Linux ?!?

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21

Well - the installation is done and I am now operating in FIrefox under Ubuntu. The installation seemed time-consuming, but it seems to have gone OK.

Quite exciting really as this is my first Linux experience.

I’ll see how I go in the foreign land.

EDIT: I do have a rather daft question - hope this is a simple one to answer. How do I place my output files (rtf’s, wav’s, avi’s, png’s etc.) on my main Windows hard drive if they were created on the Linux drive?

There will be very many instances where I will create something in Blender or OpenOffice, and I will want to use the output in a Windows-only program. How do I manage that?

Caleb

22

It depends on what filesystem your windows installation is. Perfekt would be if you had it on a FAT32 partition or if you had a second HD/partition formatted in FAT32 as linux can natively read/write to it. If you only have NTFS drives there are ehmm, other ways:

  1. Linux can read NTFS natively but not write (safely! It can but the driver is still marked as experimental so it is not recommended in production environment.)
  2. There are ext2/ext3/resiserfs driver modules for windows that can read these linux filesystems. But not write to them.
    ext2/ext3: http://uranus.it.swin.edu.au/~jn/linux/explore2fs.htm
    reiser: http://p-nand-q.com/download/rfstool.html
    If you use Total Commander, like I do, there´s a plugin that combines these two in one: http://www.ghisler.com/dplugins.htm#dateisys
  3. You can use the native ntfs driver to read and write to NTFS under linux with captive: http://www.jankratochvil.net/project/captive/
    A bit slow but hey, like yafray, but it´s fine either?!

Are you sure that this can only be done in Windows?

krizu

23

There is a Windows driver that will allow you to read and write ext2/ext3 volumes. You can find it here.

24

Thanks guys - will look into that.

I’m a bit ambivalent about the experience so far. There seems to be some good ideas, but I’m not sure if I’ve hit the WOW! moment yet.

The package distribution idea is an interesting one - reminds me of the Squeak platform package distribution. Although - I haven’t been amazingly impressed with some elements of it.

I installed Eclipse and found that elements of the package were missing. Then I decided to remove it again and was told that other software was now dependent on it. The whole system seems designed to dumb down installation, but because of its simplicity (ironically enough) I found it a “hit and miss” exercise.

Same with the impressive “Start Menu-alike” navigation system. I was quite happy that installing packages updated this menu so that selecting applications was a very pleasant exercise…when that was what happened. However, when this menu was not updated with an installation I was totally baffled where I would look in the file system for the executable file.

Also - the fact that some of the popular codecs didn’t seem to come installed by default made the multimedia experience a bit of a trial. Haven’t worked out how to play an mp3 yet.

Some of this will be because I need to get used to a different paradigm (eg Linux filesystem structure) of course.

But I’ll keep playing - I would like to at least use Linux for Blender and maybe OpenOffice for a while and slowly add Web Browsing, web development, multimedia, image editing, drawing/diagram packages, DTP if Scribus turns out to be good enough, video editing/compositing.

Maybe one day I’ll only need Windows for music/audio stuff. You never know.

Caleb

25

All this ( the all Linux “thing”) is Open Source and free ( no money)

It’s not enough for WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW

26

That is an advantage although you can get by very handsomely on a Windows system without having to spend a huge amount of money anyway.

There are - after all - alot of Open Source projects for Windows including OpenOffice, GIMP, Blender, Inkscape and Scribus (possibly soon). The Open Source attraction possibly isn’t as strong as it used to be.

I believe I was getting by on Windows without paying much at all. The OS and MS Word came with the computer so it was a cost I didn’t notice much, and (apart from music software) I haven’t purchased that much Windows software - I also shopped for the best price.

Paint Shop Pro, Dogwaffle and Serif PagePlus (all 3 relatively inexpensive). Nearly everything else that isn’t specific to music creation is all freeware or Open Source.

For me, I’m becoming more interested in an OS that I don’t have to reinstall all the time. I find Windows to be a decaying OS. I’m hoping that Linux is a little different in this regard although it could be wishful thinking on my part. I’m also looking for something that is very stable - a quality also attributed to Linux.

Caleb

27

Also - the fact that some of the popular codecs didn’t seem to come installed by default made the multimedia experience a bit of a trial. Haven’t worked out how to play an mp3 yet.
licencing issues - mp3 is a proprietary technology.

28

The dependency thing is actually on of the strenghthes of debian based distributions, like ubuntu is. the installation system, apt as I know in ubuntu, takes care to have a consistent install of your system, so it should be almost impossible to deinstall something vital to your system. During installations it takes care that all dependant libraries, programs and so on are installed, as well to have your system consistent.

I thought I give you some tools to play with:

Mp3s - xmms or rythmbox
Video playback/encoding - mplayer
where are your programs binaries? /usr/bin/ or /usr/local/bin
installed programs don’t turn up in your “Startmenu”? - try the command update-menus in your shell(ubuntu users: is this in ubuntu? - don’t now if it’s a debian(pure) only command)
being used to Total Commander? - go get mc
get used to the shell: xterm, eterm, which one you like
video editing - cinelerra
audio editing - audacity
audio workstation/sequencer - ardour
convert - bmp to vectors - potrace

need network filexchange? nfs for linux-linux , samba for linux(server)-windows(clients)

like playing games? - www.happypenguin.org - commercial ones: http://www.lokigames.com/products/

of course don’t forget wings3d, blender3d, gimp, cinepaint, firefox, evolution, openoffice, just to mention my other favorites…
more to find in the forum.

One of my personal biggest pluses for linux is the huge worldwide community of noobs, users and geeks providing help to each other over various forums, howtos, chats, et, etc.

btw welcome to penguin land!

krizu

29

Thanks krizu.

That Cinelerra looks great - so does Cinepaint.
Linux for video editing, compositing, 3D modelling, graphics editing and vector drawing look good to me.

I haven’t actually worked out how to install Cinelerra on my computer though. Seems like the fancy package installation software doesn’t know about it - yeah I’m on Ubuntu.

I’m thinking of buying a book on Linux - there seems to be some real potential here in many areas.

Scribus looks really good except that it has no fancy handling of large documents. However, LaTeX does and I might even have a closer look at that along with AbiWord, Lyx and other potential front-ends.

OpenOffice is a good all-rounder.

But I’m already having difficulty with some fundamentals so I probably need a reference manual of some type.

I’ve started looking around various Ubuntu sites to see if I can get the info without having to shell out too much money.

Some of this stuff looks great though.

Caleb

30

maybe take a look here - also debian based stuff, might work with ubuntu - haven’t tested though


http://www.mediainlinux.org/index.php/mediainlinux/software/software_articles/video_software

this distro claims to be easy to install - pure debian with ease of ubuntu install, claims to let you use debian repositories. haven’t tested yet.

http://genieos.toluenterprises.com/

31

Caleb,

cinelerra comes in .rpm format which is aother packaging method used by other distros like Suse, RedHat and Mandrake I think.
you need the program alien to convert to .deb package which you can install it unless you want to colpile yourself.

so do a: apt-get install alien (or use ubuntu package manager, dunno)

then: alien -d cinelerra.XXX.rpm to get your .deb
then: dpkg -i cinelerra.XXX.deb
(all as root)
then as user fire up cinelerra!

eeh, you know how to use your xterm, do you?

have fun

krizu

32

The CVS version of Cinelerra should come in a version made for Ubuntu if I remember correctly. But I’m sorry to say that I don’t remember their web adress at the moment :frowning: so if you’r intressted your going to have to google it upp.

33

Use the CVS version much better IMO. There should be a CVS version in the Ubuntu repository.

The web site for the CVS version : http://cvs.cinelerra.org/

I must warn you, even though cinelerra is VERY powerful, it is not very intuitive at all.

However, when this menu was not updated with an installation I was totally baffled where I would look in the file system for the executable file.

look in /usr/bin

Also - the fact that some of the popular codecs didn’t seem to come installed by default made the multimedia experience a bit of a trial. Haven’t worked out how to play an mp3 yet.

Codec support comes is separate packages.

Maybe one day I’ll only need Windows for music/audio stuff. You never know.

That’s the primary function for my linux box.

34

It does indeed refer to such a package - I even found it eventually in Synaptic. However, it won’t install. There are missing elements there.

Ubuntu is based on Debian yes?
I’ve found some fairly extensive user guide documentation for Debian on the web which I could quite easily get printed out and bound for my reference. (yes I’m one of those horrible people that like have reference manuals in paper format)

I’ve just printed out an APT How To guide which looks like it covers the concept of package management to some degree.

If I’m right with Debian documentation, I won’t need to bother people as much and I can learn all those exciting things like building from source etc… that make Linux interesting. :slight_smile:

Caleb

35

I tried your suggestions - unfortunately doing all this for the SUSE rpm seems to work until you try to actually run the application - then nothing happens.

Anyway - I managed to dig up information that says that Debian needs extra libraries found elsewhere. The instructions are clear - but only as clear as mud, the instructions point to a location but are not specific on what I actually have to install. shrug

It’s amazing how much effort I’ve gone through just because I want to have a look at this program. I might not even like the damn thing :-? .

I am slowly getting the hang of the OS though (VERY SLOWLY). I’m trying to work out all the steps I need to take if I want to build something from source.

Caleb

36

hmm, I just looked at my installed packages which cinerella needs. These are:
libc6 (>=2.3.5-1)
libgcc1 (>= 1:4.02)
libpng12-0 (>= 1.2.8rel)
libstc++6 (4.02-4)
libx11 | xlibs (> 4.1.0)
libext6 | xlibs (> 4.1.0)
libxv1
libxxf86vm1
zlib1g (>= 1:1.2.1)

The numbers inside the brackest are the minimum required versions of these libs.
In synaptic or aptitude ore whatever packet manager you use you can look for these libraries and their version numbers.
Hope this helps.
I know this almost “personal” challenge of getting something running that refuses to do so. This is how I got to know my system (to a certain point) and what requires what and why…by reading lots and lots of manuals, manpages, forums, howtos,…
Anyway I never really used cinelerra (yet) as it seems quite ambitious for people not used to pro editing. Therfore I am looking forward to positron and others to come…

krizu

37

If you have all the dependencies, compiling is usually as simple as


su
<rootpassword>

cd /blah/blah/blah/

./configure

make

make install

and I think some of those steps can be combined (by shoving a “&&” in between them).

38

Hey krizu - I seem to be in this position whereby some core packages of mine seem to have become “broken” seemingly on their own.

I know that isn’t likely, but I was still trying to install Cinelerra (something I have now completely given up on - no method I’ve tried has got me anywhere), but tonight when I tried to install Thunderbird email client I got an interesting message telling me that basically all my packages where going to have to be removed to install Thunderbird.

Then I realised that this is across the board with any installation I attempt.

My advanced package management front-end (Synaptic) is telling me I have the following broken packages:

cpp-4.0
gij-4.0
libgcj6

None of them will reinstall without a warning that all my packages are going to be removed.

If I use apt-get install to try to reinstall these packages they give me this message:

xxxxx: Depends: gcc-4.0-base (= 4.0.1-4ubuntu9) but 4.0.2-4 is to be installed

I can find gcc-4.0-base version 4.0.2-4, but I can’t see to find version 4.0.1-4 anywhere. Does anyone know where I can find this package? I would rather repair things rather than have to reinstall Ubuntu.

Caleb

39

Actually - don’t worry - I managed to repair all 3 broken packages.
I’m so proud of myself.

:smiley:

Caleb

40

Cool to hear that. sometimes packages conflict with each other and you get something like what happened to you, broken packages. This should of course not happen, I think this sometimes happens to distributions that try to be as up to date as possible.

krizu