New installation test
Greetings!
First, thanks for all your hard work. As a debian user, I
appreciate it.
I'm currently running slink and woody on two different computers,
so I'm familiar with the debian system. But for this test I
decided to pretend I was a newby and try a new installation on an
empty disk. The results are as follows:
1) downloaded the required 1.44 floppy images for a i386 as
directed by the installation instructions at para 5.4 - (the 7
june version) (16 images for a total of 23MB....wow!) I seem to
remember it was only nine the last time I did this. The only
possible problem I saw was that a newby may have a hard time
selecting the correct images. If close attention was paid when
reading para 5.2 they'll have no problem; but since it's all new
to them, there'll be some that choose the wrong images. A short
statement at 5.4.2 would help a lot. Something like: "NOTE: See
para 5.2 for definitions of idepci,compac, udma and safe" would
make a newby's life a little easier.
2) created the disks via the directions for using dd. It went
fine.
3) built the base system using the floppies. The only problem I
had was an inability to install the lp module. Soooo.. I started
all over (from the rescue disk on), and had the same problem . I
could not load the Parallel Printer Support module "lp". I tried
both accepting the default and entering an address and IRQ on the
command line. It would not load. The rest of the base install
went fine.
4) Created a boot disk rather than lilo since this was on
/dev/hdd. It worked.
5) rebooted and chose to load the rest of the system via apt
http. The process went very well, but it probably would have been
better if I had had the choice of not loading the source package
list. Most users don't need it and it used some precious
connection time.
I chose the simple method and the selection process went as well
as expected - newby's will always be lost here.
After making my selections and starting the installation I
realized that I couldn't download all 120MB at one setting.
Unless you have a extremely fast connection it's almost a
certainty that you'll stop the process prior to downloading all
the packages. It took me six download periods over several days
before I was done. Luckily I was familiar with debian and knew to
use dselect after my first disconnection. I'm afraid that a newby
would be totally lost. Perhaps a few words of advice on what to
do if the process cannot be completed at one session would help.
The system is now up and running, but I've had two other bugs so
far.
1) during the setup of gpm, I allowed it to attempt to identify
my mouse - big mistake. It totally hung the computer. It
shouldn't have been hard to find since it's a microsoft protocol
on ttyS0. A reboot was my only option. Not sure how well a newby
would have survived.
2) during the setup of the screensaver using the gnome control
center. I selected '3D o'clock' and it froze the gui. My only
option was <ctrl><alt><backspace>. I've tried several times since
and each time it hangs. Even worse, It's stuck in the '3D
o'clock' selection. I'll continue troubleshooting.
I hope some of this helps
John
--
Powered by the Penguin
--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-testing-request@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster@lists.debian.org
Reply to: