Dragons and Pygmies.

[KnottyDon]

I am kinda new. Ok, alright, I don't even have a linux system set up yet. But that is where my problems are. I am going to use either DragonLinux full version, lite version, or I may use the Pygmy distro.
All of these distros have one thing in common. They claim to work on the DOS partition and will operate safely with my Windows OS.
I download these as zip files. I unzip it and I get more zip files. Then I unzip those3 and there are more zip files. This goes on and on until I have done this for over an hour.
Windows hides everything from me, and because I haveused it for my entire computer experience, I have become very ignorant. Now, do I need to unzip al these files? Is there a way to unzip them all at once instead of unzipping all 1000 or so individually? Or is this Dragon Linux's way of getting me to give in and buy the CD?


Once again, Piece and hotdogs. :)

[KnottyDon]

Okay, say I do have to unzip them all individually. I am going to run the Lite Dragon Linux or the even smaller Pygmy. These are both Console environments only. How would I add a GUI environment such as gnome to the system?

[Tyr-7BE]

Well first off, I wouldn't recommend running linux off of a dos partition. This isn't true linux...more like an emulation toy. If you're new and you want something small, try Progeny or Libranet.
If you insist on sticking to the akward ones, in order to get a GUI you need XFree86 available at http://www.xfree86.org/ . Once that's installed, you'll probably want to get a better window manager (the one that's included is pretty crappy...might have been impressive sometime around 1980 or so :D). There are links left right and center to window managers, and I think there are even some on X's page. However, if you go to http://www.gnome.org/ or http://www.ximian.com/ (both Gnome, but one is backed by a company called Ximian (formerly known as Helix). I prefer Ximian but that's not the case with everyone), you can download Gnome which includes the Sawfish window manager (a very nice one!). If you decide to go to http://www.kde.org/ I believe that KDE 2.x comes with its own window manager...crappy little thing but it functions.
Consider what I've said about the distros. Partitioning isn't nearly as big a deal as people make it out to be, and it's so incredibly worth it...
Good luck!

<edit> as for the zip files? I dunno. Maybe look for a main zip or one that says install? An install batch file?
<edit again> I just thought of something...I'm not sure how X would react to having linux on a vfat (windows) partition. You might wanna email their support if you're planning on going with the vfat linux, cause I'm really not sure whether it would install and/or function.
[ 27 March 2001: Message edited by: Tyr-7BE ]

[ 27 March 2001: Message edited by: Tyr-7BE ]

[KnottyDon]

Okay. I already have these distros so i am going to give them a stab. I did find that they will support the GUI environments on my system. I am going to download Gnome, it does seem like a nice environment. When I get that, how do i use the console environment to install this Gnome environment?

[PimpHolic]

dragon linux didn't work for me. i installed it and supposedly everything worked fine but when i tried to boot into it, it didnt work, bit waste of time.

just use dos to unzip one file like stated in the readme just follow the readme unzip run some file (i forgot) and setup.

[KnottyDon]

I did not get a readme file. Do you know where to find the readme file?

[HarryGoiter]

hate to be redundant, but you really should look into to partitioning your hard drive (after backing up ALL your data that you need), reloading windows on a partion. Then go pay $25 for a copy of Mandrake7.2--excellent newbie distro that comes with bootdisk, manuals, and cd's. This is exactly what I did a year ago. Had to switch to Slackware after a while, but Mandrake is by far the best newbie distro I tried (I had also tried Corel, and something called ArmedLinux which could be run from DOS). Learn Unix commands if you haven't already; thats key to enjoying the linux experience.

Good luck