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Linux Distro Noob thread of Linux noobs

K

Krelian

Member
angelfly said:
Gentoo - 4 years and counting so far. The only distro I've used longer is Slackware (which i left for Gentoo)

Arch is just a poor mans Gentoo
Click to expand...
I used to use Gentoo too, as well as Slackware. Both were my main systems for quite a long time, though I don't remember which one I used at the end of my Linux time (around 2004). Today I sometimes boot up Fedora and I'm using Ubuntu at work. Don't really have a favorite anymore. I'd like to give Gentoo another try but I don't have time to compile everything anymore.
 
C

Cheeto

Member
I've haven't had any problems just taking DSL and just grabbing what I need. I've actually gotten away from using the big desktop environments. I prefer to just use a basic window manager like fluxbox now.
 
A

angelfly

Member
Cheeto said:
I've haven't had any problems just taking DSL and just grabbing what I need. I've actually gotten away from using the big desktop environments. I prefer to just use a basic window manager like fluxbox now.
Click to expand...
Yeah, Fluxbox is great. However once I tried Awesome I quickly switched and haven't looked back.
 
B

Bananakin

Member
Does anyone else have a problem with Firefox crashing a lot in Ubuntu recently? I dual boot Windows 7 and Ubuntu, and lately I've been doing programming work, so I've been forced to use Ubuntu pretty much every day. And much to my annoyance Firefox has been incessantly crashing on me. I mean, it's not a huge deal, but it is kind of bothersome. Any suggestions on what might be causing it or how to fix it?

And please, don't say "Get Chrome." I'll do that if I have to (I like Chrome perfectly fine), but I'd rather stick with Firefox if possible.

btw, this is with a kick-ass computer, and not a lot of tabs open (maybe 5-6 or so). So it seems kind of weird to me.
 
V

Vic

Please help me with my bad english
Bananakin said:
Does anyone else have a problem with Firefox crashing a lot in Ubuntu recently? I dual boot Windows 7 and Ubuntu, and lately I've been doing programming work, so I've been forced to use Ubuntu pretty much every day. And much to my annoyance Firefox has been incessantly crashing on me. I mean, it's not a huge deal, but it is kind of bothersome. Any suggestions on what might be causing it or how to fix it?

And please, don't say "Get Chrome." I'll do that if I have to (I like Chrome perfectly fine), but I'd rather stick with Firefox if possible.

btw, this is with a kick-ass computer, and not a lot of tabs open (maybe 5-6 or so). So it seems kind of weird to me.
Click to expand...
Are you using any addons at the moment? If so, disable them all and activate them individually to figure if one of them is causing Firefox to crash.
 
J

Jordan

Member
Hey guys,

I am coming from a windows background, always used Windows and have never really used Linux of any kind. I had it on my laptop for a while when I wasn't working and didn't have a windows license.

I was just wondering, what's the best way to learn about Linux. Like the command line stuff and possibly server installation etc.

Thanks in advance,

Jordan
 
D

dude

dude
Jordan91 said:
Hey guys,

I am coming from a windows background, always used Windows and have never really used Linux of any kind. I had it on my laptop for a while when I wasn't working and didn't have a windows license.

I was just wondering, what's the best way to learn about Linux. Like the command line stuff and possibly server installation etc.

Thanks in advance,

Jordan
Click to expand...
I also used Windows since forever (Well, I used Debian for like a month in high school), I installed Ubuntu when I got my laptop and I couldn't be happier with it.

I have a friend who's sort of an expert who I keep asking to do stuff, eventually I learned some basics...
Otherwise, I search google, see a few different solution, try and see what they do, until I feel I know what I should be doing.
 
J

Jordan

Member
dude said:
I also used Windows since forever (Well, I used Debian for like a month in high school), I installed Ubuntu when I got my laptop and I couldn't be happier with it.

I have a friend who's sort of an expert who I keep asking to do stuff, eventually I learned some basics...
Otherwise, I search google, see a few different solution, try and see what they do, until I feel I know what I should be doing.
Click to expand...


I get this, but say I want to do like a simple project that requires command line stuff as opposed to GUI.
 
M

Mecha_Infantry

Banned
What is the best beginner -> novice Linux administration guide you know of? I used linux for 4 years but since working in Windows I've forgotten so much :(
 
C

cntr

Banned
Vic said:
Are you using any addons at the moment? If so, disable them all and activate them individually to figure if one of them is causing Firefox to crash.
Click to expand...

Use firefox -safe-mode to quickly disable all add-ons, btw.
 
P

peakish

Member
Jordan91 said:
Hey guys,

I am coming from a windows background, always used Windows and have never really used Linux of any kind. I had it on my laptop for a while when I wasn't working and didn't have a windows license.

I was just wondering, what's the best way to learn about Linux. Like the command line stuff and possibly server installation etc.

Thanks in advance,

Jordan
Click to expand...
I learnt a ton of stuff by installing and playing with Archlinux. Probably not the best, or as discussed above most hardcore way to do it, but installing a system from the ground up was quite satisfying for me.
 
F

Flying_Phoenix

Banned
What the fuck! I just updated Ubuntu via update manager and it asked me to restart my computer. So i did just that but now Ubuntu won't boot. It just goes to "error:file not found" and my computer restarts.
 
Z

zoku88

Member
Flying_Phoenix said:
Wait when I do this does that mean all of my previous personal data will be lost?
Click to expand...
you can restore grub without destroying any data.


Man, im messing with gentoo right now. X is such a pain.
 
F

Flying_Phoenix

Banned
I know I have to do one of these two but not sure what they are trying to explain to me:

Ubuntu Help said:
This method allows you to restore GRUB and keep the Windows bootloader as your primary bootloader. Thanks to Ubuntu's support for NTFS writing this method is now quite simple.

The previous method puts GRUB back on the MBR (Master Boot Record) of the hard drive instead of in the root partition. Should you not wish to do so, for instance if you use a third-party boot manager like Boot Magic or System Commander, this next suggestion will be helpful. Another reason to prefer this method is for when restoring the Grub menu after a re-ghosting. In either case, use this alternative.

Restoring GRUB

1. Boot from a Live CD, like Ubuntu Desktop, or similar. It is recommended to use Ubuntu 9.04 or newer as this has NTFS write support.

2. Open a Terminal. Open a root terminal (For non-Ubuntu live CDs type su the terminal. For Ubuntu based distros run sudo -i) Enter root passwords as necessary.

3. Type grub which makes a GRUB prompt appear.

4. Type find /boot/grub/stage1. You'll get a response like "(hd0)" or in my case "(hd0,3)". Use the output from this command for the following commands.

Note:

You should have mounted the partition which has your Linux system before typing this command. (e.g. In Knoppix Live CD partitions are shown on the desktop but they're not mounted until you double-click on them or mount them manually)

5. Type root (hd0,3) note the space between root and (hd0,3).

6. Type setup (hd0,3) into the prompt. This is key. Other instructions say to use "(hd0)", and that's fine if you want to write GRUB to the MBR. If you want to write it to your Linux root partition, then you want the number after the comma, such as "(hd0,3)".

7. Type quit

8. At this stage you can either restart the system and install your own bootloader, or you can continue and tell the Windows bootloader where to find GRUB which will handle booting Linux.

Making Windows Load GRUB (and then Linux)

This is taken from Dual-Boot Linux and Windows 2000/Windows XP with GRUB HOWTO which has been helping people dual boot since at least 2005.

1. In Linux open a command window.

2. Mount a drive which you can share with Windows. This could be a USB drive, a FAT32 partition on your hard drive, or if you are using a Linux distribution which supports NTFS writing natively (Such as Ubuntu 8.04 or later) then you can mount the actual Windows C:\ drive itself! The advantage of writing to the Windows drive is that you are going to need to put a file there eventually, so it saves time copying a file around. For example:

#mkdir /tmp/windows
#mount /dev/sda1 /tmp/windows

However, when writing directly to the C:\ drive you could also do some damage to the system if you delete or move something. If you do pick the option to write directly, go in, put the file where it belongs, and touch NOTHING else.

3. Now you are going to make a copy of your boot partition. Finding out what this is called is not always completely reliable since the Linux naming conventions differ from the GRUB naming conventions. Linux labels partitions as hd[Letter][Number] or sd[Letter][Number] whereas GRUB always names them as hd[Number][Number]. If you installed GRUB on (hd0,0), then the /boot partition will be on hda1 or sda1. (Since (hd1,0) == hdb1 or sdb1, then by extension if you installed GRUB on (hd0,1) then the /boot partition will be on hda2 or sda2 and so on and so forth.) This narrows you down to two possibilities. If you now paste ls /dev |grep hd it will let you know if you have that drive on your machine. If nothing comes up which matches, then that means you must have an sd drive.

Note: The command df won't work as you are booted from a Live CD.

4. Having determined your boot partition run this command as root:

#dd if=/dev/sda2 of=/tmp/windows/linux.bin bs=512 count=1

Looking at this example /dev/sda2 is your boot partition and /tmp/windows/ is the drive you want to copy the boot sector image to.

5. If you haven't created linux.bin in the Windows drive then you need to copy it there now.

6. Next, reboot your computer and boot into Windows. Open c:\boot.ini in Notepad, and add a new line at the bottom:

c:\linux.bin="Linux"

This file might be write protected. If that is so, you need to enable writing to the file. To do so, right click, and from the context menu select Properties. Then uncheck the box that says "File is read only". Make sure to put that checkmark back afterwards.

Next, make sure that at the top of the boot.ini file there is a timeout set, i.e timeout=5 or some such number.

Do not edit this file from the Live CD, even if you have NTFS write support. Linux and Windows represent line breaks in different ways, so even though you can edit the file, it won't add a new line.

7. That's it, reboot and you will be given the option of booting into Linux, selecting that will chainload GRUB and this will let you boot into your Linux distro.
Click to expand...
 
G

ghostofsparta

Member
Flying_Phoenix said:
What the fuck! I just updated Ubuntu via update manager and it asked me to restart my computer. So i did just that but now Ubuntu won't boot. It just goes to "error:file not found" and my computer restarts.
Click to expand...

This has happened to me twice now. I freak out every time I update.
 
F

Flying_Phoenix

Banned
cntrational said:
Those parts of the guide aren't important to you; they're for people dual-booting Windows and Ubuntu.
Click to expand...

Not meaning to be a lazy bastard but can you please find what I have to do and explain it in layman. I'm very sorry but a lot of this stuff is just jibberish to me.

ghostofsparta said:
This has happened to me twice now. I freak out every time I update.
Click to expand...

This too. First was when I updated to Ubuntu 10.10.
 
Z

zoku88

Member
Finally got a working desktop XD

Well, actually, I've had it working like 5 hours ago or so, but whatever.

ZVhBv.png


I plan on getting a theme that isn't so ugly working.

EDIT: Sorry about the picture size. No image editor yet.
 
C

cntr

Banned
Flying_Phoenix said:
Not meaning to be a lazy bastard but can you please find what I have to do and explain it in layman. I'm very sorry but a lot of this stuff is just jibberish to me.
Click to expand...

'tis okay

First, create a LiveCD or LiveUSB and boot from it. (You can usually change the boot order in the BIOS setup) The LiveCD/USB will give you an option on whether to install Ubuntu or try it now, pick the latter.

Look in the Places menu, you should find your Ubuntu boot partition, click on it to mount it.

Enter this into the Terminal:
Code: 
mount | tail -1
You should see something like this:
Code: 
/dev/sda2 on /media/0d104aff-ec8c-44c8-b811-92b993823444 type ext4 (rw,nosuid,nodev,uhelper=devkit)
Note the "/dev/sda" part (it'll probably be /dev/sda<number> on your computer too, but note it down anyway) and the "/media/0d1z4aff-ec8c-44c8-b811-92b993823444" part (your number will be different)

Now, use this, replacing the "0d104aff-ec8c-44c8-b811-92b993823444" between /media/ and /boot with the number you got earlier. You only need to type in the first few digits if you press the tab key to tab-compelte.
Code: 
ls /media/0d1z4aff-ec8c-44c8-b811-92b993823444/boot
You should get something like this:
Code: 
config-2.6.18-3-686      initrd.img-2.6.18-3-686.bak  System.map-2.6.18-3-686
grub                     lost+found                   vmlinuz-2.6.18-3-686
initrd.img-2.6.18-3-686  memtest86+.bin
If you don't get something like this, then you've mounted the wrong partition, unmount and repeat the steps above with another partition.

Run this, again replacing the "0d104aff-ec8c-44c8-b811-92b993823444" with the number you got before, and replacing "/dev/sda" with what you got before, if it differs.
Code: 
sudo grub-install --root-directory=/media/0d104aff-ec8c-44c8-b811-92b993823444 /dev/sda
If you get BIOS warnings, use the below command instead:
Code: 
sudo grub-install --root-directory=/media/0d104aff-ec8c-44c8-b811-92b993823444 /dev/sda --recheck
If everything went fine, you should get something like this:
Code: 
Installation finished. No error reported.
This is the contents of the device map /boot/grub/device.map.
Check if this is correct or not. If any of the lines is incorrect,
fix it and re-run the script `grub-install'.

(hd0)   /dev/sda

Reboot the computer, making sure to boot from the hard drive this time, and GRUB should automatically detect your Ubuntu install and boot it.
 
I

itxaka

Defeatist
This has happened to me twice now. I freak out every time I update.
Click to expand...

See? this is exactly what I said, Ubuntu has to get their shit with upgrades. They always brings bugs and regressions for no reason.

I had to reinstall ubuntu on my eepc1005ha as it started degrading for no reason until it stopped working on the login screen. Just froze. Tried to troubleshoot it but wasn't lucky.

Now the touchpad doesn't work for no apparent reason...sigh. At least I have something to do at work.

ALSO. WTF. Does ubuntu no longer asks you if you want to install grub? The fucker just erased my arch grub installation. Talk about copying windows, FFS.
 
A

angelfly

Member
zoku88 said:
A while ago, we were having a discussion about the most hardcore distro.

My friend recommended this to me whenever I get bored with Gentoo.

http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/
Click to expand...
I wouldn't exactly call it hardcore but just a PITA to maintain. I lasted three months before I said "fuck it!". The book is extremely easy to follow which for me made setting everything up painless.

itxaka said:
ALSO. WTF. Does ubuntu no longer asks you if you want to install grub? The fucker just erased my arch grub installation. Talk about copying windows, FFS.
Click to expand...
It's probably something they only have enabled in expert mode now.
 
K

Kad5

Member
Can someone explain to me what Unix is and what it's relationship with Linux is?

What is so special about Unix?
 
A

angelfly

Member
Kad5 said:
Can someone explain to me what Unix is and what it's relationship with Linux is?

What is so special about Unix?
Click to expand...
Unix is a proprietary OS
GNU/Linux is a Unix like OS. Linux itself is just a kernel (for the OS to run on).

As for the other question Unix based operating systems are (at least for me) more secure and easier to work with along with other reasons.
 
C

cntr

Banned
Kad5 said:
Can someone explain to me what Unix is and what it's relationship with Linux is?

What is so special about Unix?
Click to expand...

UNIX is a computer operating system standard. If an OS complies to the "Single UNIX Specification", it is considered valid to use the UNIX name. It's not any single OS , it's a specification. (though there technically is an original UNIX OS, made by AT&T)

Linux is a Unix-like kernel, meaning that while it works similar to a regular UNIX system, it does not have a proper UNIX license, because it costs thousands of dollars to use the UNIX name. It's a single open-source kernel.
 
I

itxaka

Defeatist
Finally got around installing Arch again in my eeepc after some partition re-arranging.

Everybody in this thread should try it at least once. Everytime I boot it after using ubuntu/Fedora I'm just shocked at how fucking fast it is.

Strange thougth, I was having issues with ext4. The partition suddenly got read only for unknown reasons. Had to reinstall a couple of times until I decided to go with ext3 to see if that was the problems. checked the bugs but I can't find anything related to it, have you guys had any issue with ext4 lately? It's the first time it gives me this error, and it seemed to be pretty constant.

XFCE <3

Wiicd-ncurses <3 (Didn't knew they had an ncurses version, fucking awesome. Much better than wpa_supplicant)

Also, I can't seem to be able to use xvmc with an intel card. I know it's supported, I changed xorg.conf, libraries are there, xf86-video-intel is there, kms is activated and in the kernel but mplayer just refuses to play anything with xvmc output. Any guesses at what could be? Intel on arch wiki pages are kind of small :D
 
Z

zoku88

Member
I can't say that I had issues with ext4 either in when I was using Ubuntu before or Gentoo now.

It's supposed to be stable anyway, right?

Speaking of (un)stable, has anyone tried Btrfs? I was tempted to choose it for my install, but eventually thought better of it XD

And speaking xvmc, does anyone know of a good trancsoding tool? My card (7700Go) seems to support xvmc but not vdpau, so I wanted to transcode a file from h265 to MPEG-2. I've heard of mencode (sp?) I think. Anyone have experience with it?
 
I

itxaka

Defeatist
zoku88 said:
I can't say that I had issues with ext4 either in when I was using Ubuntu before or Gentoo now.

It's supposed to be stable anyway, right?

Speaking of (un)stable, has anyone tried Btrfs? I was tempted to choose it for my install, but eventually thought better of it XD

And speaking xvmc, does anyone know of a good trancsoding tool? My card (7700Go) seems to support xvmc but not vdpau, so I wanted to transcode a file from h265 to MPEG-2. I've heard of mencode (sp?) I think. Anyone have experience with it?
Click to expand...


Yeah I know. That its why I ask because it's the firsat time I have encountered an issue like that and it's so strange.

I got BTRFS in my ubuntu alpha partition, works great, no issues so far. Seems pretty stable to me. Not that I have find it to be faster or anything, it just works like ext4 before and ext3 before that.

Can't help you with transcoding, no idea. But mencoder is based of mplayer no? It should be great but difficult to use xD
 
Z

zoku88

Member
itxaka said:
Yeah I know. That its why I ask because it's the firsat time I have encountered an issue like that and it's so strange.

I got BTRFS in my ubuntu alpha partition, works great, no issues so far. Seems pretty stable to me. Not that I have find it to be faster or anything, it just works like ext4 before and ext3 before that.

Can't help you with transcoding, no idea. But mencoder is based of mplayer no? It should be great but difficult to use xD
Click to expand...
So you don't feel like you saw any benefit from it over ext4?

hmm, ok then.
 
I

itxaka

Defeatist
zoku88 said:
So you don't feel like you saw any benefit from it over ext4?

hmm, ok then.
Click to expand...


Not really. Checking on the wiki it seems that btfrs has a lot of cloning and secure operations which are more directed to big filesystems and maintenance more directed to enterprises than end users.

So it seems to be the same as ext4 + better for servers and such where cloning and snapshots are required.

I'm no expert at file systems thought, so maybe someone else can comment on this.
 
F

Flying_Phoenix

Banned
What's a distro that is simply like Ubuntu but is much much more reliable and power hungry?

Would Arch really be too complicated for me to get it?
 
B

BlueTsunami

there is joy in sucking dick
Used a Live! Ubuntu CD plus KlamAV to clean up a Windows Install and was surprised how nice the GUI is and the "Software Center" like setup is real nice (I remember having to find binaries online and compiling and shit). Extremely user friendly.

I also had an issue with the wrong resolution being defaulted (and didn't have the right one as selectable). All it took was a simple command to force the correct resolution. Its that mixture of user friendliness and the option for low level control that was also striking.
 
V

Vanillalite

Ask me about the GAF Notebook
Flying_Phoenix said:
What's a distro that is simply like Ubuntu but is much much more reliable and power hungry?

Would Arch really be too complicated for me to get it?
Click to expand...

Why not try one of the Ubuntu variants then? I assume you mean less power hungry too.

I'd highly suggest Linux Mint and you could also check out Crunchbag!
 
K

Kad5

Member
cntrational said:
UNIX is a computer operating system standard. If an OS complies to the "Single UNIX Specification", it is considered valid to use the UNIX name. It's not any single OS , it's a specification. (though there technically is an original UNIX OS, made by AT&T)

Linux is a Unix-like kernel, meaning that while it works similar to a regular UNIX system, it does not have a proper UNIX license, because it costs thousands of dollars to use the UNIX name. It's a single open-source kernel.
Click to expand...

So who decides if an OS is UNIX?
 
V

Vic

Please help me with my bad english
itxaka said:
Finally got around installing Arch again in my eeepc after some partition re-arranging.

Everybody in this thread should try it at least once. Everytime I boot it after using ubuntu/Fedora I'm just shocked at how fucking fast it is.

Strange thougth, I was having issues with ext4. The partition suddenly got read only for unknown reasons. Had to reinstall a couple of times until I decided to go with ext3 to see if that was the problems. checked the bugs but I can't find anything related to it, have you guys had any issue with ext4 lately? It's the first time it gives me this error, and it seemed to be pretty constant.

XFCE <3

Wiicd-ncurses <3 (Didn't knew they had an ncurses version, fucking awesome. Much better than wpa_supplicant)

Also, I can't seem to be able to use xvmc with an intel card. I know it's supported, I changed xorg.conf, libraries are there, xf86-video-intel is there, kms is activated and in the kernel but mplayer just refuses to play anything with xvmc output. Any guesses at what could be? Intel on arch wiki pages are kind of small :D
Click to expand...
This ArchWiki entry might help: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Fstab
Actually, could you post your /etc/fstab here so that I can take a look at it.
 
I

itxaka

Defeatist
Vic said:
This ArchWiki entry might help: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Fstab
Click to expand...


No no, the thing is, the file system mounted ok. Installed and deleted files ok. But suddenly it will get ro for no reason. Happened 3 times in a row and after that it just died. Tried to recover it several times but it was just fucked up. I even thougth that it was an HDD defect!

So maybe I'm affected by this?:

Data Corruption
Some early adopters of ext4 encountered data corruption after a hard reboot. Please read Ext4 data loss; explanations and workarounds for more information.
Since kernel 2.6.30, ext4 is considered "safe(r)." Several patches improved the robustness of ext4 - albeit at a slight performance cost. A new mount option (auto_da_alloc) can be used to disable this behavior. For more information, please read Linux 2 6 30 - Filesystems performance improvements.
For kernel versions earlier than 2.6.30, consider adding rootflags=data=ordered to the kernel line in GRUB's menu.lst as a preventative measure.
Click to expand...

But it seemed not random as it happened 3 times almost at the same time after the reinstall. That is why I thougnth it could be a HDD error (like a bad sector or something)

Still, something strange happened. Doesn't seem to be an HDD error and for ext4 to fail I would need a crash or hard reboot, which didn't happen.

Anyway, I'm okay with ext3. I'll probably check gentoo again or LFS in a couple of weeks so I'll try it again :D
 
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