Fun with Knoppix, or: Linux is hard

RThurmont · Post by **RThurmont** » 2007-01-28 04:46pm

Well, I've joined the legions of casual Linux users. I'm too much of a n00bish pussy to make the switch completely, so until I can get my wireless going, I'm dualbooting XP Pro and Kubuntu Edgy Eft.

I'm surprised I managed to do this without something breaking catastrophically. This morning I barely knew partitioning and formatting were two different things...

Pleasant surprise: while Kubunu didn't autoconfigure my printer, it did properly identify it and installing the drivers was a matter of clicking through three screens.

Congratulations. Kubuntu is a great system (though if I were you I'd also download Ubuntu and Xubuntu, as it can be pleasant to occasionally change GUIs, oh also, full disclosure, Kubuntu is one of two FOSS projects that I'm involved with). A lot of people are really terrified of the process of installing linux, and of hardware not being detected properly, and while the latter remains a risk, Linux installation is getting easier and easier, and hardware detection is improving. I think that in 2007, were going to see a snowball effect in which many of the remaining desktop annoyances are dealt with.

EDIT: I also wanted to say there is nothing n00bish about continuing to use XP, since XP does have a vastly superior library of commercial apps compared to any other operating system. I would argue that it would be dumb not to, in fact.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-01-29 03:45am

EDIT: I also wanted to say there is nothing n00bish about continuing to use XP, since XP does have a vastly superior library of commercial apps compared to any other operating system. I would argue that it would be dumb not to, in fact.

My original plan was to put XP on one partition using a slipstreamed CD, Linux on another and use the rest of the hard drive as a data partition. Instead I took the easy route, resized my existing NTFS partition and installed Kubuntu behind it. Not very elegant.

RThurmont · Post by **RThurmont** » 2007-01-29 03:53am

Still, its fully workable. If you have fast enough hardware, the most elegant approach would be to use VMWare to run Windows XP, but then, you would naturally get a performance hit, so I wouldn't attempt that unless you have a really high performance system.

I would keep a CD with Mandriva One on it around though, for use in the event that you b0rk something... Mandriva's partitioning tools are the best I've seen.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2007-01-29 09:25am

VMWare is actually quite fast - the main issue isn't really CPU power but RAM and HD I/O (anything that writes to the HD is really, really slow unless you give each VMWare image it's own HD)

RThurmont · Post by **RThurmont** » 2007-01-29 10:04am

Interesting. Would I get a performance boost if I put a VMWare image on an external USB HD?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2007-01-29 10:10am

RThurmont wrote:Interesting. Would I get a performance boost if I put a VMWare image on an external USB HD?

Maybe. There's an automatic performance hit, though, with USB (and latency penalty) and things will never be entirely speedy since it can't natively write to disk without going through the OS' I/O. Preallocating your images will also boost your performance.

RThurmont · Post by **RThurmont** » 2007-01-29 10:33am

I do preallocate, and I normally run VMWare on a workstation with 2 GB of RAM, which results in much better performance than on my systems with less RAM. However, I'm always interested in figuring out ways of making it run faster, as I see it as an essential tool for avoiding OS entrapment.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-01-29 11:05am

You are so not gonna fucking believe this

I am posting this from Kubuntu. How did I do this? Did I get my PCMCIA card working? Did I buy a new, more Linux-friendly adaptor?

No. I cannibalised my Nintendo USB Connector (!!!). That's right, it never worked right as a DS->Wifi connector, the very thing it was designed for, but for some reason it works just jolly as a general wireless access...thingamajig. All it took was a little tweaking of the driver's INF file.

I am *so* hyped right now. I know this sort of system setup is nothing special to anyone who's a proper computer techie but for me, it's a massive egoboost to see something juryrigged actually work

ETA: Firefox is now installed, Adept is doing updates.

RThurmont · Post by **RThurmont** » 2007-01-29 11:48am

Doesn't FireFox get installed automatically with Kubuntu?

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-01-29 11:54am

RThurmont wrote:Doesn't FireFox get installed automatically with Kubuntu?

If it was, Adept couldn't find it. The only installed browser as far as I could see was Konqueror.

Spyder · Post by **Spyder** » 2007-01-29 02:24pm

RThurmont wrote:Congratulations. Kubuntu is a great system (though if I were you I'd also download Ubuntu and Xubuntu, as it can be pleasant to occasionally change GUIs, oh also, full disclosure, Kubuntu is one of two FOSS projects that I'm involved with). A lot of people are really terrified of the process of installing linux, and of hardware not being detected properly, and while the latter remains a risk, Linux installation is getting easier and easier, and hardware detection is improving. I think that in 2007, were going to see a snowball effect in which many of the remaining desktop annoyances are dealt with.

I actually find the hardware detection is actually better. XP still has problems picking up my network interface and sound card on a fresh install. Ubuntu doesn't have a problem with either of those. The only thing that throws up the odd hitch are nvidia graphics drivers, but even that process is getting easier.

I think he work the Ubuntu team's been putting in is going to pay off in the long run for the whole Linux community. It's refreshing to see Linux people not being complete zealots about their system and actually taking great strides at making it usable.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-01-29 02:26pm

Question: what exactly does ctrl-alt-esc do, except the cool skull&bones cursor?

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2007-01-29 02:37pm

Bounty wrote:Question: what exactly does ctrl-alt-esc do, except the cool skull&bones cursor?

Brings up the system taskbar for me.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-01-29 04:06pm

Appears to kill whatever app you click with it for me...odd.

Oh, Amarok rocks. It scanned my 10gig library in seconds, imported art, recognized Marvin (iPod) immediately and the playlist creation is flawless. I love this thing.

...I do miss the "safely remove hardware" icon. How's that done in Linux?

ETA: never mind, it's on the desktop

Dave · Post by **Dave** » 2007-01-29 06:07pm

RThurmont wrote:Doesn't FireFox get installed automatically with Kubuntu?

IIRC, Not in Dapper Drake or Edgy Eft. Getting it wasn't a prob, but I think it should have just been in there.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2007-01-29 07:29pm

Destructionator XIII wrote:I think it stems back to Debian's and GNU's dislike of proprietary rights and related policies. They have an issue with the licensing on the trademark of Mozilla® Firefox® and the Firefox logo, so they try to keep away from them.

Well, the standard Ubuntu uses Firefox, so maybe it's just a KDE thing where the devs feel Konqueror is sufficient?

RThurmont · Post by **RThurmont** » 2007-01-29 09:17pm

Definitely possible. That might also have a simplicity advantage: Konqueror can do basically everything, like Internet Explorer on Windows. They might see it as your hub of activity and don't want to weigh the newbies down with choices they don't care about, which I would argue is good design. There isn't much that Firefox can do that Konqueror can't, and since it also shares memory with the rest of the KDE applications, it often gives better performance.

If all browsers were equal, I would agree with you. However, there are some websites that you can't access (or get to work right) in browsers other than Firefox or Explorer. Thus, Firefox can be extremely useful as a "back up browser." I keep it installed on all of my computers for this purpose, although I avoid using it unless I absolutely need it (I've never liked it that much).

Also, Debian already negated the Firefox branding issue by forking it and rebranding their fork as Iceweasel. Stupid name, but what the heck...

Finally, Firefox has a lot more brand appeal than Konqueror, and in my opinion, including it in a distro is good PR, as it has a reassuring effect on prospective users that yes, they actually will be able to use mainstream applications. My ideal distro would also come preloaded with Opera...

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-01-30 07:37am

Finally, Firefox has a lot more brand appeal than Konqueror, and in my opinion, including it in a distro is good PR, as it has a reassuring effect on prospective users that yes, they actually will be able to use mainstream applications.

I can see why they'd stick with Konqueror even without the trademark issues. A clean Kubuntu install has a single program per task - one IM client, one mail application, one media player (Kaffeine is video, not audio, right?). Adding another program that takes up disk space while doing exactly the same function - render HTML - seems superfluous in that "make it lean" philosophy.

I can see where you're coming from in terms of immediate recognition of a mainstream application, though. It's reassuring to see and use a program that you're familiar with amidst all that K-branded tomfoolery.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-02-06 01:13pm

Sorry for the resurrection but since this is part of my general Linux woes:

I now have Windows on my first partition, then data on the second, Linux swap and then Kubuntu with GRUB to choose which one to boot. Now I want to format the first partition and install a bare-bones version of XP, but if I understood correctly this will wipe the Master Boot Record and GRUB with it, right?

I already have a bootable floppy with GRUB which works (tested it just now, I can get into Kubuntu from it). The plan now is to pop in the XP disc, format C: (the current Windows partition), install XP, then reinstall GRUB (maybe using this - looks foolproof enough).

The whole Windows partition is backed up; all I'm worried about is not getting GRUB working again. Did I miss anything or can I go ahead?

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-02-06 03:36pm

Posting from XP now. I've still got to set up Firefox, but at least I'm back to 1024x768 and wireless is up and running.

GRUB, by the way, is borked. Well, I knew it would be, but the floppy says it can't mount the partition so for the moment I'm locked out of Linux save for the LiveCD. To the Troubleshoot cave, OSman!

ETA: shit. Windows activation. I knew I'd forgotten something. Still, I should be able to find my key in the next month.