, but if you switch to Kubuntu both your problems will be solved

Excellent! I will soon be switching over!

http://www.kubuntu.org/announcements/kde-commitment.php

Nice.