arthur

for those who want to install packages manually here are the ones that I THINK are needed (the mandrake wizard installed these packages automatically for me) pppoa or pppoatm pppd speedtouch-1.2 ppp iptables and these should have their corresponding dependencies, but those should be taken care of by RPMdrake or urpmi.

on the contrary, I have used the speedtouch USB on Mandrake 10 CE with no problem. I am sorry to have missed this thread as I was busy recently, but if anyone PMs me the details of his/her problem I'll do my best to help. My setup: kernel 2.6.3-7mdk VIA USB controller (this is probably irrelevant) and the "green frog"/stingray Alcatel speedtouch USB :) other versions still use the same firmware, i believe. there's no nice GUI frontend for this thing unfortunately, I only recommend this to those who are not afraid of command-line. modprobe.conf (RELEVANT LINES ONLY, you will have additional lines) alias tty-ldisc-3 ppp_async alias ppp-compress-26 ppp_deflate alias tty-ldisc-13 n_hdlc alias ppp-compress-21 bsd_comp alias speedtch off alias ppp-compress-24 ppp_deflate alias tty-ldisc-14 ppp_synctty alias char-major-108-* ppp_generic /etc/ppp/options: lock noipdefault persist noauth usepeerdns defaultroute /etc/ppp/pap-secrets # Secrets for authentication using PAP # client server secret IP addresses 'username' * 'password' * /etc/ppp/peers/adsl noauth noipdefault #these are MY vpi and vci numbers, use your own ISP's numbers =) pty "/usr/sbin/pppoa3 -e 1 -c -vpi 0 -vci 100" sync noaccomp kdebug 1 nopcomp noccp novj holdoff 4 maxfail 25 persist usepeerdns defaultroute user "username" Mandrake Firewall: DISABLED Merely installing the speedtouch rpm and running the internet wizard gives me all of these configuration files, I did not write them from scratch. I just edited them for the VPI and VCI numbers. Just select "skip" when asked for the firmware, and "do not start connection at boot", and don't bother attempting to connect right away. Now, to connect, I run this script(as root), which is the same as typing these commands one by one(except fot the first line): #!/bin/bash modem_run -m -f /path/to/alcaudsl.sys pppd call adsl sleep 4 ifconfig iptables -A INPUT -i ppp0 -p tcp --syn -j DROP now be sure to change /path/to/alcaudsl.sys appropriately. the 5th line should print out the ifconfig, if there's a ppp0, then you're connected. The last line is my firewall. Rather rudimentary, but it suits me fine for now. I'll try to improve the script when I have the time, for SSH and stuff. Suggestions for other improvements are welcome. ps. you can start the connection at boot by running this script at boot, using .xinitrc or that nice gnome starter or something. there are many choices so I guess I'll just write a HOWTO for only one method. HTH, arthur

well, you can try to find distros with precompiled packages for your programs...or try installing them without checkinstall. "make", the gcc compiler should be present in all linux distros. gentoo is great, but only if you have a fast computer and connection. Emerge is a little bit like checkinstall :)

SATA is much easier to connect up than those old IDE ribbon cables, but in terms of speed/performance, not much. SATA is just put on top, it's actually an ATA100/133 IDE drive at heart. But from years of mucking with those cursed ribbon cables, SATA is a welcome sight. :D It should work with linux no problem.

for some reason kernel 2.6 and KDE 3.2 are only advertised on Professional...I'm not sure, but anyway let us know how it goes.

Just a question to any 10.0 OE user: are the bugs gone? like that mouse pointer bug in RPMDrake? Updating CE fixed a few bugs namely the KDE PIM crashes...now, is CE frozen to OE or will it become like cooker, moving on and staying unstable? This is Mandrake's big chance to bite off a big chunk of M$ users, I hope they do it right. Great article btw

uh, sorry for a stupid question, but what's all the "sleep" for? I mean, that will make the startup bloody slow, won't it? or just give the apps some time to do...stuff? Edit: I should take more than 2 seconds to look at that script...so I'm guessing the sleep will dictate the startup order, right? Anyway don't mind this post...:woops:

gnome has nautilus-cd-burner, so it *should* have gnome dependencies. but I don't know anything devoid of DE dependencies, at least the GUI burner progs...Nero can run under wine though

thanks gowator, I'll look that up. My Knoppix is now mainly a rescue disk... ;) I'll get PCLinuxOS too, but that means several hours less sleep

argh, by August 29 I could be overseas again(either back to Singapore or to the UK), so I just wish that group all the luck. Unfortunately gmac software piracy is the norm over there except in rare cases, and people don't care about the legal issues very much. So I guess my argument for linux is not the legality, but the price, and its features as a more powerful operating system. Some of my classmates have already been wowed by the cool screenshots. :D I'm bringing over OO.o and the GIMP 2.0 for windows too. Debian unstable is downloading at 30kb/s...it's going to be a long day. :(

by the way, I'll be staying there for only 2/3 months, so it's a narrow window of opportunity for me to be able to help those guys on setting linux up properly. so if you're going to send at all, please don't take too long. thanks

In a few weeks' time I'll be going home to the Philippines. I have plans to promote linux heavily there. Broadband is very rare there, but I have a CD burner and plenty of blank CDs. Most of my classmates are only dial-up, so distros like Gentoo are not really advisable. :( I myself will have to stick with dial-up I'm currently downloading (through ADSL) Debian Unstable, Slackware 9.1 and Fedora Core 1, but it's taking forever ( >10 CDs) and I don't have that much time. I already have MDK 9.2 and 10CE. I plan to finish as many CDs as I can but I'd appreciate some If you're feeling generous and happen to just have a few extra CDs of good distros around, I would be very grateful if you mail them to me @ 2C Freedom Lane Interville 2 Homes, Culiat, Quezon City, Philippines 1128. My address right now is Blk. 121 Bukit Batok Central, #13-445 Singapore 650121 but I'll be staying only a few weeks, so use the Phil. address unless you're very near here. I don't desperately need this, but you can save me a few hours of sleep. If you don't want to, then just send me a postcard. B) thanks all

grub is more advanced than lilo. i think you could configure a splash screen in grub.conf, using the splashimage="file.bz2" option. I'm not so sure about the nice menu though. You can try the gentoo handbook on grub http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook this has been useless if you really want lilo, go to MCC > boot instead.

no, I didn't mean to install them separately. just put them in a folder, add that folder into Media manager, then urpmi the kernel. then don't forget to run lilo(type lilo as root in terminal, of course). If the new kernel doesn't appear there, edit /etc/lilo.conf and point it in the right direction. the kernel image should be in /boot/

kernel 2.6.3 has about 5 dependencies. kmc77, you can try downloading them manually and putting them in a local folder, then adding that folder to Media Manager. Or just the kernel rpm, and hopefully urpmi will find the deps on the mirrors. I'm experimenting with other distros right now until mandrake mirrors are fully up.

/etc/gowator.conf #the -v option sets the verbosity level post -v 100 EOF :D

I switched to the 2.6 kernel because of improved ACPI support, all my USB devices worked in 2.4 anyway - but you can upgrade the kernel just by using two lines(be sure to have the mirrors set up): urpmi kernel-2.6.3 lilo -v then reboot into your new kernel. If it doesn't work, reboot into your old kernel. You can't go wrong! I think... :o

I'm a bit lost here, but why did you install the iptables-ipv6? just do a normal iptables install... Iptables might have been activated as a service, go to MCC>system and look at services to disable/enable iptables. Does dialing give any error messages?

can you connect to the internet? then there's no problem. type "ifconfig" as root to see the interface. For all we know, it might be ppp1 or something. If you want to have a meter/timer for your connection, gkrellm is a good app.

yep, try putting it to "no firewall" for a while, you can't set it to ppp via the GUI, you have to edit the shorewall config files. in the meantime under terminal, once connected, type iptables -A INPUT -i ppp0 -p tcp --syn -j DROP to set up a basic firewall, assuming you have iptables installed.

bvc: yes, supermount still is in 2.6. but I don't have a floppy drive anyways :D

No, modules are loaded by /etc/modprobe.preload. It's simple really, just put a line for each module, like this: evdev acpi whatever And that's it! by the way, modules.conf is not being used at all on my machine, and any changes I make to it are ignored. Totally useless. It's been deprecated, I'm using Mandrake 10.

noresume2 is only for software suspend 2. to exit the Mandrake setup as cannonfodder explained, just hit ctrl-alt-backspace, then reboot. I haven't tried it but alt-sysrq-b should also work.

No. The pre-compiled mandrake kernels are perfectly fine for your purpose. Kernel compiles are only for people obsessed with performance/customizability ;) er...me :wacko: that's why I posted that info...a compile will teach you a lot about linux Here's the easier way: http://www.MandrakeUsers.org/index.php?sho...indpost&p=87215 btw, 9.2 still uses supermount, but 10.0 doesn't, so pick a kernel that has supermount - 2.6.3-3mdk, unless later versions still have supermount, I haven't checked.

I started playing around with my parent's computers when I was 8 or 9. I loved the bright colors of the BIOS, which of course was screaming warnings I didn't heed. :lol: By the time I was 11 I could load the CDROM driver into DOS by editing config.sys and autoexec.bat using any drive letter I wanted. I could even specify memory addresses for the TSRs. :D By the time Win 95 came about it was a piece of cake. 'Aint that hard you know. There's even an essay on why CLI can be newbie friendly, here: http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=6282 ps. sorry about all that bragging :P