On Thu, 26 Jul 2001 19:40, John Rigby wrote:
> Hi Sridhar,
> This was specific to the fix from you re ONE of my problems.
> A lot of data to copy from an Email message into a "black screen".
> (*x commands are not intuitive! :-) )
You mean it isn't "intuitive" for a Windos user? Then you are correct. For
people who have been using *nix for a while this can be very intuitive.
Remember, this is _not_ Windos.
> As you know, I am trying to compose - eventually, a simplified
> startup and "gotcha" list for both New Newbies and ex-Doze Newbies
> and am rapidly coming to the conclusion that there won't be much
> difference!
First time computer users can generally learn an OS like GNU/Linux much
faster than a Windos user, since they don't expect everything to be like
Windos.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, I taught myself MS-DOS when I was three
years old. Since I had no previous conceptions on what an OS should be like,
I learned rather easily. I then took things in steps, learning Windos 3.1,
OS/2 Warp 3 and then Win9x with little trouble. When I tried MacOS, a very
user-friendly OS, I couldn't understand it, simply because it wasn't anything
like what I had tried before. The same thing initially happened with
GNU/Linux (in 1999). However, I kept an open mind, and now I find that I
can't understand the "logic" (if there is any) in Windos, my previous OS of
choice.
> The question was really aimed at doing the job simply as per the
> expectations of a Doze user and/or the reasonable expectations of a
> New User and that always will mean GUI, I'm afraid.
When it comes to troubleshooting problems, often you will _have_ to use the
command line. In Windos, if something goes wrong, the user has no way of
finding out what it is. This is because things are 100% graphical. As a
result, often the solution is to reinstall, and even this can't fix
everything.
> So that's what I meant. I knew cutnpaste wouldn't work. I was
> looking for a reasonable way via GUI.
When you select text with the mouse in GNU/Linux (either in the console or in
X), its contents are automatically placed in a clipboard. To paste, just aim
and middle-click. The Windos ctrl-x, ctrl-c and ctrl-v will also work in many
apps.
> So many critical jobs do require Su and I was looking for a simple
> way to do that on the front end for a situation like this.
kdesu is a graphical version of su. You can even make desktop icons ask for
the root password in a graphical dialogue box before they run their app. Its
syntax is simple:
$ kdesu -c command
More information can be found in your KDE documentation (if searching doesn't
work, install the htdig package) or by typing "man kdesu" in a terminal. Also
have a look at sudo, which can give root access without a password for a
limited amount of time.
> Further example: Xemacs.
> Unknown on my machine ( run command has no idea)
You obviously don't have every app known to humanity installed on your
system. You will need to install Xemacs if you want to use it (it is on one
of your Mandrake CDs). There are many other editors out there you can try --
some graphical, some console-based. In KDE, Kedit and Kwrite ("Advanced
Editor") are good. In GNOME, Gedit and GXedit are good as well.
> On Wed, 25 Jul 2001 21:15, you manipulated electrons to produce:
> > On Wed, 25 Jul 2001 19:32, John Rigby wrote:
> > > Hi folks,
> > > With MY memory I NEED cutnpaste.
> > > Can't do it on Emacs.
> >
> > What are you copying from? X has a clipboard, but it cannot share
> > it with apps loaded at the console (i.e. not just in a terminal
> > window). Have you tried Xemacs?
> >
> > > In M8 GUI how do we assign root/su permissions to a file like
> > > modules.conf?
> > > Esp. on a temp basis?
> >
> > If you mean /etc/modules.conf then it should already be owned by
> > root.
--
Sridhar Dhanapalan.
"There are two major products that come from Berkeley:
LSD and UNIX. We don't believe this to be a coincidence."
-- Jeremy S. Anderson
