Redhat n00b Q&A pls.

vibe666

thanks to some very generous downloading and ISO burning on the part of Kaimera, I now have 3 nice shiny new RH9 CD's and now have it installed on my desktop and laptop (dual booting in both instances).

some quick Q's if any of you Linux guru's out there wouldn't mind.

1. I've got (obviously) a single (20gb) drive on the laptop with 98/XP/RH and a data drive in their own particular partitions, but would like access to the data drive through linux.

I am runnning Gnome at the moment, and would like to know if there is an easy (GUI) way to mount the other partitions or will I have to do it the old fashioned way?

2. I have a 3com megahertz pcmcia modem that RH seems to have detected as just a standard modem, but it's dialling and handshaking fine (sound is on and I can hear the handshake). only problem is, it's not establishing a connection. if I remember rightly, its giving an error 38 (will check again to confirm this). connecting to eircom 1893 150150 and as far as i can see all my settings are fine (well the same as windows anyway). there are some tickboxes for various types of compression, which i have left blank just in case, but it's not made any difference.

3. The desktop has a USR Sportster ext. and I read somewhere that you can't get linux drivers for it, but I don't know how old the article was. RH was pretty good at detecting all my other hardware, but I'm not sure if I can just plug it in (serial) and get it detected automatically.

thats it for now, but I'm sure I'll have lots more questions as I get into things further.

btw, does anyone know of a good resource with a list of shell (if thats the right term for it, remember, I'm new at this) commands?

thanks in advance for any help.

longword

Originally posted by vibe666
1. I've got (obviously) a single (20gb) drive on the laptop with 98/XP/RH and a data drive in their own particular partitions, but would like access to the data drive through linux.

Best thing to do is add a line to the file /etc/fstab. If you mkdir /dosc, odds are this line exactly in /etc/fstab will work:

/dev/hda1 /dosc vfat umask=000 0 0

The files should be browseable through the GUI file manager/desktop. You'll need to run 'mount /dev/hda1' after adding the line, but it'll mount automatically from your next boot.

2. I have a 3com megahertz pcmcia modem that RH seems to have detected as just a standard modem, but it's dialling and handshaking fine (sound is on and I can hear the handshake).

Put 'debug' in the file /etc/ppp/options and keep an eye on /var/log/messages during or after a dial attempt. The option 'kdebug' might also help.

3. The desktop has a USR Sportster ext. and I read somewhere that you can't get linux drivers for it, but I don't know how old the article was.

Good old serial modems require no drivers. It should Just Work.

btw, does anyone know of a good resource with a list of shell (if thats the right term for it, remember, I'm new at this) commands?

http://rute.sourceforge.net/

vibe666

Longwood, you're a star! That should keep me going for a good while.

niallb

There's a booklet called
"Unix is a four letter word"
available from
http://unix.t-a-y-l-o-r.com/

It's a great starting point for shell use.

NiallB

vibe666

you're all goning to think that I'm a total plank, but I'm going to tell you anyway, cos I think it's a step in the right direction, and I'm acvtually quite proud of myself. :ninja:

I just looked up a bit of info and with a few shell commands, I now have my fat32 data partition and USB flash drive miounted and working fine.

the HD mounting wasn't quite as smooth as I had predicted, because the data partition was hda5, but with a little bit of guess work I got it going.

the USB flash drive was a little harder, but with a little googling I got it up and running fine.

Only thing standing in my way now is my net connection.

I can't figure out how to turn on the logging thing to check where my dial up connection is going wrong. is that the 'tail -s 3 -f /var/log/messages' shell command I was using to make sure my USB drive was being detected?

sorry for being a complete dope, but I'm starting to feel like I could actually make Linux into something I cpould use day to day and really don't want to give up at this stage.

thanks again.

edit: btw, I've emailed the guys at linux.ie with a view to doing sopme sort of blog or similar for people like myself who want to get started with linux to help them get over these first few bumps. thought it might be a good idea. I guess we'll see.

vibe666

OK, so this is me typing my first post in Mozilla on RH9.

Woohoo!

:rolleyes: well, it's exciting for me.:p

OK, still having a few teething problems though.

can only get my net connection going with the 'free' eircom number.

whenever I try it with my 1893 flatrate number it gives me 'CHAP authentication failed' which I'm guessing is a standard username/password error. thing is, I know it's the right info, so where am I going wrong? I have both connections set up identiacally, and the other connection works with the 1892 number in it, just not with the 1893 no.

i've called to double check my password, and have even tried it again in XP to make sure its working.

only thing I can think, is that something to do with the way it authenticates is incompatible with linux.

dunno. help pls. if poss.

also, how can I get root privelidges on my standard account? most of the stuff i try and do, it tells me i don't have permission.

also, i seem to have bunched my root login for gnome for some reason. anyone know how i could sort that out? every time i try and login, i get the message saying its logged me out in less than 10 seconds. is there somewhere i can find out why and how to fix it?

aaaaaarrrrgggghhhhh!

but at the same time, WOOHOO!

I'm getting there anyway.

zAbbo

congrats vibe666

you can go to comman line shell by pressing ctrl+alt +f1, then logout and login as root, then try startx and report any problems.

Might help. i prefare Mandrake to RH, i had variuos problems with RH

vibe666

sounds great, but you'll have to bear in mind that i don't even know the commands for logging in and out never mind all the other stuff.

sorry to be a pain, but step by step instructions would be a godsend if you could.

sorry.

zAbbo

when you`re at the shell

$logout

then it will ask for username and pass, you can login as root, and

$startx
starts the desktop manager

you can type the first few letters of the command and press the tab button.

Does RH not have a super user(root) terminal. It`s not advised to login as root and "startx"

If its a total pain i think you can use no password for root :eek:

niallb

Originally posted by vibe666

only thing I can think, is that something to do with the way it authenticates is incompatible with linux.
...
but at the same time, WOOHOO!
I'm getting there anyway.

Good for you.
Linux has no problem with UTV.
Do you by any chance have the same username with UTV
as you use with someone else?

Take a look at the file /etc/ppp/pap-secrets
It should have a line with your username and password in it.
Make sure they look right.
If you can find the log messages, they may have more details.
From a root terminal, type tail -f /var/log/messages
and watch it while you connect to the internet,
you might see where it's going wrong.

For a root terminal, just type su - in an xterm.
It'll prompt you for the root password.

What are you using to set up your connection?
I think kppp has a debug window option.

Have you tried to use wvdialconf from the command line (again as root).

As for gnome, are you clicking a box after logging in
that's asking you whether you want to continue?
(It might be saying [i["it's a bad idea"[/i])

Get back with a few more details,
should be easy enough.
You know you can connect, all your hardware
and the network is working.

Good luck,
NiallB

vibe666

i had the log thing going from the shell and when i log in as root it just logs me in, then straight back out again, without any errors at all.

As for the flatrate thing, it's eircom not UTV, but since its all the same under the surface I really can't see why it shouldn't work.

it might make things easier to fix if i could figure out how to give my user account the linux equiv. of admin rights (I'm guessing root privelidges) because at the moment it won't let me do anything logged in as me and as my root login isn't working for xwindows i'm having trouble getting things sorted.

now i know how to log out that might help a bit anyway.

yossarin

also, how can I get root priveliges on my standard account? most of the stuff i try and do, it tells me i don't have permission.

if you dont't want to keep su'ing in and out to root, then have a look at the sudo program - after you set it up you can run selected root owned programs using the prefix "sudo". e.g. "sudo wget 'www.superdonkeyporn.net'"

- like linux itself, its a tiny bit of hassle to set up, but once you have it its dead useful !

type "man sudo" from a shell to get info. It'll be installed on your system allready

vibe666

i just want to get basic day to day rights for my plain user account without having to do absolutely everything as root. how can i in crease my standard user rights to allow me to do this?

btw, i have no idea how, but I've got my flatrate working now. i just removed all the connecitons and started from scratch. seems OK now anyway.

a couple more things though.

1. is there something i can do to show that I'm online? similar to the dun icon in windows and mac. just an icon to indicate a connection.

2. is there any kind of bandwidth meter like DU Meter for Linux?

3. I'm going to need some sort of firewall. what would you recommend?

btw, i got my first rpm downloaded and installed today too (Opera). I'm actually starting to get somewhere now. :ninja:

Typedef

Originally posted by vibe666


3. I'm going to need some sort of firewall. what would you recommend?

iptables

run lokkit as root... it should do all the sweet stuff for you (assuming... you actually like your OS, doing such things).

vibe666

got lokkit going, but how do i know if it's doing anything? i know it's just closing off unused ports, but how do I know that it's doing it's job properly?

parasite

Originally posted by vibe666


1. is there something i can do to show that I'm online? similar to the dun icon in windows and mac. just an icon to indicate a connection.

yeah if you use kppp to dial in, it'll dock an icon into the 'system tray' and if you right click on it for statistics, you'll get a basic graph like dumeter, but not as good

Typedef

Originally posted by vibe666
got lokkit going, but how do i know if it's doing anything? i know it's just closing off unused ports, but how do I know that it's doing it's job properly?

You could always post your static ip address.

I could provide you with a quick smurf, for a reasonable price.

vibe666

or I could just bend over!