another newbie

another newbie

[Ron Kassen]

Hello all,
Please bear with me as I ask some repeat questions.  First, let me tell you
where I am coming from:
I am a hardware and troubleshooting expert.  I am not trying to be
egotistical here, I have had fourteen years of computer experience, with
DOS, Windows 3.1, Windows95, Windows NT, some with Windows 2000, and diverse
PC based hardware experience.  I am a quick learner, and it is time to learn
again.  It has been a long time, I am rusty, and this is just what I needed
to kick me in the can and get me moving again.  Now for the questions:
I downloaded zipspeak and unzipped it to the \linux directory on my hard
drive (actually it created that folder itself).  After trying to fire it up
once and having it not find the partition, then realizing that I needed the
sda1 partition instead of the hda1 partition (I have scsi hard drives), I
loaded it successfully.  However, when I got to the login screen, typed root
and pressed enter, I did not know what to do next.  So, I did the
ctrl-alt-del to shut down the system (I don't know how to properly exit from
linux), rebooted into windows to go find the docs.  I think the docs are
actually where the zipspeak.txt says they are, but not in a format that
windows can read.  So how do I read the docs?
Second question:
I would like to convert from Windows to Linux because I am looking for a
more stable operating system that I do not have to reload every month (did
you know that Microsoft actually recommends a reformat every year with their
operating systems?)  However, I have some concerns.  I use the computer to
do my finances, serf the net, grab email, play wave and mp3 files, burn cd's
and more.  Are you using linux exclusively?  Am I going to have to keep
windows around to do stuff like burn cd's, do wave and mp3 files, etc?  I
know that I can serf the net and grab email with Linux, but what do I do
with all the emails that I have saved in a Microsoft outlook pst file?  How
do I edit the etc/rc.d/rc.modul file to tell linux what net card and sound
card I am using?  I know that I can read all the docs I want, but until I
actually start playing in Linux, I won't learn a thing.  I know to be
cautious - I can quickly destroy the data on the system.  Any
advice/help/etc would be appreciated.  Also, Linux is like another language
to me - I don't know it yet.  Be patient with me while I learn.  I know
there are some docs that I can get off the net, and I will go get them.
Thanks in advance!

RK

Re: another newbie

[Buddy Brannan]

Hi Ron,

First thing you'll want to do is create a user account. No, scratch
that. The first first thing you should do is change the root password with
passwd

After you've done that, *then* create a user account, from which you
should do most things. Doing everything as root is a bad
idea. (I.E. typing rm -rf * at the root directory is bad if you're
root.) You will create the user account with
adduser

Slackware's pretty nice in that it will step you through the account
creation, asking all the relevant questions.

Yes! You can do your CD burning, listen to MP3's and wavs, record wavs, do
Email, and surf the Web. (Remember...Linux was really *created* over the
Internet.) I'm not sure what Email program Zipspeak comes with--I'm
running the full Slackware distribution--but I use one called elm, and a
lot of folks use pine, while some swear by mutt. pico is a good basic text
editor. vi is the default in a lot of cases, but it's fairly arcane; if
you find yourself in vi, just type
:q!
and you'll get out of that.

Right. I don't know what to tell you about converting from Micro$haft
Lookout!, but you *can* do Email. Some pages don't work in lynx, and
you'll have to compile in SSL support--but you don' have to do that
immediately. Most things, however, work great with lynx, and I actually
prefer it for in-depth reading. About the only thing I use Windows for
these days is the odd OCR job and my online banking program, which runs in
Windows. Absolutely everything else I do in Linux.

I'm certainly not the most experienced person here, there are lots of
those on this list, but I'll certainly be glad to help if I can. Hope this
helps.


-- 
Buddy Brannan, KB5ELV        | And if the ground yawned,
Email: davros@ycardz.com     | I'd step to the side and say,
Phone: (972) 889-8147        | "Hey ground! I'm nobody's lunch!"
Voice mail: (877) 791-5298   | --Eddie From Ohio

RE: another newbie

[Ron Kassen]

Buddy,
I downloaded the bigslack version from the net.  Can I just unzip this into
the \linux directory, and with the linuz.spk kernel will it still load and
run ok as long as I have the bat file setup correctly?  Do I have to know
some cryptic language to tell this rc.modul file what hardware I have or is
it pretty straight forward?  How do I know how to tell linux, for example,
that I have a 3com 3c905b network card and an ensonic audio pci sound card?
Will it find and install my video card correctly?  Going back: When I get to
the login scree and type in root and press enter, am I in?  Then I can do
the passwd to change the root password and do the adduser to create my user
account?

Another note:
I tried to download the book off the net about linux installation and
getting started, but I have to download each page individually, and where I
found it compressed, it was a .tar.gz file, which I have to work with in
linux.  Any easier way to get these docs?
Thanks!!!

RK

-----Original Message-----
From: speakup-admin@braille.uwo.ca
[mailto:speakup-admin@braille.uwo.ca]On Behalf Of Buddy Brannan
Sent: Sunday, April 02, 2000 9:25 AM
To: speakup@braille.uwo.ca
Subject: Re: another newbie


Hi Ron,

First thing you'll want to do is create a user account. No, scratch
that. The first first thing you should do is change the root password with
passwd

After you've done that, *then* create a user account, from which you
should do most things. Doing everything as root is a bad
idea. (I.E. typing rm -rf * at the root directory is bad if you're
root.) You will create the user account with
adduser

Slackware's pretty nice in that it will step you through the account
creation, asking all the relevant questions.

Yes! You can do your CD burning, listen to MP3's and wavs, record wavs, do
Email, and surf the Web. (Remember...Linux was really *created* over the
Internet.) I'm not sure what Email program Zipspeak comes with--I'm
running the full Slackware distribution--but I use one called elm, and a
lot of folks use pine, while some swear by mutt. pico is a good basic text
editor. vi is the default in a lot of cases, but it's fairly arcane; if
you find yourself in vi, just type
:q!
and you'll get out of that.

Right. I don't know what to tell you about converting from Micro$haft
Lookout!, but you *can* do Email. Some pages don't work in lynx, and
you'll have to compile in SSL support--but you don' have to do that
immediately. Most things, however, work great with lynx, and I actually
prefer it for in-depth reading. About the only thing I use Windows for
these days is the odd OCR job and my online banking program, which runs in
Windows. Absolutely everything else I do in Linux.

I'm certainly not the most experienced person here, there are lots of
those on this list, but I'll certainly be glad to help if I can. Hope this
helps.


--
Buddy Brannan, KB5ELV        | And if the ground yawned,
Email: davros@ycardz.com     | I'd step to the side and say,
Phone: (972) 889-8147        | "Hey ground! I'm nobody's lunch!"
Voice mail: (877) 791-5298   | --Eddie From Ohio

_______________________________________________
Speakup mailing list
Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup

Re: another newbie

[cpt.kirk]

I remember seeing what the root password starts as, but can't help you
with that one. But I would not so much worry about destroying data. Linux
is actually less likely to let you wipe out the system or destroy data
then is Winblows. The thing is that if you spend your time in a
non-privledged account, you can't destroy any more then data local to that
account.

As for keeping Winblows, there are two things that I can think of for you
to do so. The first is OCR software (if you have it). I have not found
that in Linux yet. The other is if you have a need to use M$ Office or
similar programs for interchangability reasons. For those using X, that is
less an issue. But since your using speech, then I don't know of any
method of reading the screen inside X. (Though shell scripts can let you
use some X programs.)

As for the formatting every year, you are another victim of M$ outsourcing
program. Having been a contractor at a M$ facility I can assure you that
M$ does not endorse its support personel passing on a regular format
recomendation to its customers. The thing is that most of their support
comes from people who work with no direct M$ contact. Further, the average
tenure at said company is less then 6 months. And the first month is
spent in a class that blows over the top of 80% of the people's heads.
Such leads to people telling customer's that things such as a disk utility
(scandisk) can actually solve program errors (other then those dealing
with disk access).

Kirk Wood
Cpt.Kirk@1tree.net
------------------

Your fly might be open (but don't check it just now).

Re: another newbie

[Buddy Brannan]

Yeah, bigslack should work with the speakup kernel you got from zipspeak,
unless I am much mistaken.

rc.model: I'm not sure about that file, I haven't seen it. I'm afraid
someone else will have to tackle getting your hardware done. ... Actually,
it may take some doing; you'll probably either have to set up to load the
modules or re-compile your kernel with the network card installed. As for
the sound card, ... Hmm.....yeah, you'll need to put together a new kernel
anyway, as I don't think they have sound support turned on by
default. Matt, do you know for sure? If they do have the sound support,
you can probably use the ALSA drivers, which can be had at
www.alsa-project.org. Kirk or Gene can probably help with those, as I
don't have the latest version of them on my machine.

BTW, no, compiling a kernel is really not that hard. It looks a lot harder
than it is, but I suspect before you try that you might wanna use the
system a bit. :) 

As for the docs; a tar.gz is a fairly standard beastie in Linux. It's a
tar (a bit anachronistic in most cases I suppose, since tar stands for
tape archive, I think), which has been compressed with gzip. Under linux,
you can do
tar zxvf filename.tar.gz (it's case sensitive, and you have to type the
whole thing.) It will unzip into a bunch of files under a directory. I'm
not sure if you downloaded plain text, html, or something else though, but
I think that Winzip will handle tar.gz files...won't it?

-- 
Buddy Brannan, KB5ELV        | And if the ground yawned,
Email: davros@ycardz.com     | I'd step to the side and say,
Phone: (972) 889-8147        | "Hey ground! I'm nobody's lunch!"
Voice mail: (877) 791-5298   | --Eddie From Ohio

RE: another newbie

[cpt.kirk]

Ron,

I will start off with answering some questions here:

When you are at the lodin screen and type in root, after pressing enter
you are prompted for the password. (If memory serves correct the default
password is a cariage return.) After entering the password correctly you
will be in.

For the book, download it in the compressed file. Winzip supports the
compression method. Just say yes to the first prompt about uncompressing
to a temp directory. If you are in linux use the command "tar -zxvf
filesname". (Of course replace filename with the appropriate filename.)

Kirk Wood
Cpt.Kirk@1tree.net
------------------

Your fly might be open (but don't check it just now).

Re: another newbie

[Buddy Brannan]

Sorry, nearly forgot. Yes, you just do the passwd and adduser after you
type root. There is no root password initially, which is why Kirk couldn't
remember it. <Heh>


-- 
Buddy Brannan, KB5ELV        | And if the ground yawned,
Email: davros@ycardz.com     | I'd step to the side and say,
Phone: (972) 889-8147        | "Hey ground! I'm nobody's lunch!"
Voice mail: (877) 791-5298   | --Eddie From Ohio

Re: another newbie

[William F. Acker WB2FLW +1-303-777-8123]

Hi Ron,

     I might be able to help with one of your questions.  Does outlook
Distress support connecting to an IMAP server.  If so, you could copy all
of your mail folders using Outlook to a directory on the IMAP server, and
copy them back to the Linux side using IMAP.  I know that pine supports
IMAP.  I imagine that there are other mail clients for Linux that do.

     I have a machine on the network which was put there for the express
purpose of having Speakup users and other friends play with it.  There's
an IMAP server on that machine.  If you're interested, just tell me what
you'd like your username to be.





          Hope this helps.
          Bill in Denver

Re: another newbie

[cpt.kirk]

Lookout excuse (outlook express) does support IMAP as does Outlook which
he is using. A more straight forward way is to use a converter tool. I am
pretty sure you can find a program on www.freshmeat.net that will import
mail in a pst file to your mailbox on the Linux machine.

Kirk Wood
Cpt.Kirk@1tree.net
------------------

Your fly might be open (but don't check it just now).

Re: another newbie

[Chuck Hallenbeck]

Another solution is to just 'forward' the mail in question from the
Windows software to your own address, then retrieve it with your Linux
software.

Chuck.
 On Sun, 2 Apr 2000 cpt.kirk@1tree.net wrote:

> Lookout excuse (outlook express) does support IMAP as does Outlook which
> he is using. A more straight forward way is to use a converter tool. I am
> pretty sure you can find a program on www.freshmeat.net that will import
> mail in a pst file to your mailbox on the Linux machine.
> 
> Kirk Wood
> Cpt.Kirk@1tree.net
> ------------------
> 
> Your fly might be open (but don't check it just now).
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> 

My web site is http://www.mhonline.net/~chuckh (I C Q = 67363342)
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin, 1759.

RE: another newbie

[Ron Kassen]

I am far from there, but I will let you know if I am interested.  Thanks to
everyone for the notes.  They are useful.

RK

-----Original Message-----
From: speakup-admin@braille.uwo.ca
[mailto:speakup-admin@braille.uwo.ca]On Behalf Of William F. Acker
WB2FLW +1-303-777-8123
Sent: Sunday, April 02, 2000 5:56 PM
To: speakup@braille.uwo.ca
Subject: Re: another newbie


Hi Ron,

     I might be able to help with one of your questions.  Does outlook
Distress support connecting to an IMAP server.  If so, you could copy all
of your mail folders using Outlook to a directory on the IMAP server, and
copy them back to the Linux side using IMAP.  I know that pine supports
IMAP.  I imagine that there are other mail clients for Linux that do.

     I have a machine on the network which was put there for the express
purpose of having Speakup users and other friends play with it.  There's
an IMAP server on that machine.  If you're interested, just tell me what
you'd like your username to be.





          Hope this helps.
          Bill in Denver



_______________________________________________
Speakup mailing list
Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup

Re: another newbie

[William F. Acker WB2FLW +1-303-777-8123]

Hi Chuck,

     The only problem with forwarding the mail from Outlook and then
picking it up from Linux is that you would lose easy access to the date
and sender information.  It would still be contained within the file, but
not where the mailreader could display it without the user's opening it.




          73.
          Bill

RE: another newbie

[Geoff Shang]

Hi Ron:

If I were you, I'd recompile the kernel to get your hardware
supported.  Since you are a hardware expert, this shouldn't present any
major difficulties.  Grab a kernel source from the kernel 2.2 tree at
ftp.kernal.org, get the patch from
ftp.braille.uwo.ca/pub/linux/speakup/speakup-0.08.tar.gz and go for it.

Geoff.

Re: another newbie

[Christopher Moore]

And, here's another reason to use Linux. If something goes wrong, you can
fix it w/o having to re-install everything.
Over the weekend, I had a bad library file which preventing me from
booting.  Well, I was able to restore it from my slakware distribution by
booting from floppy and mounting the "root" filesystem.  Try that with
winblows. <g>
Chris

w1gm@sdf.lonestar.org
SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

Re: another newbie

[Geoff Shang]

Hi Ron - great to have you on-board.  If you're in to trouble-shooting
hardware probs then linux is for you.

The w;ay to close linux is by using the shutdown command.  Hopefully
zipspeak is set up so that control-alt-del invokes this.  The command is:

	shutdown -h now

to halt the system.  Use -r instead to reboot.

Geoff.

Triple Talk

[Janina Sajka]

Hi:

Does anyone have the contact info for the people building the Triple Talk
PCI and USB speech synths? It was posted here some months ago, and I
thought I kept the message, but now I can't find it.

Thanks.


				Janina Sajka, Director
				Information Systems Research & Development
				American Foundation for the Blind (AFB)

janina@afb.net

RE: another newbie

[Geoff Shang]

Hi Ron:

Questions are good.  Then we know what to tell you.

Lets tackle the kernel first.  You will want a kernel source from
kernel.org or somesuch place that looks something like
linux-2.2.14.tar.gz.  Don't get the 2.3 tree unless you're particularly
adventurous ... oh and if you don't want speakup to work <grin>.  Kernels
prior to 2.2.7 won't work with speakup either so unless 2.2.15 has come out
by the time you go to get it, it's best to get 2.2.14.  If you know how to
use bzip2 and have it installed, then you can get the bz2 file, otherwise
get the tar.gz file.  It will be aproximately 14 meg.  Untar it into your
/usr/src directory, such that it creates a /usr/src/linux directory.  You
will also need to grab speakup-0.08.tar.gz from
ftp.braille.uwo.ca/pub/linux/speakup so that you can patch it into your
kernel.

For reading matter, take a look at the README in the kernel source.  Also
take a poke around in the Documentation subdirectory, and if your
super-caucious like I was, you can even read the entire configure.help file
there too which lists all the help text for the kernel configuration
procedure.  It's a good read if you don't know what you must have.  There
is also a kernel howto on the linux documentation project
(www.linuxdoc.org) which you might also want to read.  Also check out the
hardware howto plus any others that pertain to your hardware.

Untar the speakup patch into /usr/src which will make a speakup-0.08
directory.  Then issue the command (from /usr/src):

patch -p0 <speakup-0.08/speakup-0.08-patch

All hunks except the MIPS one should take.  If you get more errors then, to
paraphrase Linus, either you or I have gotten something wrong.

Go into /usr/src/linux and type "make config".  Set aside some time to do
this, as you will be asked a plethora of questions.  You will be prompted
about network hardware and you should be able to find your card.  If you
plan to use the ALSA sound drivers (recommended in my opinion), say
"yes" to sound support but don't say "yes" to any other sound questions.

After you've answered all this, type the following:

make dep
make clean
make bzImage (note the capital I)
make modules
make modules_install

What you do next depends on the way your distribution does things and which
university you went to.  I personally type "make bzlilo" and am done with
it.  Others move the resultant image by hand.  Still others do other things
that I can't think of at present.  Perhaps other people using your
distribution can comment on this.

OK, you should be ready to reboot.  Hold your breath and type "restart".

I've gotta run so I'll answer the rest of your questions later unless
someone beats me to it.

Geoff.

Re: another newbie

[Jacob Schmude]

What about the "halt" and "reboot" commands, they do the same thing.
On Mon, 3 Apr 2000, Geoff Shang wrote:

> Hi Ron - great to have you on-board.  If you're in to trouble-shooting
> hardware probs then linux is for you.
> 
> The w;ay to close linux is by using the shutdown command.  Hopefully
> zipspeak is set up so that control-alt-del invokes this.  The command is:
> 
> 	shutdown -h now
> 
> to halt the system.  Use -r instead to reboot.
> 
> Geoff.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> 

RE: another newbie

[Ron Kassen]

Geoff,
Thanks for the encouragement.
This is my plan, but I have to learn a few things first:
1.  How do I tell the kernel that I have a 3com 3c905b 10/100mb ethernet
card?
2.  I know that alsa will give me the sound support I need and I know that
my sound card is supported, but I don't know if I have all the pieces I need
to get it up and running.
3.  There is a minor issue of Video, but for the moment, linux seems not to
care what my video card is.  I suppose it would be different if I was doing
graphics (not likely unless I think about running x-windows).
4.  How do I get the internet configured, and how do I start receiving
email?  It looks like there are many docs I need to read before I get
started, but I am somewhat impatient and want to start experimenting.
5.  I have no kernel compilation experience.  I downloaded what I think is a
kernel source from kerneli.org, but I'm afraid this is a new one for me - I
don't have a clue what I am looking at.  Do you know of a good kernel
compilation document?
6.  Where is a good place to find applications.  I downloaded mp123 (?) from
a site that I can't remember now.  Someone mentioned cdcd, where do I find
this?  Anyway, I won't ramble on like this - any help you could give would
be appreciated.
P.S.  I see your .au email address?  Are you from Australia?  What part?

Thanks a bunch!

RK
-----Original Message-----
From: speakup-admin@braille.uwo.ca
[mailto:speakup-admin@braille.uwo.ca]On Behalf Of Geoff Shang
Sent: Monday, April 03, 2000 12:55 AM
To: speakup@braille.uwo.ca
Subject: RE: another newbie


Hi Ron:

If I were you, I'd recompile the kernel to get your hardware
supported.  Since you are a hardware expert, this shouldn't present any
major difficulties.  Grab a kernel source from the kernel 2.2 tree at
ftp.kernal.org, get the patch from
ftp.braille.uwo.ca/pub/linux/speakup/speakup-0.08.tar.gz and go for it.

Geoff.



_______________________________________________
Speakup mailing list
Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup

Re: another newbie

[Scott Howell]

you forgot the most important command/action of them all. First go to your
windows box and type "format c:"
hahahahahahahahahah

3com network driver (was another newbie)

[cpt.kirk]

For the 3905b card that Ron had questioned about, Redhat 6.1 lists the
card as workable but not supported. They also gave a driver. But in
interest of giveing the best information I can, I went and found the
following site to get 3com network drivers for Linux. You can find drivers
for that card and several others at:
http://support.3com.com/infodeli/tools/nic/linuxdownloading.htm


Kirk Wood
Cpt.Kirk@1tree.net
------------------

Your fly might be open (but don't check it just now).

Re: 3com network driver (was another newbie)

[Mike Gorse]

I've got a 3c905 (not sure if it's a b or not), and the 3c59x driver in
the kernel works fine with it.


On Tue, 4 Apr 2000 cpt.kirk@1tree.net wrote:

> For the 3905b card that Ron had questioned about, Redhat 6.1 lists the
> card as workable but not supported. They also gave a driver. But in
> interest of giveing the best information I can, I went and found the
> following site to get 3com network drivers for Linux. You can find drivers
> for that card and several others at:
> http://support.3com.com/infodeli/tools/nic/linuxdownloading.htm
> 
> 
> Kirk Wood
> Cpt.Kirk@1tree.net
> ------------------
> 
> Your fly might be open (but don't check it just now).
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
>