Re: How Do I Start the Debian GUI
Richard Blake wrote:
Hello,
In a Newbie to Debian... and for maybe... 4 hours I thought
Debian was a text based OS. I recently ordered Debian for my I686
System... and I went through the installation.. 4 or 5 times I kinda
lost count... I thought I was doing it wrong... and there is a great
possiblity that I am. Im stumped at the Login part... after
installation... I only used the bootable Disc... and yet there are
7!.. whats going? and how do I get to the Desktop of Debian.. what do
I have to do.... PLEASE TELL ME. please reply promply :(
Recent versions of MS-Windows is strictly GUI-oriented. GNU/Linux, on
the other hand, is text-based, with applications that can run on top of
the text-based system, including a GUI. This is more similar to the
older versions of Windows, which ran on top of DOS (but GNU/Linux is
_far_ more powerful than DOS).
So now, how to get the GUI (X11 Windowing System) working for you.
If you have newer hardware, you may benefit from upgrading to testing or
unstable, but I'd hold off on that for now (assuming you're running
stable currently).
Start by installing the basic X packages; you can do this in a couple of
ways:
1]
apt-get install xserver-xfree86 xserver-common xbase-clients xfonts-base
xfonts-scalable xfonts-75dpi xfonts-100dpi
2]
Run "tasksel" and select to install the desktop windowing environment
(or whatever it's labeled).
After the basic X stuff is installed, you can run it with the command
"startx". Don't be surprised if X fails to start; if it does, look at
/var/log/XFree86.log for details about what may have gone wrong.
If you want X to start automatically on boot-up instead of starting it
manually with "startx", you can install kdm, gdm, xdm, or wdm, but I
suggest you hold off on that until X works properly.
--
Kent
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