God no wonder Gates makes so much money 1

[metron9]

Just starting out here on trying to install linux Thought I would post some things as I go for others that may follow me in this nightmare of undocumented and very hard to understand instructions so far while I try and install Debian GNU/Linux

I thought I would just put up the problems I run into and how I solve them as I go because so far it looks like the people who put these things together could use a little help in getting across to "non hackers" so here I go.

Day 1: Downloaded floppy image files for freedbs, everything worked fine, all finished and never got it to boot.
Failure, decided to try Debian

Day 2:
Downloaded CD image file from:
ftp://mirror.cs.wisc.edu/pub/mirrors/linux/debian-cd/3.0_r1
Filename: "Debian-30r1-i386-binary-1.iso"
Burned CD using Nero Burning Rom

Booted computer and install screen starts
Selected English
NEXT artition Hard Disk

Problem: Nothing I could find explained exactly how to do this in the Debian online Manual, plenty of how to do the partitions but nothing on exactly what to do.
Searched google and found a site:

http://www.aboutdebian.com/install3.htm

Instructions detailing the problem I had while trying to create a SWAP partition. Turns out you have to select TYPE and then select 82 as the type of partition to make.
Ok good now I initialize the swap file and select test for bad blocks.

Problem: The screen says initializeing swap partition but looks like it is locked up as the screen just stops with no feedback. I sit and wait and finally its done. I only had a 1 gig swap partition but if I had 5 gig I think I may have just given up and reset.

NEXT Initialize Linux partition:
HEY! it has a screen that shows what blocks it's testing. That's good because it needs to check 4,755,232 blocks and so far while I have been making this post its only at 615,000. Guess I will go to bed and check it in the morning as the last few nights I have been pulling my hair out trying to install freebsd till 3:00am I can say one good thing so far, the install program waits for me to come back so that's good.

If one way gets it done someone else will create a thousand more ways to do the same thing. Really, it's almost idiotic the number of versions of linux that do basically the same thing and this 8700 free programs that I hear about better not all be spreadsheets or im gonna go nuts.

Just pokin some fun here because of the frusturation effect.

 

[metron9]

Well I am ready for the next step and I guess I need to set up drivers for network interface. I have a 3com 3C905B-TX card

So I choose net and I get a list a mile long of all the cards I don't have installed. (why cant the system just read the card and choose the correct driver the freedbs install had no problem doing this) so I read the HOWTO and it goes off in a shell direction with all kinds of commands. The screen I have before me says "You have a network device, but it is not yet configured. please select next to configure the network.

Hmmmm

Now it says would you use autmatic configuration using DHCP/BOOTP it says You'll need a DHCP or BOOTP server in the local network for this to work. I wonder what that means??? and I say yes, it goes and tries and comes back failed for eth0, now asks if I want to manually configure this card. Hell why not I say Yes, it asks me for the Ip address gateway and dns server numbers and after the last input (no form here folks just line by line input like I use to program 10 years ago on my Vic-20) anyway it just goes to the next propmt install the base system.
Hmmm I wonder if the nic card works? I guess if it not going to say it isn't working I can assume it is? getting more confused as i go... Feedback feedback common guys lets have feedback say it works don't just skip to the next thing with no pat on the back, no at a boy, just keep me guessing it's my first time ya know. Really this is probbly the most important device in the whole darn setup and I have no idea if its set up or not!

So I install the Base Syatem next by pressing enter....

Next is make system bootable I press enter and pray it wont ask me any questions I don't have the answer too.
Spoke too soon, two questions but one says pick this one if unsure so I do. So then it installs it and says this malarky:

NOTE: The default LILO config is not secure enough against local attacks. A user with physical access can modify the boot parameters and... bla bla bla...

What! I say... now i gotta read a bunch more documentation? Who wrote this stuff? George Carlin? man we have tinfoil we have tape.... FIX IT! gees

Next i make a boot floppy, remember I made the linux configuration BOOTABLE just a few minutes ago but... Just in case that won't work it says I should make a floppy. I say if it won't boot after all this I will try mandrake or red hat or fabio or echo or farnsworth or, you do know some of these are not real implimentations don't you?

Next i get Reboot Syetem to start the new syatem, its crunch time lets see what happens

Looks like its working and... Arg i forgot to take out the CD, take it out, turn it off, turn it on again and its working! It says Congratulations i'm working. so I open a beer.

It says if I want to revisit this setup just run /usr/sbin/base-config

Do they think i'm nuts!

Next I get some trick questions on GMT time this is funny, it tells me the "hardware clock" is set to todays date and it shows the time that looks correct as my clock says the same thing however it says 01:35:56 but no am or pm so I assume its military time and turns over at 24:00:00 but this is the kicker the question isn't is the time correct the question is this:

Is the hardware clock set to GMT?

Hmmmm I don't think so because GMT is not the same time as my local clock but it also says the system knows your time zone and converts it to the local time. Now I have to think is the time it is showing me converted? if it is I guess the clock is set to GMT, if it is showing unconverted then the answer would be No. So being totally confused and knowing that I can go back and set this thing up over IF I can find the command to do it in some manual out on the internet I am going to chose the default Yes.

Crap now it asks what part of the world I am in and i think I chose Americas but it wants a city on the next screen but all I see is mexico citys so I must have selected the wrong thing, Hmmm there is no BACK button so instead of choosing Minneapolis I chose Cancun, Hell i am going there in January anyways.

Oh wait a sec I see Chicago and above that it says Center but I don't really know if Chicago is the same time zone as Mnneapolis but it is pretty close so I choose that.

Now i set up passwords and a user

It tells me that I dont need PCMCIA and that it was installed but it's not needed. I don't know what it is so i do a google search Hmmm looks like its NIC cards about 500 of them, I guess I will remove it but I don't really know yet if my NIC card is working or not.

Now it wants me to set up PPP Hey thats a modem not my NIC eth card, what the heck...


Ahhh hell its after 2am here now I will try again Monday.

 

[metron9]

I stayed up a bit longer and tried some things out. I logged in as root and typed in apt-get install apache
I guess my eth0 is working, now Apache is installed and when I go to my web browser I type in

http://(my

ip address) I get the apache server page.

Wow, cool, hmmm got to install mysql and PHP, better go to sleep now back at it Monday night.

 

[aixmurderer]

Now don't you feel you actually achieved something and had to use your brain for a change, and felt the power of being in total control of your OS destiny?
Isn't it so much more rewarding than clicking on a Wizard icon and not having a clue what the system underneath is doing (or not doing) to your OS?

Enjoy the frustrations and achievements...no more <CTL><ALT><DEL> to try and fix problems.

Good luck!



IBM Certified Confused - MQSeries
IBM Certified Flabbergasted - AIX 5 pSeries System Administration
MS Certified Windblows Rebooter

 

[metron9]

Yes it is nice however

Today I installed mozilla using

apt-get install mozilla

Fine its installed, the document I have says:

&quot;fire up the GUI, and start Mozilla. When you install it using the above command, a menu selection for it will be automatically added under the Net submenu of the desktop menu you get when you left-click on the blank desktop.&quot;

From this link:

http://www.aboutdebian.com/packages.htm

Well I have no idea how to fire up the GUI, I don't even know if I have a GUI installed. I really need a bone here.

Another thing I dont know where it is installed, is there a command line to start it why do they just stop in mid air when they tell you how to install something.

 

[metron9]

I installed ftp using

apt-get install wu-ftpd

During install I get some instructions

Please look at /etc/wu-ftp/ftaccess and its manual page for further information on how to make /pub/incomming more secure

I have no idea how to &quot;LOOK AT&quot; or even how to read the manual, I dont iknow how to see whats in the /etc/wu-ftp/ directory as I have only a debian:~# prompt. man i need some Linux for dummies manual or something. Is this not great? I have a web server running and an ftp server running and have no idea how to set anything up on them because the info I am reading (above link) only has how to install them.

Great I know how to install packages but I have no idea how to run them unless they automatically run themselves like Apache. Still I have to set up some security on that too, and on and on it goes.

 

[metron9]

I posted this in the wrong thread so I am reposting it here.

I thought i would read lesson one at this link

http://www.linux.org/lessons/beginner/l2/lesson2f.html

it says
If you have a basic knowledge of Unix commands already, You should go to the directory /etc/apt/ and do the following (as root). (Even if you don't, you may want to try it!)

That would be great only they omited to tell me how the heck I &quot;GO TO THE DIRECTORY&quot;

Ok figured that one out its the same as the old dos command
CD for change directory

Where can a person get information that walks you through line by line how to do the most basic things like changeing directories.

Ok I thought i would try vi as the following instructions say:

Do this first:

vi sources.list

This brings up the text editor 'vi'. There are people who love this program so much, they will challenge you to a pistol duel at 20 paces if you tell them you think it's lousy. If you have zero experience with Linux or Unix, 'vi' is probably *not* the text editor for you at this point, but with a few simple strokes of the keyboard, we can do what we want for now.

Has me type some things and then just lets me hang! I have a page with ~ characters in the first character of each row, no menu no help nothing just an editor that lots of people love and I already hate because I dont have a clue how to get out of it. I try the ESC key I try alt Q it says Q is not a vi command. Ok its google to the resque and its 9:00 PM, I want to see whats in the readme file in a directory I am in I should have typed vi filename I guess but still I have no clue to even one vi command here.

Well Q is a command however you have to type a colon first to quit vi you type the following

:q!

That quits without saveing a list of commands are here:

http://search.netscape.com/ns/boomf...=http://www.cs.colostate.edu/helpdocs/vi.html

So I am able to exit but i type vi readme and I get a blank page. I know from somewhere in the back of my head that unix treats upper and lower case letters as unique so I try using capital letters like this:

vi README

And it works, great that only took 20 minutes to figure out how to open a readme file.
windows you just double click it and in dos you can use any word processor but I doubt very much if you could even find a dos program word processor that did not have some kind of menu, who but a unix editor that has been around for a zillion years would put someone in a blank page with absolutly no menu commands at all. This is where the fun in unix is I am starting to get the picture now it's a game of CLUE. I always hated that game too.


Ok I have decided to just write a book on this experiance using HTTP pages. I will post a link to the document here when I get things set up on my server because from the looks of it it's going to take alot of bytes and I dont think the tek-tips admin would go for that.

 

[flugh]

For a less demanding method of reading text files, try 'less'. Pretty much just up and down arrows, page-up, page-down, 'q' to quit.

As for man pages, try 'man ftaccess'. Also, 'man man' would be a good read to get an overview of the manpage system.

Here's a decent link to some practical Linux use:

http://www.ibiblio.org/gferg/ldp/practical_linux_guide/

You will probably appreciate this section:

http://www.ibiblio.org/gferg/ldp/practical_linux_guide/x360.html

Hope that helps!

----
JBR

 

[LGTObug]

I would suggest to use GENTOO. It also has an Portagetree like (OpenBSD, NetBSD....)

It is very similiar to install and the Howto's are fine. You also could check

http://www.gentoo.org

for Docu's and so on or forums.gentoo.org where you will find everything when having troubles.

Gentoo is more for advanced users, cause you got to compile everything yourself. I also started on year ago as Beginner with Gentoo and Windows Dualboot. After two month's i've deleted the Windows partition and made my hole system with linux.

I love it.

I think my laptop chrashed the last time in March when there was Windows on it. *gg*

 

[jrjuiliano]

I love Gentoo as well. I have it as my Samba server and as my &quot;toolkit&quot; for my laptop.

HOWEVER, if Debian gives you headaches then Gentoo will as well. The good thing about Gentoo is the documentation (on most things), and the GREAT thing is the user community on forums.gentoo.org.

If you are really starting out, trying to learn Linux and just see what everything looks like, I would consider something more like Mandrake and/or Red Hat. Basically because the installers are a lot more newbie friendly and faster than a two or three day Gentoo install-fest.

Then, once you get used to using the command line, viewing files, starting and stopping services and daemons, getting KDE, Gnome, XFCE, whatever up and running, I would suggest Gentoo...

I admire that you're going for something a little &quot;off the cuff&quot; to a person new to Linux, but really you shouldn't give up on this. Linux (Debian, Gentoo, et. al.) are extremely useful and fun, as long as you don't mind the learning curve.

Hope that helps.

J.R.

 

[asm1]

Well that was an excellent read, I laughed all the way through. It felt really good to know that somebody has had to struggle through the same “learning curve” that I have gone through.

When I first started out on Linux I thought that there must be some magical knowledge that Linux uses were born with or there was a secret webpage which nobody would divulge and its whereabouts more guarded than the Crown Jewels. The man pages and how tos’ seemed to be wrote for a Linux doctor and not the intended audience. I have a bos in com science and love to programme but that counts for nothing when beginning to use Linux.

I do admire you for getting Debian installed, I actually gave up because I didn’t have a clue which numbers to pick for the different partitions and eventually settled for Redhat.

All that being said I do LOVE my Linux box, I think it’s the control that I have, no it’s more than that but I cannot just put my finger on it. It took me ages to close the man pages after reading (but not understanding) them as there is no mention of how to close the window or dos screen or whatever it is but its free so we cannot expect it to be the perfect operating system.

I agree with what you are saying fully, if Linux wants to attract people from the other-side it has to vastly improve its experience for the novice and guru alike.

I Look forward to the finished book and I will set a weekend aside for it, happy hacking and bashing.

T