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tony4818
11-29-2002, 05:38 PM
WARNING THIS IS LONG (any help would be greatly apretiated)

I found it was time to sit down and do whatever it takes to get this linux thing down.. YAY!! :OP I have bought a few books read alot of website tutorials and have a general idea of whats goin on but there are just a few things that have slipped through the cracks... I know its probably going to be long but any help would be apretiated maybe even a pm icq would be nice :O) hehe I am trying to compare everything to windows so i can get an idea of what is going on.... Also i am using caldera 3.1 i have tried mandrake suse and redhat and I really didnt like them all to well and hope to try soon debian slackware and whats this lindows thing anyone used it??.

First off every one says type ./configure. I have successfuly installed a few apps from compiling them but I would liek to know what is actually going on. what does that do?? is that a script? what does the ./ do?? Is it similar to typing configure.bat in dos? My newbie guess is it is its a script proir to compiling that checks for the necessary libraries versions etc.... but the main thing is i wanna knwo what that damn ./ does... hehe :OP

next make im guessing make actually turns the source code into 10101001 and make install puts everything in the apropriate dir and make clean cleans up the temps etc.. does it delete the source code?? where does everythign go after it is installed??? My distro came with netscape 4 or somthing of the sort i install the latest version comple it etc.. and the link on the taskbar still opens up the old version.. how do i associate bookmarks with the new version?? how do i uninstall the old version?? Is there a peticular place i should install programs to?? i know of a make install command that you can choose the dir everything installs to but where is best?? I hear a million diff answers to this question. There is no c:\program files :OP Besides the directory where it does go are there other files sprawled about .dll s regestered lets say in the system folder... when i uninstall somthing do i need to run a script to remove all those other files to avoid missing broken links etc?? Do i just delete the folder?? can i tell kde to be like whenever i click this extension .avi to open in lets say mplayer?? or whenever *.avi is clicked to send this command to bash?

I have 2 cdroms... how do i mount one and not the other can i address my cd roms as /dev/hdc what one will it mount if i do /dev/cdrom?? isnt there a link in /dev/cdrom to /dev/hdc?? if my cdrom was pri master (that should be /dev/hdc i think) One is a cdrw the other is a dvd/cd rom

Now on to program reccomendations
Mplayer or xine?? I could compile xine but it wouldnt play a darned thing and mplayer is so confusing 10 million different files do download etc... Just wondering if anyoe knows of an easy help file for mplayer on installation. I could get the gui up for xine but it wouldnt play anything it would just sit there and let me click its buttons.. Maybe a reccomendation on the two and a easy smeazy help install file what files to d/l etc get this file then this one compile in this order engine gui etc with these commands put this tag on when you install this file do i install the engine first and put the enable gui tag on that config or do i put that tag on the gui config??

Good web browser.. Should i just get the latest netscape?? i heard somone say phoenix... I would liek to be able to do my online banking and view flash vids the latest netscape made me puke looked like aol+netscape built in this built in that.. I really just want a stripped down browser that i can install a flash plugin and is up to par with ssl so i can do my banking

as far as messaging goes i have been able to get gain working works great i love it way better than trillian trillian is slow and blah i dont care for it

now last and final a topic i havent gotten into yet at all wine.. i have a palmpilot and sync it with quicken and pocket quicken... My answer to this problem would be to stay with windows... I think wine just makes it so you can run certain programs in linux not actually run windows uner linux.... I was wondering if i could lets say install linux do everything i need and run windows on top of it liek aprogram then open quicken and be able to sync my palm 5 run quicken and close it liek a program.... palm 5 uses com port for the cradle so i was thinking it would be alot easier than usb.... SO i guess im just asking for some reccomendations on how to tackle this problem in the future....


Again i thank you for reading this and have tried to keep it short simple sweet and to the point.. Again I apretiate any help you could give me!! :O) I would liek to be up 100% on linux soon instead of dual booting... I really have enjoyed it so far and like its potential.. So far i have been installing play play play till i mess somthing up then do a clean install of another distro same distro and try to do it better each time..


One more thing.. WTH is CVS??? hehe I keep hearing about it... do programs require it or is it an option to better manage file versions etc... :O)

Thanks
Tony
icq 500057
aim tony4818
yahoo tony_toreson

Hitokiri_X
11-29-2002, 06:19 PM
Originally posted by tony4818
whats this lindows thing anyone used it??.

Lindows is suppose to be an easy to use linux distro with having to make users and stuff.Its based on debian so it has an easy package management system.


First off every one says type ./configure. I have successfuly installed a few apps from compiling them but I would liek to know what is actually going on. what does that do?? is that a script? what does the ./ do?? Is it similar to typing configure.bat in dos? My newbie guess is it is its a script proir to compiling that checks for the necessary libraries versions etc.... but the main thing is i wanna knwo what that damn ./ does... hehe :OP

./configure checks and make sure all the required libraries and stuff needed to run the program are installeds and any extra optimization.Make builds the program and Make install installs it. ./ just tells the file to execute itself or run it.


next make im guessing make actually turns the source code into 10101001 and make install puts everything in the apropriate dir and make clean cleans up the temps etc.. does it delete the source code?? where does everythign go after it is installed??? My distro came with netscape 4 or somthing of the sort i install the latest version comple it etc.. and the link on the taskbar still opens up the old version.. how do i associate bookmarks with the new version?? how do i uninstall the old version?? Is there a peticular place i should install programs to?? i know of a make install command that you can choose the dir everything installs to but where is best?? I hear a million diff answers to this question. There is no c:\program files :OP Besides the directory where it does go are there other files sprawled about .dll s regestered lets say in the system folder... when i uninstall somthing do i need to run a script to remove all those other files to avoid missing broken links etc?? Do i just delete the folder?? can i tell kde to be like whenever i click this extension .avi to open in lets say mplayer?? or whenever *.avi is clicked to send this command to bash?

Most stuff installed from source goes into /usr/local and to uninstall it,run make uninstall from where you compiled it.As for running files,play around with your file manager.I'm sure theres an option to configure what programs to use for a certain file extension.To uninstall already installed programs look for some kind of package manage tool like kpackage.

I have 2 cdroms... how do i mount one and not the other can i address my cd roms as /dev/hdc what one will it mount if i do /dev/cdrom?? isnt there a link in /dev/cdrom to /dev/hdc?? if my cdrom was pri master (that should be /dev/hdc i think) One is a cdrw the other is a dvd/cd rom

Check in your /etc/fstab to see their different mount points.Then just use mount as normal for the mount point in a terminal.

Now on to program reccomendations
Mplayer or xine?? I could compile xine but it wouldnt play a darned thing and mplayer is so confusing 10 million different files do download etc... Just wondering if anyoe knows of an easy help file for mplayer on installation. I could get the gui up for xine but it wouldnt play anything it would just sit there and let me click its buttons.. Maybe a reccomendation on the two and a easy smeazy help install file what files to d/l etc get this file then this one compile in this order engine gui etc with these commands put this tag on when you install this file do i install the engine first and put the enable gui tag on that config or do i put that tag on the gui config??

I think MPlayer is the best without a doubt.Xine is easy to install but it froze too many times on me for my liking and I'm not sure it uses ffmpeg.MPlayer is not that hard to install,read their documents.All the info you need is there and thats what its there for.If you need an alternative player Avifile (http://avifile.sourceforge.net/) is nice.

Good web browser.. Should i just get the latest netscape?? i heard somone say phoenix... I would liek to be able to do my online banking and view flash vids the latest netscape made me puke looked like aol+netscape built in this built in that.. I really just want a stripped down browser that i can install a flash plugin and is up to par with ssl so i can do my banking

I used to be a big mozilla fan until I found phoenix.Phoenix just rocks,its fast and handles all my plugins just like mozilla (flash,java,realplayer,adobe acroread).


as far as messaging goes i have been able to get gain working works great i love it way better than trillian trillian is slow and blah i dont care for it

Yeah,gaim does rock.


One more thing.. WTH is CVS??? hehe I keep hearing about it... do programs require it or is it an option to better manage file versions etc... :O)

CVS means concurrent versions system.Its is not a requirement,but I love the Mplayer cvs.Its usually development stuff and can be more buggy than stable releases.So you don't really need it unless you want the latest bleeding edge stuff.