On Thu, 11 Jan 2001 16:53:57 -0500, Clarence Verge wrote:
OT? in the subject line? How is Arachne OT?
> I took the defaults and it
> didn't complain, but I seem to recall that the instruction for launching
> was unclear. I viewed the install script to get a refresher on what it
> might have said but that was also unclear.
> I mean, I tried to do whatever it suggested and nothing useful happened.
> I also tried typing "arachne" while root in root dir and various other dirs
> that seemed reasonable and NOTHING. Actually, I believe the Linux message
> was "No such file or directory".
That error would seem to indicate that either /usr/bin isn't in
your path, or arachne ended up somewhere besides where you think
it did. What happens when you type "which arachne" ?
And as I mentioned before, which directory you're in isn't relevant.
If /usr/bin is in your path, and arachne is in /usr/bin, then
you can type "arachne" from anywhere.
Another thing that should perhaps be mentioned in the
install procedure docs, is that you might have to set vgalib
for your card. This will be in /etc/vga/libvga.config.
Check that either your specific card, or VESA is uncommented.
If you have S3 Virge, uncomment VESA. Also, make sure the
correct mouse is uncommented.
> Same result. But now, in mc I think I found another copy of arachne-svgalib.
> This makes the total number three copies of the same file.
> They appear to be different physical copies because the hex locations are
> different as displayed by mc.
I untarred the tarball in /opt. All files will be in the
arachne subdirectory there. The install script copies them
to their "proper" places in the Linux file heirarchy. Once
copied/installed, you can delete the arachne directory from
wherever you opened the tarball.
As you've noted, Linux doesn't keep all files in the same
directory. Since it's a multi-user OS, it wouldn't make sense
for each user to have his own copy. Imagine 100 copies of
Arachne on a multi-user machine! This is why global
configuration files go in /etc and user configuration files
go in each user's home directory.
> However, there seems to be SO MUCH duplication of files and directories that
> I am beginning to believe that it is unreal, and the directory tree has
> side linkages to other directories, and I'm seeing the same files through
> different paths. Otherwise, why are there so many /usr branchs and so many
> /lib and /slib and /bin branches ?
You should see two copies of everything... in different
directory structures. Delete the entire ../arachne-1.66b
directory if you want. It's just there for installation.
Other than that, you'll see an .arachne directory in each
user directory, where all the user files will reside.
If you have more than that, maybe you've installed it
multiple times using different target directories?
> Grrr.
> The most useful information came from selecting .arachne in mc and hitting
> ENTER.
The only .arachne I can think of would be a directory.
Selecting it in mc should have shown you the contents of
the directory.
> The screen went blank (black) with a cursor in upper left and some
> disk activity. I waited a reasonable amount of time after disk activity
> stopped and there was no change on the screen. I couldn't get back to mc
> so I did altF2 to get another console to see if it would work and it did.
> AltF1 took me back to the initial console and there was mc, working !
Strange! Sounds like a bug in mc. What version is included
with pygmy? (RH 6.2 ships with v. 4.5.42 ... I do recall earlier
versions were kind of buggy)
> Exit took me to the Pygmy prompt and I could see the messages from Linux
> on the screen. Something like Error at line 7 of arachne-svgalib* no such
> command.
Again, this sounds like a path problem. You *know*
arachne-svgalib does actually exist.
> Nothing finds the overlooked steps or twisted logic as fast as a newbie. <G>
You'll need to twist your DOS logic a bit more before it
becomes Linux logic. ;-)
- Steve
-- Arachne V1.69, NON-COMMERCIAL copy, http://arachne.cz/
