New User needs Help...

MetalheadGautham · 2008-07-27 14:59:32

Hello Everybody!

I am MetalheadGautham, a guy who has been using linux since May 2007, and linux made me what I am - a guy with an attitude, from a n00b who couldn't use his brains thanks to windows. I migrated from Ubuntu 7.04, my first distro, to Ubuntu 8.04 on may 2008 then within a few weeks, I got rid of that horrible piece of bloatware. Then I installed Debian Lenny, and then migrated to Sidux in just a couple of days, when I heard lenny was about to go on a suspended animation soon.;)

I installed arch a week back, since even debian sid was proving too slow for my hardware, and I think its the best linux distro ever. Period. Its so simple to use, everything can be done so very easily, that I think even Ubuntu was much much harder to use than arch. But I still have lots of unsolved issues, since I am still a newbie (depending on how far you stretch the defination of the word "newbie").

1. Hardware

I have a Pentium 4 "Prescott" 2.66GHz processor (not the HT technology model), 256MB DDR 400MHz RAM, Intel D915GLVG motherboard with onboard Intel GMA 900 Video and RealTek ALC880 Audio. I hope you see that this is certainly not the best system in the world... I run KDEmod on this. So far, except for Firefox hanging, I have found no issues. Any advice on running arch on this ugly baby ?

2. IceDE

I am trying to create a full DE using IceWM, called IceDE. I want to make lightweight easy to use apps, either simple commandline like nano or curses based terminal apps or light gui apps available for use on this. So far I use EmelFM as file manager, DFM for desktop icons, nano for text editing and xterm for terminal. I need some more apps, mainly a media player. Please suggest a good light weight all-format-supported media player for this environment.

3. AUR and Pacman

I need a good GUI client for Pacman. I heard of aorut or something. How good is it and is it a native KDEmod app ? And is there a simpler way to install stuff from AUR other than visiting the site each time ? Is there some AUR client ? And does anyone know some good commandline pacman game ?

4. Konqueror issues

Konqueror can't use WYSIWYG editing mode in vBulletin. If I press and hold the down arrow in a text box, I can't reach the end of the text I am typing. I need some adblock filters for doubleclick, ad.yeildmanager, google, yahoo, etc. Please help. I want to replace firefox completely.

5. Doccumentation

Can someone please link me to some good .txt files containing well formatted doccumentation I can read with less while in commandline mode ? I need all the doccumentation I can use, since without that as a newbie I can get seriously screwed on this distro. I want one for newbies, pacman, kdemod, aourt, AUR, fstab, rc.conf and most importantly, kernel compiling. Files with formatted coloured text to help see things more clearly will be welcome. And why doesn't arch place the doccumentation files anywhere in the OS after installing ? I had to copy the wiki manually via another live CD to my /home directory in order to finish my configuring.

rooloo · 2008-07-27 15:46:28

3. AUR and Pacman
I need a good GUI client for Pacman. I heard of aorut or something. How good is it and is it a native KDEmod app ? And is there a simpler way to install stuff from AUR other than visiting the site each time ? Is there some AUR client ? And does anyone know some good commandline pacman game ? big_smile

it's not GUI and it's called yaourt. Fortunately you only need to visit the AUR once and use makepkg to build yaourt. Then once installed you can use yaourt like pacman and install stuff directly from AUR using yaourt in terminal. Yaourt is a wrapper for pacman that gives AUR functionality.

5. Doccumentation

You could try

man man
man pacman
man yaourt
man rc.conf
man fstab

or how about the wiki? Did you see the links at the top of the page?
http://wiki.archlinux.org/

Last edited by rooloo (2008-07-27 15:53:58)

tigrmesh · 2008-07-27 15:48:34

For pacman, do
man pacman

rooloo · 2008-07-27 15:52:26

btw,

makepkg, AUR, and ABS are discussed extensively in the wiki.

skottish · 2008-07-27 15:58:47

Welcome to the forums MetalheadGautham.

Most WMs will get the best out of your system, including Ice. Openbox is a good choice here at Arch. You'll get tons of helpful advice for that one; Just about everyone loves Openbox here. I've used E17 on a machine with far lower specs than yours with excellent results. In fact, it's all I use on both of my computers. Just don't use the default theme, you'd be at risk of random vomiting!

As far as a media player goes: Xine is very lightweight and can play most formats. Mplayer and VLC are a bit heavier but play more formats, and both will do well on machines less powerful than yours. MPD is a great choice for music. I use Sonata as a front end and love it. The combination is extremely lightweight.

Last edited by skottish (2008-07-27 16:00:10)

mcmillan · 2008-07-27 16:09:46

Since you asked about a gui app and yaourt isn't what you're looking for you might want to look at shaman. It's made by the same people involved in making kdemod, and they've done a nice job of integrating it with kde4.

Square · 2008-07-27 19:35:36

When it comes to hardware, you're ok on everything. I would suggest upgrading your RAM if you get a chance however, for 256MB could put you at a snag every once and a while (Especially if using a DE). About 512MB is perfect IMO, for a basic desktop, and could greatly improve overall performance.

Last edited by Square (2008-07-27 19:36:27)

floke · 2008-07-27 20:06:42

More ram.

peets · 2008-07-27 22:31:17

I suggest that you learn to enjoy your shell (bash, zsh, fish, ...) It's my quick and scriptable file manager. I find it fun to use.

MetalheadGautham · 2008-07-28 01:26:17

rooloo wrote:

3. AUR and Pacman
I need a good GUI client for Pacman. I heard of aorut or something. How good is it and is it a native KDEmod app ? And is there a simpler way to install stuff from AUR other than visiting the site each time ? Is there some AUR client ? And does anyone know some good commandline pacman game ? big_smile
it's not GUI and it's called yaourt. Fortunately you only need to visit the AUR once and use makepkg to build yaourt. Then once installed you can use yaourt like pacman and install stuff directly from AUR using yaourt in terminal. Yaourt is a wrapper for pacman that gives AUR functionality.
5. Doccumentation
You could try
man man
man pacman
man yaourt
man rc.conf
man fstab
or how about the wiki? Did you see the links at the top of the page?
http://wiki.archlinux.org/

yaorut ? I guess thats the one. I don't need GUIs. I just need something better. I am pretty comfortable with commandline.

rooloo wrote:

btw,
makepkg, AUR, and ABS are discussed extensively in the wiki.

yes they are, but I need text only version browsable from commandline init 3 using less. And man pages don't make the cut - they are not sufficiently newbie friendly since they lack advices and tips.

skottish wrote:

Welcome to the forums MetalheadGautham.
Most WMs will get the best out of your system, including Ice. Openbox is a good choice here at Arch. You'll get tons of helpful advice for that one; Just about everyone loves Openbox here. I've used E17 on a machine with far lower specs than yours with excellent results. In fact, it's all I use on both of my computers. Just don't use the default theme, you'd be at risk of random vomiting!
As far as a media player goes: Xine is very lightweight and can play most formats. Mplayer and VLC are a bit heavier but play more formats, and both will do well on machines less powerful than yours. MPD is a great choice for music. I use Sonata as a front end and love it. The combination is extremely lightweight.

IceWM is simply THE LIGHTEST I have ever seen. It uses lesser ram than fluxbox which uses lesser ram than openbox. Along with that, its got great features - flag+space to run a command of your choice, a network monitor, a cpu load monitor, a tray, workspaces, easy to edit menus, etc. Its simply THE best. Thats why I didn't install the LXDE based OpenBox and decided to create my own IceDE just for the fun of it.

I have been thinking of Xine MPlayer and VLC, but I need something commandline. I remember that launching vlc via (I guess) ncurses-vlc or something launches the ncurses version. I don't know the same for MPlayer and Xine. Which uses the least resources while in commandline ? And I don't want mpd since I want to keep things as simple as possible, with ONE APP PER TASK approach.

mcmillan wrote:

Since you asked about a gui app and yaourt isn't what you're looking for you might want to look at shaman. It's made by the same people involved in making kdemod, and they've done a nice job of integrating it with kde4.

Sounds good. But I doubt I will be using it most of the time since I love working from init 3. Is there a (n)curses client for pacman, the way aptitude exists for apt-get ?

Square wrote:

When it comes to hardware, you're ok on everything. I would suggest upgrading your RAM if you get a chance however, for 256MB could put you at a snag every once and a while (Especially if using a DE). About 512MB is perfect IMO, for a basic desktop, and could greatly improve overall performance.

I am thinking of getting myself another gig of ram on 2nd of august (the sunday). Will it help run KDE4 without issues ?

And will my onboard gpu become better if I up its vram from the current 12mb to 192mb ? (after adding a gig ofcourse).

peets wrote:

I suggest that you learn to enjoy your shell (bash, zsh, fish, ...) It's my quick and scriptable file manager. I find it fun to use.

I am trying... its fun... but I have still not managed to COMPLETELY replace a file manager with the shell due to various obvious reasons (like speed while using).

skottish · 2008-07-28 02:59:17

MetalheadGautham wrote:

I have been thinking of Xine MPlayer and VLC, but I need something commandline. I remember that launching vlc via (I guess) ncurses-vlc or something launches the ncurses version. I don't know the same for MPlayer and Xine. Which uses the least resources while in commandline ? And I don't want mpd since I want to keep things as simple as possible, with ONE APP PER TASK approach.

MPlayer works from the command line without a GUI also. On not sure how that works on build of gmplayer though. I disabled the GUI on my builds and use smplayer for watching videos. I'm fairly certain that xine does it also. Of the three xine is without a doubt the lightest.

The Avatar of Time · 2008-07-28 07:43:41

Just thought that I would add this about Yaourt:

If you don't want to use makepkg to install it you can add one of these (depending on your architecture) to your '/etc/pacman.conf':

[archlinuxfr]
Server = http://repo.archlinux.fr/i686

[archlinuxfr]
Server = http://repo.archlinux.fr/x86_64

I put mine at the very bottom of said file.

Then a simple 'pacman -Sy yaourt' should do the trick.

This thread has most all the information that you could need about Yaourt:

http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=25718

They say it's better to build yaourt yourself, just so you get the hang of doing that sort of thing, but never the less this is a nice alternative. Hope it helps.

The Avatar of Time · 2008-07-28 07:58:16

Oh, also:

I am trying... its fun... but I have still not managed to COMPLETELY replace a file manager with the shell due to various obvious reasons (like speed while using). sad

Have you tried Midnight Commander for a file manager (pacman -S mc)?

It's a terminal based, dual pane file manager. It takes a bit of getting used to, but I have grown quite fond of it. It can be configured to open your different file extensions with whatever program you prefer. You do have to edit a text file for that though.

Also if you do use it I prefer to launch it with 'mc -b' for a black and white interface since I find the color scheme a bit annoying.

I need some more apps, mainly a media player. Please suggest a good light weight all-format-supported media player for this environment.

I am quite fond of VLC. Not sure if it is lightweight enough for you, but I don't see a problem running it.

Otherwise I would say MPlayer, which I am almost starting to prefer over VLC, though VLC is probably 'easier' to use. Never been real fond of Xine, but that doesn't mean there is anything wrong with it.

***Just noticed that you had already mentioned VLC not working for your needs. That being the case MPlayer would definitely be my recommendation.

Also if you need a messenger, and like terminal based apps, give CenterIM a try (pacman -S centerim). It's a nice little app.

Finch (pacman -S finch) is perhaps a more functional app, but CenterIM is certainly the better looking one. Finch is almost identical to Pidgin, except terminal based. I guess it is in fact a 'sister app' or something of the sort.

Enjoy.

Last edited by The Avatar of Time (2008-07-28 08:05:05)

Garns · 2008-07-28 08:24:05

MetalheadGautham wrote:

rooloo wrote:
btw,
makepkg, AUR, and ABS are discussed extensively in the wiki.
yes they are, but I need text only version browsable from commandline init 3 using less. And man pages don't make the cut - they are not sufficiently newbie friendly since they lack advices and tips.

Have you taken a look at a text based browser? Like ELinks, links or lynx. It might not work for everything, but I think the wiki is very readable in Elinks.

Regarding mplayer, playing music in cli works like a charm with the gmplayer build.

rooloo · 2008-07-28 09:28:03

The whole wiki is not in a easily readable format for a pager like less, but as I understand it, the beginners guide is on the new ISO cd. Should be able to read that with a pager like less.

I am not sure how the dev's got the beginners guide onto the CD, but I am sure no one re-wrote the whole guide just for the CD.

MetalheadGautham · 2008-07-28 16:41:40

lets see...

1. I too love VLC, but I use VLC QT4 edition nightlie builds, not wx-vlc. But I don't know how is ncurses-vlc.

2. I tried midnight commander once but its a bit too... unfriendly. plain shell is much better.

3. so xine it is. I trust win32codecs are named win32codecs itself ? if not, whats the right package name ?

4. Aorut - source - where - located ?

5. I finished the beginners guide long back. I need advanced guide now. But language still needs to be simple.

6. Messenger ? No, I prefer IRC. So I use irssi. It rocks.

Finally:

1. Is there a way I can play Kolf game online ? I would love to challenge some friends when I am free. And I also want a good chess program to help me remaster the game.

2. Is there any alternative to konsole ? I seriously think that it sucks. And mine even lacks a menu bar. No idea why. I loved gnome terminal, but I don't want to bloat my system with gtk libraries.

Misfit138 · 2008-07-28 16:50:25

2. pacman -S terminal

rooloo · 2008-07-28 16:54:14

4. Aorut - source - where - located ?

There is no such thing.

MetalheadGautham · 2008-07-29 00:40:02

^^ guess it was yaourt (screw the name)

Anyway, KDEmod4 is out right ? Should I proceed with installation ? On my configuration ?

11010010110 · 2008-07-29 10:28:24

Wellcome to Arch !

Your box is ok to run Arch. I run Arch on 2 pentium 3s (1000 and 450 MHz 256 M ram i810 and voodoo3 video) with KDE 3.5 and it runs ok on the 1000 / i810 and allmost the same on the 450 / voodoo

Plain unaccelerated 2D (like what i have on the i810) will work if a bitmap of your screen (resolution * color depth) fits in the video memory. For composite / 3D / etc you will need more. After some amount of memory adding more will have no or allmost no effect. I think this amount is ~ 64 - 128 for i900 but you experiment with it. Or set to the maximum and forget

The hanging is probably not cause of the box. Try to find which apps make freeze - if glxgears or video players freeze its direct rendering problem and so on

To me Konqueror never supported wysiwyg (I didnt interest in it either)

For adblock there are image blocker and popup blocker in the settings. For flash my solution is to not install flash at all

Try man:whatever in Konqueror instead of the terminal

Right click in Konsole and configure it to whatever you want

FFMPEG does great work. No need anymore in win32codecs for most users

11010010110 · 2008-07-29 10:30:30

I think your box is ok for KDE 4.1 too. If you upgrade ram it will be for sure

MetalheadGautham · 2008-07-29 11:28:28

can I have some speed comparisons between KDEmod4.1, Gnome 2.23.5, Xfce and LXDE ?

robertoprs · 2009-03-02 00:38:57

To listen to music, mocp is a nice choice. It's a console music player. I haven't had any issue with it and it is amazingly easy to learn and use.

sudo pacman -S moc

To run it:

mocp

To get all the commands you need, type 'h'.

Last edited by robertoprs (2009-03-02 00:39:48)

Runiq · 2009-03-02 06:38:00

You can use links to dump the formatted output of a website to a textfile, this should help you with less. (I'm in a hurry, otherwise I'd look for the command now... I suppose it's in the manpage anyways. Other text-based browsers like w3m can do this too.) If you do a bit of sed magic, you can also get rid of all the wiki tags like "[Edit]" and the likes. Voilà, textbook wiki.

Plus, if you think IceWM is lightweight, you gotta give dwm a try.

Arch Linux

#1 2008-07-27 14:59:32

New User needs Help...

#2 2008-07-27 15:46:28

Re: New User needs Help...

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