On Thursday 04 Jul 2002 10:48 am, Harrigan, Vaughn wrote: > Hello, > > I'm new to the Linux world and I've been trying to get used to it. I > like the capabilities that it offers. I bought Mandrake 8.2, because I > didn't know anything and it said it was easy to install. Which is was. My > question is... How do I install software onto my computer? I've tried > downloading BTERM, because I need a good telnet session for my work. Once > it was been downloaded, I found it on my Desktop (file system), not ( > Desktop ), but I couldn't get it to do anything. Probally because lack of > understanding, but it's frustrating. > Is there software (drivers) for DVD's. The computer I am currently using > has this and I would like to use it if possible. > One last question. Mandrake included a lot of Installation sources and > commercial software. How do I know what to install ( not knowing the naming > convention that is given to all the RPM's ) and once it is installed, how > do I find it? I installed what was said to be Common C++, but I can't find > it. Please help. > > Thank you for your time. > > Vaughn E. Harrigan
Welcome.. Hope you enjoy the power of your new environment. It is new and confusing, but hopefully you will find it fun. If you prefer to use a GUI environment the best way to install software from your CDs is using Mandrakes Software Manager Just click on Mandrake Control Centre>System>Software from here you can browse through all the packages both installed and uninstalled The 'Files' Tab on the right allows you to see where the files from that package are/would be, and the little question mark on the top line tells you if the files are actually present or not when you click on it. The 'Brief' Tab gives you a text description of what the package does. I do not recommend downloading and installing any application which is not a 'Mandrake RPM package' There are over 3000 applications on your install CDs so the probability of your needing something not on the CDs is quite low (for the moment) So for example you want a Telnet client. On your CDs is gnome-telnet ktelnet telnet-server-krb5 and telnet-client-krb5 Simply searching for 'telnet' in Software Manager will find these. When you install them they will appear in your KMenu. When you first run Software Manager it will nag you to define a security update source. It will fetch a list of sources and you just pick one. Some are frankly very slow. I always use sunet.se because it is fast and reliable. You should press the 'Mandrake Update' button every now and again so it can search the web for security updates and bug fixes. Unlike Microsoft the Linux world is very open about security hazards and publishes fixes very quickly. If you cannot find what you need on the CDs then search at www.rpmfind.net You will find thousands of Mandrake RPM packages there. (Avoid ones marked 'Cooker', They are 'bleeding edge' packages intended for the next release of Mandrake) Just clicking on an RPM on a web page using konqueror browser will cause it to be downloaded and installed. But beware.. Some RPMs have dependencies on other RPMs. When you install from CD using Software Manager these will be automatically installed at the same time. When you install from the web it is up to you to locate and install any required dependency. If you do not know the name of packages you want to install then do a linux google search http://www.google.com/linux? using keywords of what you want to do and you will get lots of hits. As for the commercial Software... well the only one I ever install is the Opera browser (which if you have not tried in the Windows world you really should :-). And there is a newer version of that available online. (Get the RPM with static QT) I think the commercial CDs also contain Acrobat reader and Nvidia drivers. Again there are newer versions available on-line. Have fun derek
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