My Linux Blog

2003-04-06T21:51:00.000-04:00

SuSE 8.1 up and running

I can't tell you how amazing the SuSE 8.1 installation is. It configured everything on my system with a minimum ammount of interaction. I've installed a Mozilla and now I'm getting GAIM working. Bottom line, however, is that SuSE 8.1 kicks serious ass.

2003-04-04T12:55:00.000-05:00

Side note
A friend of mine pointed out that today was not found... (4/04) Nice work, Raj.

2003-04-04T12:54:00.000-05:00

So I can't make up my mind
Well, I've decided to install SuSE after all. I guess I've let Red Hat run long enough now that I don't feel guilty about replacing it, even though it was so happy to configure itself. As previously mentioned, I've always been more of a SuSE man anyway, since it was my first non-Microsoft OS. And, honestly speaking, I feel that Red Hat is just the Microsoft of the Linux world anyway. I'm not running Linux because it's popular, so why run the most popular version of Linux? Anyway, I'm just about finished downloading the SuSE release 8.1, and now it's time to install.

2003-04-03T00:55:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:1st linux post

Well, I decided to not install SuSE after all. I rebooted into the Red Hat installation that I was planning on writing over, and it just took off like a jet, configured itself to the router downstairs, and told me it had found updates for itself. The little thing just seemed so happy to serve me and ready to go. How can I say no to a computer and operating system trying to be so friendly. I think this installation of Linux might be here to stay.

2003-04-02T23:27:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:Cable Modem Fun

Well, I had actually bought a copy of Red Hat 7.3 from Staples the other day (for the hight price of one US penny) and have it installed now, but with the cable modem that I had installed today, I've decided that, seeing how I've always been more of a SuSE man, I'm going to see if I can get an ftp install of SuSE 8.1 working. Funny how the reason I started using Linux was that I was sick of installing Windows, and now all I seem to do is install Linux. Never fear, I think that this next install might be the one that will stick. Hopefully the next entry will be from a Linux box.

2003-03-19T22:47:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:Core Linux running like a dream

Good stuff, good stuff. Core Linux is up and running on the new hard drive. Here is a breakdown of exactly what was done:

fdisk run to create the swap partition and the / partition

mke2fs run to create file system on / partition, mkswap run to create swap partition

new file systems were mounted and the Core install shell script was run

edited the new /etc/profile file to include the proper paths

chrooted into the new file system (How sexy. I've always wanted to use this command.)

compiled a kernel from the 2.4.20 release and moved it into place

updated the new fstab

updated rc.si and rc.ha (to turn off swap file)

That was enough to get Core up and running. After that, I increased the number of virtual consoles from 3 to 6 and partitioned the remaining hard drive space for /usr and /home. Now it's time to beef things up a bit. Downloading rpm now, and then who knows what.

2003-03-18T23:34:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:This is turning into a bad habit

I wonder if you are as sick of reading about me downloading the 2.4.20 kernel half as much as I am of actually downloading it. I think I might keep a copy of the tarball this time, just incase I should ever need it again. Yea, so 2.4.20 is downloaded for what must be the world record 3rd time. It wouldn't bug me so much if the damn thing wasn't 32.3 MB. Ok, enough of me complaining about my own lack pack-rat-ishness. Time to get cracking on some serious linux configuration. Core, here I come.

2003-03-17T21:36:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:simply put: no crap.

'ello again. After a wonderful meal of B-B-Q'ed hamburgers made my yours truly (and if you doubt me I'll prove it by sticking my arms out the window and waving in your direction, as I still smell like a fire), time to settle into some linux fun. I've recently discovered a distro called core linux and I'm going to give it a go on my brand-new-somewhat-state-of-the-art 40GB hard drive. Could be fun "building" my own distro from "scratch." I'll let you know how it turns out.

2003-03-09T20:15:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:Lay off me, alright! I've been busy!

Ok, since people were starting to complain that I have not updated this in quite some time, I guess it might be time to, eh? Here is what I've been able to accomplish since the last post:

Updated gcc from version 2.7.2.7 to 2.95. Sadly, that's the highest version I can get to compile. Still working on it, though.

xfree86 version 2.4.0 is up and running, and, IMHO, looking quite nice. Right now I'm using KDE as a window manager, but I'm thinking about using fvwm2, just because I've always loved it. There's a special place in you heart for your first window manager. You always remember it.

Honestly, that's about all that's been done. Been a bit on the busy side, what with the job hunt and all. The good news is, I have a standing job offer. The bad news is, now I'll have to go back to work.

2003-02-24T03:54:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:All night session

Can't sleep, might as well work on Linux. Finally completed installation of net-tools, so there is one headache out of the way. I got kernel modules working and have re-compiled the kernel to make the file systems of fat, vfat, minux, NTFS, NFS, and NFS server modules. Plan on recompiling as many kernels as possilbe. I'm curious how small I can get the kernel. As for now, I'm finishing up the last of the download on xfree86. Hopefully before dawn that will be working too.

2003-02-23T16:26:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:On again, off again

Well, the patern is developing. First one bad day, then one good, then (yesterday) bad again. Guess that means that today will be productive. Here's a recap:

Silly me forgot to check the deps on net-tools, So I have to go get some. I'm dumb.

To compile xfree myself proved to be too much for my experience. Because of this, I'm now downloading the binaries.

One thing did go right, however. I was able to add a new partition for the user home directory. That's better than nothing, I guess.

2003-02-22T15:08:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:net-tools update

Still working on downloading version 4.2.0 of xfree86, but in the meantime I figured it would be a good idea to update the (rather aged) version of net-tools to newer version 1.60-7. I've also made note that I need to get an update of RPM itself to version 4.0.2, but that will have to be done another day. Since that only took just a few minutes to download, I've since caught up on various slashdot stories, wich is always good time spent. Likewise, I've caught up on e-mail and now I'm doing the same with newsgroups. Nothing like a flood of information to start a weekend off right.

2003-02-21T23:26:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:2.4.20 kernel up and running

Second time is a charm, I guess. Today/this evening's work was much more productive than yesterday. Since previous post, I've been able to get a fairly clean kernel working. There was some issue with a line in the Makefile for ACPI and OSPM, so in true hack fashion I simply commented the pesky things out. Maybe not the safest and most stable way of fixing a problem, but it seems to have worked. I fought for several hours trying to get the USB keyboard and mouse to work, but regardless of all my effort, it never got going. I instead swapped the USB keyboard and mouse for an ATX style keyboard and a serial mouse from the Windows box that sits beside me. Both keyboard and mouse are now working, although I feel a bit like I cheated. There are still two main issues that I'm dealing with (as far as the kernel, that is):

Complaints regarding file system of 'devpts' not being supported by kernel.

modprobe is running during the boot process, even though I currently don't have module support compiled into the kernel.

These I'll still be working toward, however more important issues, such as getting xfree86 running, are going to be solved first. Currently I'm grabbing version 4.2.0 from ftp.xfree86.org. Once again, due to this being over a 56K connection, it will take some time.

2003-02-21T14:02:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:Note to self

Start a telco and provide myself with high speed internet service, that way next time I need to download a kernel, it won't take two hours. Time to watch some History Channel. They have some Civil War programming on this afternoon/evening.

2003-02-21T13:15:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:Making with the download.

Downloading the 2.4.20 kernel... again... so that it can replace the 2.2.7 kernel... again...

Spent the night finishing up the novel The Alienist by Caleb Carr. Good stuff. A bit morbid, but it needs to be, based on the context of the book. I quite enjoyed.

2003-02-21T01:10:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:Total waste of an evening.

Yea, tonight wasn't as productive as I had hoped, partly due to the fact that I took off two hours to watch MASH. (Highly suggest you see it if you've never.) When I was getting work done, here's what happened:

Had to recompile the old 2.2.7 kernel to support fat and vfat, as the new kernel was sitting in the root directory of my windows drive.

After the first (clean) compile of the 2.4.20, lilo didn't want to configure due to the drive crossing the 1024th cyl. (Odd that it didn't have an issue with this before)

Due to above, took time to move the partitions around with pqmagic.

Had to boot from floppy image of 2.2.7 due to lilo not being properly configured above.

First good clean compile of 2.4.20 completed, however I forgot to include USB support. No USB support, no USB keyboard support. Forced to hard reboot.

Much to my surprise, only ended up getting two small Inode errors on the fsck when I rebooted using the floppy of 2.2.7

Started to recompile with USB, but kept getting pesky errors with NFS filesystem area. Decided to remove NFS support and mess with it later.

Now it was the PCI bus that started giving me trouble. Decided again to change the config to simply ignore all PCI devices, but it still give me the error.

Finally broke down and decided to download 2.4.20 again (as I foolishly deleted the compressed file before, something that will not happen a second time) and start from scratch. Something strange is going on.

Since I can't stand a system that will not boot, I copied my backup of the old 2.2.7 kernel back and verified that it would boot, which it did. (Wish I had backed up the source for the 2.4.20 kernel... Grumble, grumble, grumble.)

And that's about how the night went. After 4 hours of on and off work, I've succeded in nothing more than getting the 2.2.7 kernel to support fat and vfat file systems, which was something I finished in the first 15 minutes. Nice, eh?

Well, I'm off to bed. I'm considering buying some USB -> PS2 converters tomorrow to fix the USB issues, but can't figure out if that would be cheating or not.

2003-02-20T21:02:00.000-05:00

UPDATE: Linux kernel 2.4.20 download complete.

Well, in just a shade under two hours I've managed to get the new kernel downloaded. Now it's time to put it to good use.

2003-02-20T20:10:00.000-05:00

UPDATE: Still downloading linux kernel 2.4.20.

Ok, this is taking forever and I'm starting to get bored. I thought I would add a note saying that if anyone would like to get in touch with me to offer some friendly encouragement, feel free to at brock201@hotmail.com.

2003-02-20T19:43:00.000-05:00

So far, I've been able to get SUSE 6.1 installed, but it's such an old version that I've decided to first get a new kernel. Currently I'm downloading kernel version 2.4.20 which, at the time, is the latest stable version. More to come.

2003-02-20T19:41:00.000-05:00

Since Microsoft decided to give me the birthday present of Windows crashing, I've vowed to make my life goal to never use a Microsoft OS ever again. I intended to download a distro of linux, but seeing how I live in the middle of nowhere, it would have been done over a modem connection. I found, lucky me, a copy of SUSE 6.1 and decided that it would be a lot more fun to install that and build it from there into something I can use.

For anyone interested, below are all of my system specs:
Intel Celeron 266
160M RAM
Adaptec AIC-7850 PCI SCSI Controller
->Matshita CD-R CW-7502
Rage Fury Pro/Xpert 2000 Pro
Lucent Win Modem [ This will be fun to get working. :-) ]
USB keyboard and optical mouse
Soundblaster 16