Mandriva 2007 install by newbie [solved]

[r.singh]

I used Mandrake linux 9.1 for a few days to get a feel for Linux. It could not fulfill all my needs, but it was stable and reliable. Encouraged by this I obtained Mandriva 2007, free, disks and installed. For the first 30 minutes or so, after installation everything worked well --the only major annoyance being the tiny bouncing icon that accompanied the arrow after I clicked on anything (it continues to bounce for a while even after the click has had the desired effect). I am using the KDE desktop, and I wandered through various menus trying to get rid of the bouncing icon, but failed. Instead, at some point, and I don't know how, the following happened:

 

1. The uppermost bar on every window (title bar ?) I opened was missing, so no window could be moved or resized, or clicked to close (File -->quit does work). And the default location of any open window showed only about the top 3/4 and the left 3/4 portions, i.e. the windows did not open in a central position. An exception is the Firefox browser window, which opens in the normal position, but cannot be maximised or moved.

 

2. I could not enter any text in the Firefox address bar, and the Konqueror address bar did not show.

 

3. I could open a Konsole, or an X-terminal, but no text (or other) entries were possible in either.

 

4. By right clicking on the desktop and choosing End Session, I got a login window, with a "Menu" button at the bottom. Choosing "console" from this menu did open a console window in which text entries could be made.

 

5. Having failed to solve the problem myself, I re-installed Mandriva 2007 but formatted only the / partition, thinking the system had been messed up somehow. However, at the end of the process I found that the situation had remained unchanged!!

 

6. Incidentally, I had copied the contents of the 4 CDs to the disk during the first installation, hoping that if I had to reinstall some day I would not need to use the CDs again. But I could not find any way to use the copied material (and I do not know where it is kept in the Linux system). Any comments on this?

 

Please help. I have some knowledge of Linux and vi editor commands if some expert can kindly advise me what to do. Thanks....R.Singh

[jagwah]

I had this once, don't know if I found the correct way to fix it, but if you open your home folder, and rename the .kde folder (back it up if you like first) a new one will be created, reboot and you will be back to square 1, you'll have to do all your settings again, or bring them over from the back up you made, but if you bring all your settings back, you'll most likely get the problem again.

 

This is a quick and dirty way to get your borders back, someone will most likely come along with the correct method, but if your stuck, well ....

 

I think the missing borders thing comes from messing around with themes etc, so be careful there.

 

The bouncing cursor thing (hideous, isn't it) can be disabled under 'Appearance & Themes/Launch Feedback', I can't recall exactly where it is, as I don't use Mandriva anymore, and Kubuntu is set out a bit different, but you'll find it in the start menu somewhere, Configure Your Computer or something. Or just brink up a konsole, and type

 

kcontrol

 

hit enter, and you'll find 'Appearance & Themes/Launch Feedback' easy enough. Then change the 'Busy Cursor' drop down box to 'No Busy Cursor'

Edited February 25, 2007 by jagwah

[arctic]

Renaming the /.kde folder is the best approach. The only other thing that might have caused the prob is if you enabled the 3D desktop. It works pretty well with some hardware, but not with all hardware you throw at it. Disable 3D-Desktop if you have it enabled.

[r.singh]

Thank you for the instructions, jagwah and arctic, and for your prompt response. Unfortunately, no success. I did the following, in each case as "root" and in a console window opened from the menu available in the user login window.

 

1. I found the ./kde directory and renamed it, as advised. The command I used was "rename". The command was seemingly accepted (there was no error message or "protest" from the system), but when I re-checked the directory list, I found that the name had not changed. I then tried the rename command on my username directory, instead of a serious directory like ./kde, to find, again, no effect. So, this command does not work on directories at least. If there is a different command for renaming directories, a Google search did not reveal one.

 

2. Frustrated by the above, I removed the ./kde directory altogether (after going down its tree and deleting all files). This time, it did not show up in the directory list of /, so this part at least worked.

 

3. I rebooted, to find nothing had changed!

 

4. I went to the MCC (which does work, though the window borders are missing) and updated a great deal. Rebooted. No change.

 

5. I considered re-installing, this time after formatting all the Linux partitions, but decided against this because unless I can fix the present problem with the advice of the helpful experts on this forum, I really cannot have confidence in Mandrake Linux and make it my main system. I would have to try some other distribution I suppose, or stay with Windows.

 

Please advise. Thanks. R.Singh

[arctic]

Please check if it is a global problem. Create a new user (use the MCC or run in a terminal as root "adduser") and check if the problem continues to exist there. If this is so, please take a look at the /.xsession-errors file. Maybe there is some hint at what is broken.

[AussieJohn]

You say you installed 2007. Nowhere did I see you say that you had downloaded and installed all updates.

Although it is not often seen in print, it should be the very FIRST thing you do after the install simply because the Install isos are up to 6 months or more old. Huge improvements , enhancements and fixes occur in that intervening time. Click on the easy-urpmi tab at the very top of the page and follow the directions.

 

I would strongly recommend that you do this first and then let us know the results.

 

Cheers. John

[neddie]

If you want to rename a file or a directory from the command line, do the following:

mv oldname newname

From the gui, if you can use Konqueror, just right-click on the thing and select "rename". In this case the folder called .kde is normally "hidden", so you would have to select View -> Hidden Files from the menu in order to see it.

 

The command you found, "rename", is a very powerful command but it doesn't do what you think it does. In fact it takes three parameters, not two, and can be used to bulk rename lots of files with a single command. The first parameter is a search string, the second a replace string, and the third a list of files to perform the operation on. Just stick with the "mv" command for now, it's short for "move".

 

To delete a single file from the command line, use

rm filename

(rm for remove). To delete a directory and all its contents recursively, do

rm -r directoryname

but obviously be careful with this command! To avoid the confirmation for every file, you can force the removal, using

rm -rf directoryname

but be very careful with this one!! And again, you can do the same with Konqueror with a right-click and either "Move to wastebin" or "Delete".

[r.singh]

Happily, arctic's suggestion worked! The problem was not global and the new user desktop behaved normally. Also, to my relief, I got rid of the busy cursor (small things can sometimes be bothersome) following jagwah's directions. Another good point for my confidence is that while pondering the problem it had occurred to me that it could be like a corrupted userprofile in Windows, and I had planned to try out, when I woke up this morning, exactly what arctic suggested. Perhaps I am beginning to think in Linux?!

 

Thank you for emphasizing updates, AussieJohn. In my last message (item 4) I did mention that I did a lot of updating. I used the MCC rather than easyurpmi because, being a novice, I can understand a bit better what I am doing via the MCC. Thanks also to neddie for explaining some of the commands to me. I should get a Linux handbook of commands from somewhere.

 

My thanks and regards to all of you gentlemen. I can now go ahead to learn and use Linux with renewed confidence...R.Singh

[arctic]

The MCC is just a graphical frontend for the urpmi package manager, which handles easyurpmi. The trick is the following:

Wen you go to the easyurpmi site, you can select software mirrors that you want to use. these mirrors have even more packages and also updated packages available. You could add those mirrors using the MCC and do the updating from there, but it is way faster and easier to do some copy&paste in the terminal. Once you pasted the commands in the terminal (btw: use the compressed synthesis.hdlist), urpmi will add the repositories. When it has finished, you can update the system with the MCC again or using urpmi from the command line. You decide which one you prefer.. ;)

 

Manuals:

This pdf might get you started http://homepage.powerup.com.au/~squadron/linux_manual.pdf

And here is the most detailed manual I know

http://rute.2038bug.com/index.html.gz

 

If you have more questions, just ask. :)

[r.singh]

Many thanks for the links. I have placed the linux manual on my desktop and have already used it. It is very handy.

 

I do need to ask more questions and your willingness to answer considerably lessens my embarrassment. Thank you.

 

I have spent some hours reading FAQs, Googling, and cutting and pasting, in an attempt to solve the following problem, which arose when my attempt to install my scanner failed with the message that ScannerDrake could not install the required SANE packages. I should mention that the same scanner installed readily with Mandrake Linux 9.1 a few days ago! I guess the CDs I got for Mandriva 2007, free, are imperfect?

 

Via the MCC I looked for installable SANE packages and found several. But when I tried to install them it turned out that some of them, or their dependencies, had bad signatures. Not knowing the consequences of installing such packages, I declined the option of installing them anyway. The problem then is how to get good versions of these packages. And a question here is whether it is dangerous to install packages with bad signatures?

 

I went to the Easyurpmi site and found my way to the 3 available options, i.e. to addmedia Main, Contrib or Updates. There was no option to choose a specific package of my choice. I chose Main anyway and a 30 MB download began. I cancelled this since I need just 4 or 5 packages and not a large number of others. In the forum FAQ section someone has described how he got a particular package, but I failed to adapt his method to get mine.

 

Could you please explain, explicitly, how, for example, I can get libsane1-1.0.18-7mdk2007.0 ( should there be an rpm in the name?). Also, will the downloaded version overwrite the bad one, and if not how do I get rid of the bad version (if it is sitting somewhere in my system)?

 

Many thanks and sorry to trouble you....R.Singh

[neddie]

But when I tried to install them it turned out that some of them, or their dependencies, had bad signatures. Not knowing the consequences of installing such packages, I declined the option of installing them anyway. The problem then is how to get good versions of these packages. And a question here is whether it is dangerous to install packages with bad signatures?

It depends whether the signatures were bad or just missing. Some packages for some reason don't have the signatures they should have. It's unfortunate but it shouldn't be dangerous to accept them anyway. Check the message exactly whether it's saying the signatures are bad (present but wrong) or missing.

 

I chose Main anyway and a 30 MB download began. I cancelled this since I need just 4 or 5 packages and not a large number of others.

I'm guessing this is the download of the package index, including all the lengthy descriptions etc. If this bothers you, look for the option in easy-urpmi, called "Use compressed index, much smaller than normal, with less informations". This will download a much smaller index which will be faster to download.

 

Could you please explain, explicitly, how, for example, I can get libsane1-1.0.18-7mdk2007.0

Set up your sources using easy-urpmi, then use either the command line (urpmi libsane1) or the gui (open the install software tool and search for 'libsane', select and install).

 

Also, will the downloaded version overwrite the bad one

Yes, if the "bad" one was also an rpm. If it wasn't an rpm (eg you compiled it yourself from source) then you should remove it first before installing the rpm.

[arctic]

The only thing to add is: For setting up the scanner (once you have set up easyurpmi mirrors), simply install kooka or (my fav) xsane. Urpmi/MCC will handle/resolve the dependencies automatically.

 

As said, use the compressed index for the hd.list. Sure, you might only be interested in one pacakge now, so adding the repos with its over 10 000 packages seems to be a waste of time, but sooner or later, you will or might get interested in other applications and want to check them out. Then the repos are a heaven. Also: The software mirrors have some further documentation books about linux that might also be interesting for you. ;) (they can be printed, too!)

[r.singh]

Thank you for your last 2 posts. I think the second one (post #12) arrived while I was doing what you advised in #11. So I looked for libsane via GUI (yesterday I searched SANE) and found that libsane I asked you about is already installed. Mystified, I tried to install the scanner and this time it quietly installed! I have no idea what happened. I certainly did not install any packages yesterday and several attempts at Scanner installation failed. I will now install XSane, as you advise. I will also download the compressed index and find out what it means and what to do with in future.

 

Many thanks for all your help. Slowly, the process is beginning to make sense...R.Singh

[r.singh]

arctic: I did not understand until I read your last message, #12, that essentially all installable packages that a newbie like me would be likely to install are to be found in the Main and Contrib lists. I hope I have it right now! I have downloaded the compressed lists and will try to find the documentation you mentioned. At this point my main problems seem to have been solved and the system can meet all my needs. However, if your patience still survives please answer a couple of questions about minor issues.

 

While booting up I see a message "bringing up eth0", I think, and a green OK. Then there is a pause of about 30 seconds after which there is a line "waiting for the network to be up" invariably showing a red "Failed". Thereafter the boot process goes on smoothly. I have no problem accessing the Internet. I looked at the file /etc/sysconfig/network and found an entry there about NETWORKING=yes (I think), which I deleted. I did this thinking the system was trying to bring up my local area network, and I do not have any. This made no difference to the above behaviour. Then I tried NETWORKING=no, which did have an effect: ADSL could not connect to the Internet! The question is, what is the system trying to do and why does it always fail (I suppose it is time limited)? I should mention that I did not get this pause or message with Linux 9.1.

 

An even smaller issue is that all text is fuzzier on the Linux screens compared to the Windows screens. The hardware is the same (I am dual booting) and the monitor settings are identical, so I don't know why there should be a difference and whether anything can be done about it.

 

Regards....R.Singh

[daniewicz]

Please look in /var/log/messages for a detailed error message regarding eth0 and post this.

 

Regarding the fonts, I believe you can turn off anti-aliasing from the (KDE) Control Center. I am at work now on a W2K machine so I am relying on my frequently inadequate memory...

Edited February 27, 2007 by daniewicz