Installing TKnet - where to unpack it?
I'm setting up my Debian GNU/Linux system the hard way. By that I mean that I'm adding just the packages that I need, one at a time using the dpkg tool. It's worked OK for basic stuff like man and the Xwindows packages. So far, I like the control this give me over what goes on my system. It's a bit time consuming but that's OK. Now I'm ready to install my first non-package piece of software, TKnet. I've downloaded the tknet1_1.tgz file from the TKnet site onto a floppy and now I'm ready to install. Where is the preferred place to install TKnet? There's a directory called /usr/local/bin on my system. I believe I read somewhere that putting non-Debian-supplied software there helps in maintenance down the road one day. OTOH, I also vaguely remember reading that /usr/local is for software on my particular machine that isn't in a shared-mount directory such as /usr is in some workgroup environments. Bottom line. Where would be the most standard place to put that .tgz file and unpack it? And what reasons, if any, are there to even worry about where it goes? Maybe I'm just being paranoid (my understanding of Unix in general and Linux is particular is very lacking). -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] .
Linux Standard File System
I've seen references a couple of times to something like a Linux Standard File System (of course, now I can't quite locate the document(s) where I saw it). Is that a document that exists somewhere like HOWTO or similar? A pointer would be appreciated. -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] .
/home, /usr/local, / and /whatelse?
Thanks to pointers from replies to my earlier messages about dselect, I now understand how to install software on Debian. The key is to use dpkg and install things without the whole dselect rigamarole. The biggest discovery I've made is the list of packages on the Debian web site. That lets you point and click your way through all the packages you think you want and examine their dependancies. That makes dpkg a piece of cake (once I read the FAQ, of course - amazing how much that helps ;-). As soon as I get my hands on a Debian 1.2.8 CD distribution (has anyone used the Greenbush service? 18 bucks for three monthly 2-CD sets seems like a bargain) I'm ready to install Linux for real and start using it. I've read The Linux Partition mini-HOWTO, which is excellent but mostly covers stuff in detail that I already knew at least in a general sense. What I need to know is the canonical set of mount points or file systems or whatever they're called. In the past, Unix systems I've used have been pretty monolithic - everything in one or two partitions (plus swap). This may not be optimum. In particular, I see references to /usr/local (whatever that is) and /home (that one I'm familiar with from workstations I used years ago) being on their own partitions - separate from the root and swap partitions. Is there a HOWTO or something that outlines the current conventional wisdom about partitions? If not, can somebody clue me in as to what /usr/local and so forth are used for and why they might be separate. It seems like it may have something to do with sofware that you keep up to date with the Debian package system (most everything I need) as opposed to stuff you compile yourself since it isn't available in a .deb package (at least a couple things I know I'll need fall in this category). I don't want a dozen partitions (wouldn't fit on my one 3.2GB disk anyway) but I also don't want to combine stuff that is hard to sort out later. - Brent Hutto [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] .
Doing the dselect portion of an installation
I apologize in advance for asking a tedious newbie-style question, but a couple hours reading FAQ lists, newsgroup archives and the last couple months of the archive of this mailing list still doesn't help me put it all together. This week I've done test installations of RedHat 4.1, Slackware 3.1, FreeBSD and the bo distribution of Debian. I had CD's for RedHat and Slackware but attempted to do the Debian release by downloading the floppy images and then putting the base, libs, net and x11 directories on a FAT partition on my hard disk drive. At first I attributed the confusion surrounding my use of dselect to the fact that I didn't have a whole image of the CD on my disk partition. After doing some reading, though, it appears that everyone has this problem when they try their first Debian installation. Is there a document some where that walks me through an example of installing a few packages at a time after a new installation? Once I get my hands on a Debian CD-ROM I'd like to do the basic installation and then add only a handful of things to my system. For instance, initially I'd put the following on my system: 1) enough of the compilers and libraries to build my own kernel, 2) XFree86 and a couple of window managers to try out, 3) just enough networking to dial my PPP ISP and do ftp, telnet and mail, 4) the Xemacs package, 5) LaTeX and maybe LyX. And being the conservative type that I am, I'd prefer to do these one at a time and in roughly that order. Of course, there a other nice applications I'll need to do my real work on the machine (xlisp-stat, g77, Maple, web browser, etc.) but I first want to get a basic system running and hammer on it enough to be convinced it is reliable and suited to my tasks at hand. Does each step in the process mean sorting through the package descriptions and figuring out what I need, then running several dependency-solving iterations through dselect until the messages stop? Or is there some grouping method that I missed (reading the deity discussion leads me to believe no such thing currently exists)? One reason I'm considering Debian rather than RedHat or Slackware is that I like to exercise control over what goes on my system. OTOH, I'm not infinitely patient in trying to get a usable system (that implies networking a X windows) up and running. Oh, and one final query. Is the Greenbush source as good as any for getting Debian CD's? Seems like a good deal w.r.t. being up to date and reasonably priced. -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] .
