Re: your mail
On Sat, Dec 04, 1999 at 11:33:24AM -0700, Ray Woodcock wrote
> Making a little progress here. Many thanks to John Pearson for the most
> recent increment.
>
> Next:
>
> 1. Not sure whether my installation completed. I was looking at someone's
> comments about editing a file in /usr/src/linux, so I tried to go there. But
> I don?t seem to have any such directory. Here?s what I get at the command
> prompt:
>
> debian:/usr/src# dir
> debian:/usr/src#
>
> In other words, there seems to be nothing in there. Is this normal? Also,
> when I type ?man? at the prompt, I get ?command not found.? In general terms,
> is there a diagnostic that verifies I got the whole enchilada installed?
>
If you haven't run dselect yet, then that's normal. The base
system is very small - really just big enough to install what you
need, and deal with any problems that arise in the process.
/usr/src/linux is where the Linux source normally goes, if you
choose to install and unpack it. Until you compile a new kernel
(not that hard, and use kernel-package if you do) it's not
necessary (and would cost you 30-60 MB of disc space, depending
on the version).
> 2. I am making spiritual preparations for the long trek through dselect, in
> the hope that if I strictly control what files get installed, I can avoid
> Microsoft-style bloat. Am I correct in thinking that dselect is structured in
> such a way as to support this fond hope?
Yes, but it's a two-edged sword: you get to choose, with a high
degree of granularity, what goes onto your system. From a list
of about 2500 packages. The big plus is that when you choose a
package, dselect will make sure that you also choose any other
packages that it requires.
When you enter dselect's "Select" menu item read the first screen
carefully, and learn how to get keyboard help; use that to find
out how to scroll through the package list, how to cycle through
the different information displays, and how to cycle through the
sort options. Then practice each one and see what they do.
Don't be alarmed if the sort options don't seem to have much
rhyme or reason to them; they do, but it's not obvious.
> Will I bloat if I instead use a
> profile? Is there a way to invoke the profiler outside of the installation
> sequence? (It didn?t arise during installation, for some reason.)
>
Maybe you have non-standard CD-ROMs. Unfortunately there is no
way of repeating that step - it's built into the installer.
Still, there's nothing magical about the profiles; they are just
lists of packages.
> 3. Is there a good source of reviews on Linux software: (a) Am I correct in
> surmising that I must choose from among more than several Linux windowing/GUI
> schemes? (b) Point-by-point objective comparisons of versions of Emacs? (c)
> High-quality discussions of various utilities, office suites, etc.?
>
Selecting & configuring GUIS comes in several stages
Step 1 - No GUI, just a bunch of virtual terminals. The default.
Step 2 - Install & configure X and one or more window managers.
You need to select an X server (which live in packages
with names like xserver-*) suitable for your graphics
card (xserver-svga covers a breathtakingly broad
selection of common, cheap video cards), some fonts
(e.g. xfonts-base, xfonts-75dpi, xfonts-scalable),
some clients (xbase-clients contains many important
utilities, xterm is useful to have around), xf86config
(text-based configuration program for X) and a window
manager or three (may I recommend WindowMaker (wmaker)
and wmakerconf, and icewm and icepref, on account of
the nice configuration tools). Once X is configured
and working you can use startx to start an X session
from a virtual terminal, or you can install xdm or
(prettier) wdm for a graphical login screen if you
want to avoid text mode entirely. Look at
/usr/doc/xfree86-common/examples/xsession for a
verbose and detailed example of how to set up your
personal X environment how you like.
Step 3 - Point apt at one of the semi-official GNOME package archives,
and install GNOME. This assumes, of course, that you
have over about 32Mb of physical RAM. Replace the
lovingly-crafted .xsession file you created above with
one that just does 'exec gnome-session'.
Note that step 3 involves using software that many regard as
bloated and slow and is admitted to be buggy, but it does look
nice to many people.
If you're looking for an office suite there is a rough but
improving free one (abisuite), a large, slowish, fair-to-good
zero-cost one (staroffice), and a somewhat smaller, somewhat
faster, cheapish one (Applix, $49-$99 depending on what currency
you use). I use Applix because it was easier than downloading
StarOffice, and I'm happy with my choice.
There is also WordPerfect for Linux (free for personal use) and
some prospect of CorelOffice sometime soonish; Gnumeric is an
increasingly-capable free spreadsheet; and there are many less
guified tools that have been around for years.
> 4. Am I roughly correct in thinking that, after the installation is done, the
> next thing is to install the windowing/GUI software, and then after that it?s
> a free-for-all in which I will just install as many pieces of application
> software as I can stomach? Along those lines, can I rest my faith in Emacs as
> my do-all Swiss Army knife, or should I be expecting to install eight trillion
> utilities and gizmos?
That's a matter of personal taste; some people claim to live
their entire computing lives inside Emacs, but unless you already
know it you may find it a little austere and cryptic (at least
initially). I use mutt for mail, slrn for news, joe for editing
and Navigator for browsing; I could use Emacs or XEmacs for all
of this (and more), but I don't.
As for installing eight trillion utilities and gizmos, that's
just part of the illustrious heritage of Unix: lots of small
utilities that each do a simple task well, designed to connect
together into amazing or grotesque pipelines - sort of like a
computing meccano set. Look in /usr/bin some time - even if you
never use these programs yourself, the system scripts use many of
them to keep your system running.
Good luck,
John P.
--
huiac@camtech.net.au
john@huiac.apana.org.au
"Oh - I - you know - my job is to fear everything." - Bill Gates in Denmark
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