RE: Initial trouble with X
> I tried to get the packages but there was huge dependencies problems
> (notably shell-utils 'conflicts' with login, and also
> pre-depends on 'login' or 'hurd'... that made me do several mistakes
> - the removal of basic packages that rendered my system useless...
> and I did a fresh install, since I knew more this time and could
> avoid several errors).
>
For what it's worth I saw this problem, too. I just overrode the
shellutils conflict and installed it. I think the problem is that
Hurd "provides login", which still gets treated as a conflict. This
was the shellutils in the ftp.debian.org archive.
> Also, when I put the ftp.de.debian.org line in sources.list
> (unstable main) it reports a huge amount of packages... that
> prolly belong to Linux woody... but if I specify binary-hurd-i386
> apt tries to open ...debian/dists/unstable/main/
> binary-hurd-i386/binary-hurd-i386 ... Is that amount of packages
> (that include gnome, kde, netscape, Linux kernel,
> etc...) normal? If not how do I get it to work?
>
I think they are normal. Some of the packages show up as binary-all
because they are either sources (like the linux kernel packages),
or are not binaries in the true sense (like various system utilities
written in Perl).
Before updating you should probably install the dpkg found at
alpha.gnu.org (1.6.999). It works flawlessly and you can trust its
package handling.
> The solution was to comment out ftp.de.debian.org (after upgrading
> everything, the hurd to the correct new version) and make do with
> alpha.gnu.org... then I saw all the new X packages and
> installed them (I pretty much installed them all, except for
> Xservers, only installed mine).
>
Good.
> I had the following problems:
>
> Making the mouse translator (settrans /dev/mouse etc) it says
> /dev/mouse, file not found; I tried to do a MAKEDEV mouse but
> it gave me an error (MAKEDEV kbd worked); reading the Japanese
> page (Yasushi's one) I saw that with a serial mouse '/dev/mouse
> not needed'... is the error to be expected? If not, what must
> I recompile?
>
Note that MAKEDEV on the Hurd is just a script that calls
settrans with the right options. If you try to settrans and you
get a "file not found", just do a "mkdir /dev/mouse" first,
then settrans the mouse. This should probably be done automatically
in the upcoming Hurd *.deb packages.
> Anyway, the real trouble came later: I set up my XF86Config
> file, did a startx and receives an error message saying something like
> 'xauth: libXmu.so.6 not found'
>
> (about 8 lines of the same error)
>
> I will look in the Packages to see in which one is LibXmu
> installed.... but since I installed just about every one I wonder...
>
I had this problem, too. It's because I forgot that the Hurd does
not use ld.so.conf like Linux does. We must include the X11R6
directories in the LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable.
Do the following:
1. In your ~/.bashrc add a line like:
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/X11R6/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
2. Exit and log back in.
This will add X's libraries to your shell's library search path.
All will work properly afterward.
> Oh, and I sometimes get a 'default pager error: dumping
> blablabla', that keeps appearing in my screen (like a $yes)
> and I have to reboot the system, sometimes with the reset button)
>
Yes. There are still some memory leaks/paging problems. Just
increase your swap partition size (or create a large swapfile).
Things may seem bad now, but you should have tried the hurd a
year ago ;-)
Good luck,
-Brent
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