Re: Stupid Questions
Hi Edward,
On Wed, 13 Oct 1999, Edward S. Baiz Jr. wrote:
> I have a some stupid questions to ask. I want to start compiling and
> was wondering just which program I need.
The c-compiler is called gcc (= GNU c-compiler), but can be started with
cc as well.
> Would I go to the Debian ftp site and go into a folder called DEV and
> d/l all the files in it?
Dev usually means device and is a folder in the root directory. Do you
mean devel? It is better to write the complete path.
> What are the extensions of the files I would want to compile?
All Debian archives are *.deb, but compilable things usually have src or
similar in the name. What do you want to compile? Do you want to make your
own kernel or are you interested in soft which is not available for
Debian? If you are looking for source codes which are distribution
independend, they are usually packaged as *.tar archives. They have to be
"untarred" and might contain a Makefile. In this case compilation is
started with make. In the Makefile make finds the commands how to use gcc.
Are you sure you want to compile things and not simply unpack and install
additional binaries?
> Also, if I am in Linux, how can I tell the difference between an
> executable file and a folder?
If you list the files with ls -l, they show the accession bits and
additional information like d for directory. Do you have the manpages
already installed? With apropos "searchword" you find commands having
something to do with this item and with man "command" a help- and
infotext is displayed saying things about syntax of the command etc.
E.g. with man tar you find out, how to unpack *.tar archives.
> Right now Linux comes in Mono. How do I get it to come in color and how
> can I change the color mode to 24-bits. Right now I boot up in 256
> colors.
I cannot tell you how to change to colour, my TTM 194 would not care about
that kind of settings, but I know that colour can give you information
about the kind of beast you are confronted with. It can show different
colours depending in whether this is a directory, a datafile, an
executable or a device without a ls -l command.
Regards,
Kerstin
--
kerstin.hoef-emden@uni-koeln.de
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