Posts Tagged 'suse'

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Category: SuSE 9.0 reviews

Published on Thursday, 26 August 2004 00:00

Written by Administrator

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www.newsforge.com SuSE Linux 9 November 13 2003 SuSE Linux 9, the latest release from Nuremberg, Germany-based SuSE Linux, was released at the end of last month. I put SuSE Linux Professional through its paces, and found it to be the most user-friendly Linux distribution on the market. It's not a "must" update for users of previous versions, but it does have some nice perks. more

http://www.linuxpipeline.com SUSE 9.0: A Distro Worth Paying For By Ross M. Greenberg Europeans are different from North Americans. They have all this cool, colorful money with lots of zeroes. They can smoke where they want to. And they are trendsetters, listening to strange new music and buying cars with heated seats. more

http://www.linuxbeginner.org A Week with SuSE 9 January 25 by Gotroot Welcome to the second installment of a new series. As mentioned in the last installment, during this project, I'll be installing several Linux distributions, running them each for a 5 day week, and keeping a daily journal. more

http://www.open-mag.com OPTED TO THE NINES SUSE unwraps a must-have desktop distribution for power-hungry power users wanting more than the latest and greatest in 32 bits. more

http://www.osnews.com/ SuSE Linux 9.0 Professional Review by Steve Barnhart 2003-11-18 "I recently picked up a copy of SuSE 9.0 Professional. I have never used or been familiar with a SuSE product before as I've only used Mandrake, Red Hat, and a bit of Debian. After using Red Hat for a while I decided to evaluate SuSE and I am now sorry for not having tried it sooner." more

http://www.a1-electronics.net/ SuSE Linux Professional version 9.0 Review 2003-12-30 "A1-Electronics reviews the latest version 9.0 from SuSE of their Linux operating system." more

http://www.itreviews.co.uk SuSe - Linux 9.0 review 18/01/2004 "The subtitle of this review could so easily be 'a tale of two operating systems.' That one of them is good and the other bad should not be surprising; that they are both the same operating system might raise more of an eyebrow." more

http://www.linuxelectrons.com/ Suse 9.0 Professional Review "This is a review of SUSE Linux 9.0 Professional Edition." more

http://www.pcmag.com SuSE Linux Professional 9.0 By Oliver Kaven November 25, 2003 "With an attractive interface and a unique, comprehensive configuration tool, SuSE Linux Professional 9.0 offers rich features and simplicity for mainstream users and small businesses alike." more

http://www.suse.com Review Corner more

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Category: SuSE 9.1 reviews

Published on Thursday, 26 August 2004 00:00

Written by Administrator

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http://www.suse.com/ Novell Releases First Commercial Linux Featuring 2.6 Kernel SuSE LINUX 9.1 Personal and SuSE LINUX 9.1 Professional

http://www.pl-berichte.de/berichte/suse91.html (German)

http://www.madpenguin.org/ First Look at SUSE LINUX 9.1 Professional "With the upcoming release of SUSE Linux 9.1, I thought we'd take a few moments out of the day to look at their Personal release, including the Live CD that comes in the box, which will allow users to take their SUSE Linux desktop anywhere they go and be able to feel right at home on any PC with a CDROM drive. Is it worth the lowered $29.95 price tag? SUSE is a great desktop distro, but will the features stack up? We'll see..." review 1 and review 2

An In-Depth Look at SUSE 9.1 RC2 by Joe Barr "Here is our promised in-depth look at the latest SUSE 9.1 beta. I found a little more flakiness than I would be comfortable with long-term, but I have been using this near-final version in my day-to-day work for nearly a week now and see no reason to go back to my previous installation."

http://www.neolinkcomputers.com/linux/suse_9.1_beta.html

SuSE 9.3 reviews

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Category: SuSE 9.3

Published on Friday, 01 July 2005 00:00

Written by Administrator

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• Mad Penguin review
• Newsforge review
• Linux.com
• LinuxPlanet 
• QuebecOS 
• eWEEK 
• The Inquirer
• linux-noob 
• Geektime Linux

SuSE 10.1 released

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Category: Suse 10.1

Published on Thursday, 11 May 2006 20:10

Written by Administrator

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SUSE Linux 10.1 is available for download at the following mirrors. This release is SuSE 10.1 and not different from what you will later be able to buy in a store. The boxed retail comes with 5 CDs for x86 and one DVD9 for x86 and x86_64 and it also includes non-OSS software. It also comes with a nice, thick printed manual and 30 days of support. You won't get that with the free download. The free download comes on 5CDs without non-OSS software and one add-on CD with this non-OSS software. Later (hopefully not much later) there will be two DVD5 releases, one for x86 and one for x86_64 that are almost identical with the retail DVD9 and that include OSS and non-OSS software. TORRENTS http://download.opensuse.org/distribution/SL-10.1/ TORRENTS (MIRROR) http://ftp-1.gwdg.de/pub/opensuse/distribution/SL-10.1/ http://suse.mirrors.tds.net/pub/opensuse/distribution/SL-10.1/ http://keith.hostmatrix.org/SUSE-Linux-10.1-GM-i386.torrent http://97k.ath.cx/ul/SUSE-Linux-10.1-GM-x86_64.torrent Product Highlights XGL on SUSE 10.1 For those who prefer the DVD version, You ll have to buy the box version or use a small LINUX utility called 'makeSuseDVD' out. It will take the 5 CD ISOs and build a single DVD iso.

Migration to linux

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Category: SuSE 9.0 reviews

Published on Thursday, 26 August 2004 00:00

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What a windows users do need to install or use in SUSE 9 to complete the same tasks he get use to in Windows?.
What were the difficulties encountered and what are the potential weakness of SuSE 9 distribution?

Migration to linux

Round 2

Purpose
What a windows users do need to install or use in SUSE 9 to complete the same tasks he get use to in Windows?. What were the difficulties encountered and what are the potential weakness of SuSE 9 distribution?.

Background
I am using Windows since 10 years now, what decide me to switch all my personal PC (2) to Linux is here. I decide to try a completely free and open source Operating System to do my everyday private job....or better said some tasks....This small review has been done during evenings while watching TV, chatting on MSN, , I have only taking notes on my notebook while playing with SUSE. I hope that the quality will be good enough and that it may convince You to give SUSE or Linux in general a try.

New 21.01.2003, my anti virus AVG (free edition) was running under Windows 2000 SP5, I encounter an electricity problem, Pc reboot, since this event I can not start my system anymore! safe mode, last good configuration, scandisk, nothing work. The anti virus may have let some file open, since I get a blue screen with an error message saying: can not get exclusive access to the disk....an opportunities to kill my multi boot and only use Linux SuSE, I do not regret the switch since..

New 12.04.2004 My corporate ladtop running under M$ XP sp1, was defragmenting my Maxtor 250Gb external harddisk (FAT32) when the system hang. Rebooting windows has destruct the filesystem and leave me with a 'disk I/O error' and a blank disk! (Real men dont do backup but they often cry.....I was really pissed of at that time, lossing 180Gb of data is really a bad experience), I've tried to recover the data with scandisk, and Norton Disk Doctor 2004 (report error 'no filesystem' ) without any success :-( Last chance was my second PC running Suse Linux, MIRACLE, I've recover most of the data (95%) since Linux has mount and read all data from the damaged disk. Conclusions: defragmenting is dangerous! I consider now windows as a joke and I won't ever install a non journalised and transactionnal filesystem....Reiserfs 4 will be my next filesystem and I will replace my PC2 (w2k) with Linux SuSE 9.1 when it will be available.

Test system:

One more time, here is my system, The Linux experience you will have is very depending on hardware (and also drivers).....

Evening 1

Note all these screenshot has been done with KSnapshot, finding this application was quite easy even if the menu contains a lot of entries, you can locate it under Utilities - Desktop - KSnapshot. I must admit that due to the huge number of shipped applications, SUSE has done a good sorting job in this menu. Of course you must know what you want to start or which task you want to acomplish

Regret I browse thee documentation of KSnapshot and did not find any shortcuts/hotkey to trigger the screenshot....Naivement, I 've try the magic windows key combination, ALT-PRTSC or PRTSC, but it does not work....so I decide then to search on google...."ksnapshot shortcut" give me the answer, CTRL-SHIFT-S which is documented in a "KDE-cvs-digest" as a "backdoor". I see here a documentation potential :-)

Setting the resolution of screen

YAST require to switch to root mode, I was quite impressed by the list of available monitor driver (I have a Syncmaster Samsung 191N) but sad when I saw, it was not in the list (the 181 is), I decide to browse through the list of available brand searching for a generic driver like in windows advance control panel, Bingo there is a "->LCD" monitor section, restart the desktop engine (X server) by logging out and I am done. It seem that there is till now always a solution, all you have to do is to search a little bit which is also good too because you can only be a better user...

Since I have installed SUSE in a multi boot system, in Kexplorer (both a browser and a file manager and...see section below) all windows drive are not visible in the /mount directory like on any linux system but grouped in a /windows/ This disturb me 10s but I find it.

As default you can not write on NTFS drive (Note kernel 2.6 should support full read/write operation on NTFS), so I decide to activate this feature since everywhere on internet, you can read that SUSE 9.0 support it (SUSE bring some new features from kernel 2.6 back to 2.4.21 like 64-bit support, journaling file system, improve security, low latence of scheduling, power management for notebook and improvment in the sound-system architecture. Trying to be a good user, I start the SUSE helpCenter and search for an article which speak of NTFS..

I have found only recommendation for resizing or formatting the system during the installation of SUSE. One solution among others is to move all data from NTFS drive (full NTFS read support) to a Linux space then format back to FAT32....Operation done with Konqueror, the file manager. I already mention that I prefer to have a clone of Norton Commander.

Java support

Konqueror the default internet browser fully support Java, but it was not the case of the third party browser Opera I've installed or better said, Opera did not locate correctly the default JRE (Java Runtime Environment), so I need the feel to install the latest Java VM manually. Checking Konqueror settings shows that java is installed in /usr/lib/java2/bin/java

Go to www.java.com and download the self installer (2 links are provided a .bin and a .rpm and both are self extracting, confusing....), I choose the .bin file and that force me to set attribute of file to executable (right click on file then properties) to uncompress the .bin

You get a file with an extension .rpm, many alternatives, choose one of the 3 below you prefer.

1. Open a Terminal, log a root (type # su ) then type # rpm -iv filename
2. You can use Konqueror and right click open with...Kpackage, a small utilities, then enter root password.
3. You can use Konqueror and click directly on the rmp and YaST wll start up.

Anyway, I choose one and continue my tour....In opera I set in preferences - Multimedia- Java Path to /usr/lib/SunJava2-1.4.2/jre/lib/i386 and then my java appear on my homepage, done

 

Online Update

are done through ....YaST of course,(YaST I am know getting used to that name), software - online update to get the latest recommended patches and security fixes from one of the available SUSE server. 15 servers are installed: 13 are located in Europe and 1 in USA. The latest server is a free choice, you can also define Your own server. I choose 3 differents servers (primary in Germany) and all were working.

Another way to be always informed about the status of possible update is to look at the SuseWatcher icon in the system tray, identic to the windows update icon. The icon color can change if something is available on the server.

Internet browsing

I like Opera so much that I have acquire a licence (previously for Windows and now for Linux), I have also choose Opera under Linux and I do not regret it, even if it is not open source.

Instant messaging

Under internet - Chat You can find a lot of tools installed as default like:

• Gaim,Kopete, gnomeICU which are multi protocol instant messaging, (I decide to choose Kopete, but I will try all others in the future)
• Or some specifics application related to specific protocol:
  • KVIrc, KSirc, XChat IRC (IRC)
  • KXicq2 (ICQ)
  • others Kinkatta, Kit, Konversation

With Kopete, I was able to define ICQ, MSN, Jabber in less than 5 minutes without knowing the GUI at all! really impressive (If you can do it in windows, you can do it in Suse is now my new motto!), I am still trying to customize the GUI (like in my windows IM www.miranda-im.org) because I find that Kopete take too much desktop space.

A set of interesting plugin is provided as default: encryption, emoticons, history of messages, web presence (upload your IM status to a homepage or a server)...A lot of features, but Webcam and Whiteboard capabilities are still missing. For sure there will be a plugin soon or at least a GNU tool for this somewhere in SUSE

For me, Instant Messaging is ok and I can live with Kopete.

Mp3 and audio content.

Using Konqueror, I try to locate my favorites mp3 directory in order to launch some mp3, XMMS start as default, I've heard that this player is quite good, the default skins is based on SUSE colors, mainly green with a chameleon (see pic), This skins is acceptable for a user but not for someone who has already use Winamp's MMd3 or EMP skin (but this is personal). I take google to see if there is something else to download, official homepage is here .http://www.xmms.org/skins.php but skins section is down (after a disk crash but it will reopen). Winamp skins seems to be incompatible with XMMS and there is no converter available

Viewing file using Konqueror

Konqueror is the default file manager and web browser, It is a central application in all KDE desktop. It has a lot of functionnalities (some people may say too much), and its own control panel.
Viewing pictures with it is "slow" (dir has 26 pictures, mean size is 80kb) and it took several seconds (I am not comparing to Windows thumbnails feature, but with ACDsee). Entering twice in the directory do not create additional performance loss, since images are cached (default cache size is set to 1Mb) Windows, ACDsee and others tools use the same tricks.

Hovering over pictures and files create a autozoom...this is a nice features (working with txt file, configuraton, pdf) and is fast, during the build of a directory, the auto zooming display some strange result (especially if you have different file type like pdf, txt, jpg all together in one directory), but it is working and has not crash during the past 10 days (I must be lucky some people will say)

• I still prefer a Norton Commander (because of the dual panel), so I am hunting on internet and found XNC 5.0 but no precompiled rpm for SUSE. this oblige me to compile the source code...
• Path to file is difficult to keep in mind (mainly because there is no more drive letter, I only need some practice...), but you can define favorites

XNC is also downloable for SuSe 9.0 here : xnc-5.0.4-1.i586.suse9.0.rpm

Midnight Commander is a clone of Norton Commander running in a terminal (just type mc)

 

 

USB support (Key)

I mount a USB Key brand Apacer AP-MKSRU10 (impossible to find a picture on internet, very cheap version 8â?¬) which use Sony Memory Stick , after a beep, the drive was recognized and in use. An icons was created on the desktop. The beep is immediate but it take sometimes several seconds till the removable drive is recognized. No problems transfer rates seem to be exactly the same as under Windows 2000.

Evening 2

Security, password policy, settings and firewall

• Can be done in YaST, all setting are always done with th help of assistants, a meaninful documentation is always displayed on the left. No need to push a button or to hover on some part of the GUI like in Windows control panel.
• NAT (Network Adress Translation) which consist of hiding the real internet adresses of your machine by hiding it behind the firewall adress is supported and with only a checkbox
• You can block some Linux services (Webserver, Mail Server) or define your own.
• I am still searching in the YaST GUI for port forwarding capabilities and firewall rules (TCP-UDP and direction). It seems that you must deal with the config file of the firewall directly. (/etc/sysconfig/SuSEfirewall2)

Even if the first part of the setting is done with an assistant, I think that SuSE need to enhance the configuration of it's firewall. I do not want to dedicate a machine for running my firewall even if it is does not give the same security. My router is a Netgear 614 without firewall, but my other PC use a Netgear 634g which has one...

YaST the configuration utility, but what can YaST do for You?

A lot of things, see below the table. Clicking on a subsection always start an assistant that drive the user and give him succinct but understantable explanations.

 

Screensavers

Don't laugh! a good screensaver is part of a personal computer even if it no more needed (TFT screens are good enough to not be damaged by a fix picture)

What I dislike is that it is not possible to define a list of prefered screensavers.In the End, ANY User will be satisfied with the number and diversity of screensavers.

Emule, a P2P network under Linux

Who is using emule under windows? hum? not You? so jump to the next section

OVERNET another P2P network under Linux

Go to www.overnet.com and download the core (an executable file running in command line mode)

You need a GUI, this one is available at http://ed2k-gtk-gui.sourceforge.net/download.shtml it is a rpm

Start the gui by typing /usr/bin/ed2k_gui in konqueror

The tool ask you to locate the core, here I save it under /home/elta68/.overnet/core/overnet0.51.2

Choose a user name, a password and click "spawn core" then "go", you are now connected, share some files and here we go, download!!!!!!

Evening 3

Burning CD

Burning CD tools can be found under Multimedia - CD/DVD Burning. 2 software are installed as default: K3b and cdbakeoven. The about K3b display the release number 0.10! this is disturbing me, is it stable when you ship anything with 0.10?

1. Starting K3b	2. use the assistant, here I select Create a Data CD	3. Use the file explorer to locate file you want to burn Windows drive (NTFS - FAT32) are located in /windows/ You can give a name to your compilation, right click rename on the root.. The space left and consume on CD disk is displayed like in any burning software. The GUI is very similar to EasyCD creator	4 click burn and choose burning options Speed (I have a 16X) but only 14X is available Writing mode: DAO, TAO, RAW Type of session Volume CD-Test and filesystems and misc options. I do not see any options missing, except an assistant for some protections schemes....(Securoom, Safedisk)
Burning took 4:30 minutes for 594MB and mean speed was 12X	If you want to create an audio CD You can not directly use mp3 files but need to convert them back to wav with winamp for example. You can also right click on a file and play it.	In the menu tools: CD-RW are supported (with Erase support of course) Copy CD or Clone CD Burn image ISO, BIN and CUE: CCD are missing. Copy DVD, format DVD-RW, Burn ISO image...	Control panel It support plugins, only 3 are installed: mainly Audio Decoder and Audio Encoder and external programs to work properly. Highly extensible design is always good. The control panel follow the same clarity guidelines as the whole KDE, which are good..

• Following CD projects are possible: Audio CD, Data CD, Mixed mode CD, Video cd, eMovix CD, Data DVD, eMovix DVD. As you see everything is also present.
• What is unknow is the abilty of K3b to handle protected CD....Of course nobody of us are using CloneCD, AlcoholSoft, NeroBurning to copy protected CD.....so it is not really an issue or?
• Of course I need to burn more than 2 CD to be able to give an opinion on K3b, and I am convince that it is easy to find some better reviews on internet. What I can say is that K3b will cover my personal use
• Creating CD is as simple as with EasyCD Creator or Nero
• For resuming, whaouuuh so much functionnality for a release 0.10 ...

DVD, multimedia, Divx, Xvid

 

Windows network connectivity

It seems that connecting SuSE to another remote windows desktop is not as easy as in the windows world...I have found the iconse "Local Network" but nothing was found. There is an interesting documentation in the help center "Linux in the network" speaking about Samba (a layer on top of TCPIP) which help to connect heterogenous computer (MAC, Windows, Linux, others which have this layer). Microsoft implements this layer after pressure of IBM....:-) A good documentation but what I want is 3 uses cases::

• 1. How Linux can access to a Windows machine on the network/shares/printer/internet?
• 2. How Windows can access to Linux machine on the network/shares/printer/internet?

You must use Samba for all above.

1. How Linux can access to a Windows machine on the network/shares/printer/internet?

A lot of FAQ and Howto can be found with google, use the keywords: "linux windows smb howto"

If these steps are working, you can add definitively in /etc/samba/smb.conf the remote windows share, either with the YaST gui or with a text editor.

2. How Windows can access to Linux machine on the network/shares/printer/internet?

Remarqs

• XMMS was not able to open remotely a mp3 using a samba share, copying the same mp3 locally work...strange.

 Links
http://www.art-events.de/systeme/texte/000621samba.htm A tutorial in German
http://www.bnro.de/~schmidjo/index.html LinNeighborhood is a tool to display the network neighbourhood like in windows explorer.

Publishing, deploying web content

http://www.suse.de/en/private/support/online_help/howto/webeditor/ A very good review.

A friendly task manager

Since I was a windows user, I've been looking for a graphical program to allow process monitoring and manipulation. For chance, there is a default "task manager" coming from the base installation of KDE, it is located in System - Monitor - Kde System Guard

• It is a more user friendly way to monitor (and kill!) process or watch memory, cpu than in a terminal.(with command top or ps -ef | grep username)
• Only regret it can not reside in the system tray and wait there when yu really need it.
• You must filter in the process table, otherwise you will see a lot of process running in the background (KDE has a lot of process alone).
• Option 1) Ctrl+Alt+Esc gives you a nice mouse cursor to kill whatever you point and click at. try it.
• Option 2) Ctrl+Esc brings you a nice TasK List(Procees Table) to select and kill whatever process you like to.

A powerful calculator HP48-HP49

I still have 3 HP calculator and was developing on ASM-RPL.SYSRPL (from 1993 to 2000), I use EMU48 each day under windows, see Here

• X48 seems to be the answer, even if it is not so polish and rich of functionnalities as EMU48.
• A rpm can be download from http://rpm.pbone.net and roms from www.hpcalc.org/hp48/pc/emulators/ (no more legal issues roms can be copied freely)
• Again, great difficulties to locate a rpm for SuSE on internet, Redhat and Debian are available.
• No great skins are available, but it do its job
• http://www.fen-net.de/~ea1370/pub/Hobbies/comp/HP48/
  
• www.hp.com/calculators/
  
• http://www.hpcalc.org/  and FAQ.
• www.hpmuseum.org
  
• http://www.hpcalc.org/goodbyeaco.php the end of HP calculator

Here is a binary with roms that work... just unpack and start ./run48g.sh or ./run48s.sh in a terminal

My webcam, a Philips PCV680K vesta pro

Plug and ..... wait, after some minutes (I was playing with the mount command, maybe it can shorten the process if you log as root (type su) and try to force mount of all devices mount -a)

• In google "linux webcam philips" give me this page: http://smcc.demon.nl/webcam It seems that these is now a part of the kernel since 2.4.15
• It place an icon on the desktop ""webcam" clicking on it start Gnome meeting, you have then 7 steps to complete before using this tool.
• It only allow you to use it between other gnome meetings instance, kopete, the Instant messaging has no webcam plugin, and do not recognize that a webcam was installed.

  Intall the latest nVidia driver

As you see a lot of step, is it not time to do all these steps behind the scene in an installer? Nividia? can you help us?

  Intall media player Mplayer

Official Homepage: www.mplayerhq.hu
On packman homepage ( ftp://ftp.links2linux.de/pub/packman/suse/9.0/i586/ ), download :

• Libtheora (required by Mplayer) which use libogg
• Lame (required by Mplayer)
• Mplayer itself
• Mplayer plugin
• Kplayer is one GUI which use Mplayer for KDE

so Install first libogg then Libtheora, Lame and finally Mplayer and Mplayer plugin

Conclusions:

• Dependancy (loading a packages require to install one or many another packages), conflict with packages is horrible, it is time to find a better format than rpm, (is apt-rpm from RedHat the future??? (http://apt-rpm.tuxfamily.org/)) or to restrict visibility of packages to an application instead of the whole system.
• Mplayer seems to have a better support of all windows, and show better performance on my system. Highly recomended.
  

  Wine

Winamp	Acdsee
Reflex	...

  Firewire



  read and write on NTFS !

A lot of projects are trying to read Windows NTFS drive with more or less success

http://linux-ntfs.sourceforge.net/	"The goals of this project are: create a new Linux kernel driver for the NTFS file system (v1.2 and later 3.0), user space utilities (e.g. format, ntfs check, etc.) and a library to avoid code duplication and provide access to NTFS to other GPLed programs." -> it is existing in kernel 2.4.24 but with only read only capabilities, can cause loss of data! -> Can not write or modifying existing file (no file under 1Kb and it can not change size of file....)
http://www.jankratochvil.net/project/captive/    http://www.jankratochvil.net/project/captive/#download    Author    Jan Kratochvil <web_AT_jankratochvil_DOT_N.E.T>     Version    1.5    Licence    GPL    Source    Yes    Environment    Console    Status    Stable	"Captive provides full read/write access to NTFS disk drives in the WINE way by using the original Microsoft Windows ntfs.sys driver. It emulates the required subsystems of the Microsoft Windows kernel by reusing one of the original ntoskrnl.exe, ReactOS parts, or this project's own reimplementations on a case by case basis. Involvement of the original driver files was chosen to achieve the best and unprecedented filesystem compatibility and safety." As root user 1. Download tar gz here http://www.jankratochvil.net/project/captive/dist/captive-static-1.1.5.tar.gz 2. Install, decompress and start ./install 3. Locate ntfs.sys and ntoskrnl.exe in your windows/system32/ directory and copy it to /var/lib/captive/ I recommend You to use WinXp latest drivers 4. start captive-install-acquire it search for the dll, if not found it will download them from microsoft.com 5. for each windows drive (here  the example is for my drive C:\)    type mkdir /mnt/openC    type mount -t captive-ntfs -o force  /dev/hda1 /mnt/openC    I add the switch -o force because SuSE has already mount the drive C (read only) in /windows/c OR open the file /etc/fstab and modify it: before /dev/hda1 /windows/C   ntfs  ro,users,gid=users,umask=0002,nls=iso8859-1 0 0 after /dev/hda1 /windows/C   ntfs-captive  rw,users,gid=users,umask=0002,nls=iso8859-1 0 0 and then type mount -a to see changes Attention, You may need to have a Windows licence!
Wine WMware	I do not want to configure wine... I do not want to install windows anymore...
http://www.ntfs-linux.com/ Publisher    Paragon Software Group    Version    1.0    Filesize    69 K    Licence    Shareware    Cost    69.95$	"Paragon NTFS for Linux is designed to mount NTFS partitions under Linux operating systems as normal logical drives with appropriate drive letter. The full version mounts NTFS partitions for read and write operations; the demo version mounts NTFS partitions in read-only mode. the driver supports NTFS 1.2, NTFS 3.0 and NTFS 3.1. Free Read-only version is distributed as a driver module or bootable CD image. Mounted NTFS partitions are accepted as â??nativeâ?? â?? browse, create/delete folder or file, run applications and other usual functions are totally available."

Another way is to erase all NTFS drive and use reiserfs or extfs3, since Paragon also sell a windows driver to have full access to linux drive. Why should always Linux make the first step?

  Install KDE 3.2

step by step....

in YaST, go to "Software", and then "change source of installation"
Set a new "software media source", use the button "add" and choose ftp

server name: ftp.suse.com
source directory: pub/suse/i386/supplementary/KDE/update_for_9.0/yast-source/

wait till the system accept your new source of installation, close this windows, you can now go to "install and remove software", set the select box filter to "selection", "KDE Desktop environment" has its own section, install first all KDE base package.

You will have some conflict, for me KDE pim, and PDA tools, just remove them! you can reinstall them after having installing the base package!

restart your desktop session...known issues for KDE 3.2 are: sound (but it was working for me, alsa was selected as default) and kbear (FTP tool), for Kbear the solution for me was to remove  the previous version (kbear 2.1) and install this one:
KBear 3.0alpha1b http://kbear.sourceforge.net/index.php?page=download#binaries

KDE 3.2 is as fast as my windows desktop, what a blast! I you want to have a good stability, it is preferable to wait the next official SuSE release...

  Disk Management, rescue disk, partitionning
Soon

  Anti virus
http://linux.bitdefender.com/bd/site/products.php?p_id=16 Linux Bitdefender is a freeware

  Download manager
use kget it can be start in a terminal /opt/kde3/bin/kget

  Printing, scanning
http://www.linuxprinting.org/

  Configuring KDE, themes
Soon

  Eclipse, development
Download the file Eclipse GTK from www.eclipse.org decompress and start the executable.
Jedit www.jedit.org is a jar based installer, open a terminal and type java -jar jedit42pre9.jar and you're done

  Install kernel 2.6 on suse 9.0
here's a howto in german: http://www.thomashertweck.de/kernel26.html
Compile your kernel http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=443

  Administring a Homepage
ftp tool:
KBear /opt/kde3/bin/kbear


  Remove un needed software
Soon

  Links for download

http://www.suse.de/en/private/download/index.html AND ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/suse/i386/9.0/suse/i586/ The official page of SuSE
http://www.rpmseek.com/index.html Search for RPM
http://rpm.pbone.net/ Search for RPM
http://packman.links2linux.de/ Packman compile source code and provide RPM ready to download ()
ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/suse/i386/9.0/suse/i586/ FTP


To read
http://www.linux-mag.com/cgi-bin/printer.pl?issue=2002-10&article=jfs choose your filesystem

 

Securing your Suse http://www.antionline.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=260361

Conclusions

Good: The desktop is user friendly, at least for me, for example: saving some of these screenshot, under the save as windows, right clicking provide a menu to create, sorting or add directory. The responsiveness of GUI is good if you consider that the 3D and all 2D tricks are maybe not supported by the driver. Of course this depend a lot of your graphics cards. Trying to start XP on a integrated graphic VXX chipset with shared memory is the same (was using a IBX notebook 2 years before switching to a Compaq NX7000 with a Radeon 9200...). It a quite good to have the possibilities to reuse some win32 librairies (codecs) because they are stable and working. A bravo to the open source community! I have done many online security update with YaST, and have not restart the machine, which is very good, on the other side, there is even more update than in Microsoft world... Till now I have encounter no real difficulties, I must admit that www.google.com is a must, and so fast for locating a solution (on forums, tutorials, howto, personal webpage....) as long as you use the right keywords. If you are already a good user of Windows, you will have no problem to switch to SUSE 9.0 TRUST me and make a try! Bad: Having many rpm version for each distribution (even if you are on the same cpu plattform) or sometimes compile from the source code is the worst experience for me in linux. Only solution is to pray that someone or better SuSE provide you all rpm on a internet site (but you will always have to wait). Suse do not provide for legal reasons enough packages (better said packages that are a must), but it is not diffcult to locate them on other homepage (libcss for decrypting dvd for example) Installing basics fucntionnality ask by 80% of users are still too difficult Why Linux is not at the same level as Windows? my point of view is that people on the others side do their best to avoid porting of drivers and application from 3rd party compagny (and may be using economical threat to achieve this aim).

 

 

Links with reference to this article

 

Page created with Mozilla

 

 

When you finish this article, You may want to read the previous round 1 HERE

Thanks for reading... more to come in the future
This page is a part of www.waltercedric.com homepage - Comments welcomed click HERE

A desktop review

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Category: SuSE 9.1 reviews

Published on Thursday, 26 August 2004 00:00

Written by Administrator

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SUSE 9.1
a desktop review
installing and/or migration to Linux SuSE 9.1

WORK IN PROGRESS, running SuSE 9.1 since tuesday 11 May 2004....
SuSE 9.1 soon running on compaq nx7000 notebook

Test system:

One more time, here is my system, The Linux experience you will have is very depending on hardware (and also drivers).....

What does SuSE 9.1 brings?

I wont go through the list of changes and goodies shipped in this release since SuSE itself has also a great page HERE (professional edition) and HERE (personal edition). Note that SuSE is selling at a very attracting price the personal edition (49$) with limited server capabilities and no commercial programs.

beautifulDesktop.jpg

Migration from 9.0 to SuSE 9.1

This time I retrieve the SuSE professional DVD from colleague and did not buy it, as I prefer to wait for another major release. But wait this is a major release of Linux, I think that the release number is really not so well adequate and do not reveal the number of changes does both in kernel (2.6) and desktop (kde 3.2)

If you copy the DVD, You will get no support from SuSE directly (but you will always find help on internet), also a great help section is provided in electronic format, downside it wont be readable without a working SuSE.. FTP online update is due around the 6 June 2004....

Since I have a running version of Linux, I decide this time to update the previous SuSE 9.0 through the YaST menu (Boot and choose Update System), after 21 min update, I was booting into my new desktop with my old settings. The boot time seems to take forever, it "SEEMS" to me that it is a loooot slower.

With this version, SuSE and Novell are now showing us their commitment to the open source community and have also GNU their famous configuration tool: YaST. This is also a strategical move since they want that the maximal number of third companies develop new modules for it (IBM, ....). That is a good news since a lot of people always complains on the licensing scheme of YaST. In the meantime, YaST is now a lot more polished...understand the ubiquity of the YaST logo and eye candy colors. Even the installation process has been redesigned with fancy graphics.

YouInPaleBlue.jpg

Coming from Windows?

- In order to help users to make the transition to Linux, drives (in Linux world, it is better to say devices) are a now stored under the famous icons "My Computer" and mount a lot more faster than under the 9.0. I only regret that the system choose so bad name as default (Is it needed to display a cryptic UUID in the name of devices????).

myComputer.jpg

- Dual Booting Windows and SuSE is as easier as before, and has not changed. the boot loader grub with its fancy colors is a lot better than M$ one. That should at least convince You to make a try ;-)

- SuSe is now earlier hiding, during the boot, all ouput statements done by the kernel. I must agree that nearly no one can understand all barbarians technical terms, I still recommend to press sometimes the key 'F2' to newbies, seeing if a devices did not init. may be valuable under certains conditions. (mainly hardware crash)

- the most disturbing things for a newcomer is that you do not need to double click on folder or file to do an action, to approach the windows phylosophy, go the KDE control panel, in  "peripherals", "mouse", and checked the radio button "Double-click to open files and folders (select icons on first click)". Maybe SuSE should set this as default...

- During installation, the auto login feature is checked as default. Forget this bad windows habit. If SuSe is already login the system automatically, start YaST, in "security", "Edit and create groups", select your user and click on button "Expert Options" and select "login settings", uncheck "auto login". Remember security come at a cost.

What I dislikes

• I was one more time catch by the death black screen, (I must be really dumb because that is the second time ) the autodetection of monitor (my SAMSUNG 191N was detected as SAMSUNG 4N) lead to a black screen, Maybe SuSE, should always test (with SAX2, the graphical display adapter cntrol panel of course) what it has autodetect and ask the user to confirm the detected settings.
• Icons in the taskbar are a little bit oversized as default, bigger and it look like a desktop for kids who need to click on big icons in order not to click beside :-)
• DVD playback is still not working (but in Knoppix, and Lindows it is), one more time You will have to hunt for the library libdvdcss2 (packman is no more providing binary rpm, you must compile them now due to a change in germany).
  Here you can find a tutorial and ALL library for XINE (with libdvdcss2) Daily xine RPMS
• Since SuSE is a big supporter of Reiserfs, why not providing a graphical tool for repairing devices? with a expert system? one more time typing some cryptic commands may discourage a lot of users.
• Impossible to write on NTFS drive, I have not found any captive rpm for SuSE 9.1.
• Packages conflicts....why not embeding apt-rpm? or providing always package statically compiled in order to avoid dependancies?

What I like

controlPanel.jpg

• KDE 3.2.2 with its speed blow away any previous release, and is alone worth the upgrade (But You can update SuSE 9.0 to KDE 3.2 through FTP, easy to do but then you lose the online SuSEwatcher tool and new patches).. KDE 3.3 should be available in August 2004
• The default walpaper is a lot nicer and the desktop control panel is a lot more polished too.
• A up to date JDK 1.4.2.02 is also installed as default. Nice if you plan to use java base applications like eclipse, jedit or set P2P Freenet node
• Using SMB 3.0, it is so fast and so easy to access a windows drive! in comparaison, under M$ XP, the system seem to take forever to locate by IP a share (moreover it freeze your PC :-( during seconds)....
  (example in Konqueror smb://elta68:aJ_zU16B@192.168.0.3/Share1 )
• The kernel 2.6 even if it is running in the background all the time is not as eclatant as KDE, also it didn't have a so big visible effect as KDE speed, windows are poping so fast that it push by a magnitude the pleasure to use this release. The list of online update is quite huge (but not bigger than M$ ;-) ), but that prove the reactivity of Linux and SuSE, I've update at least 50 packages and without any OS restart. Each update has also a brief description, so You know what are the benefit of each updates. A release note is even accessible in the right corner of the screen.
• Since Novell is now bringing its expertise to Linux support, the KDE help center, is showing a better uniformity, colors, fonts and quality of documentation: 2 main sections : Administration guide and user guide. Followed by application manuals, administration; development and online ressources. One major regret: inpossibility to cut and paste some line of text/code in a terminal: copy is not possible!
  
• KDE is highly configurable and without adding any sharewares or using some obscure tweaks, of course: icons, splash screen (as desktop start, a pictures with progression of peripherals detection is shown), fonts, windows decorations and ...wallpapers can be set in kde control panel with a few clicks. Dont forget to visit www.kde-look.org  It is worth the visit!
• Konqueror can now retrieve, copy, rename data on ftp server, I still prefer the default FTP tool KBear /opt/kde3/bin/KBear
  
• I've installed today 17.06.2004 the latest kernel version 2.6.7 with source code, require a restart, but the systeem is running faster since, or at least seems to be faster.

 

patchUpdate.jpg

What I like/dislikes

• The default install provide a lot less user choice: only one chating system (Kopete) instead of the plethore in SuSE 9.0
• No 3D hardware installation as default, you need to complete the installation and then in YaST grab the latest proprietary Nvidia/ATI drivers. It is only annoying.
• YaST warn You of conflicts and dependancies but do not propose a "real" alternative, either "do not install" or "continue with risk of instability", why not:
  • Adding a third possibility: "download the missing dependancy now" or
  • Propose a UUID link on which user can click to locate the ressource (through a UDDI server), normal users don't want to write down the name of some library libdvdcss2 -1.0.6.7 p23.rpm is a pain to retain !
  • Export the list of dependancies to resolves in a new windows to shows You which library are missing, or has been installed in realtime
  • Do nothing an find a better approach...
• The only "GOOD" repositories of RPM are not given by SuSE. (understand full of rpm not approved by companies : dvd support, win32 codecs, ....) but I think this is common to all distributions: without volunteers building rpm, it will be quite difficult to live in a wwhole linux world, or at least at the beginning since not all users want to know how to compile sources versions of their favorite programs.

What I would like to see

• The ability to download any program through YaST (even non free or non supported: codecs, aMule and others), why not like in eclipse having internet page providing a XML descriptor for installing new packages and that YaST can understand?. I mean this can be a great step forward for the average user.

• Better commitments of Nvidia, Linux can be a great playing plattform if hardware manufacturer develop or give some technical help to the community for improving drivers.

Exploring Multimedia capabilities:

• Noatun is no more installed as default, Kaffeine (another interface to the famous XINE multimedia engine) is present but no interesting codecs are installed. Multimedia is, at least for me, UNUSABLE, and you need to quickly install MPLAYER/Kplayer with the full range of codecs if you want to read any DIVX, XVID, Indeo contents... I was searching Kplayer in /opt/kde3/bin/ and in YaST installer, but didnt find it. That's bad! You can find the latest version at sourceforge
  www.sourceforge.net/kplayer

mPlayer running with a special skins

• Inserting a blank CD and K3b pop up and propose You to do your compilation

• Gimp 2.0 is also included with SuSE Linux Professional, this version 2.0 has a new GUI and nicer icons.

preliminary Conclusions

WORK IN PROGRESS, running SuSE 9.1 since tuesday 11 May 2004....

With SuSE 9.1, you get a high quality distributions, and even if all the cons and drawbacks apply to this new release. It is definitely worth the update! Suse is getting even better with every release. Novell buying them has it seems already a positive affect with how the applications are running.

Even if this release is nearly filling all my expectations I am already excited about the future of SuSE, when will the version 10.0 be shipped?

Links

http://linux01.gwdg.de/apt4rpm/ how to set up atp 4 rpm for SuSE.

RPM
http://packman.links2linux.org/
http://rpm.pbone.net/
http://www.suserpms.cjb.net/
http://guru.linuxbe.org/

 

More sources for Yast

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Category: SuSE 9.3

Published on Saturday, 21 May 2005 00:00

Written by Administrator

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Do You ever want to install some "non standard" package under SuSE like Mplayer, VLC which are not officialy supported, or found on the DVD of Suse Linux?

There is a way to do it using YaST without any effort...All You have to do is to add some new Install sources 

Add the following source to YaST, go to YaST, in "Software", "Change Source of Installation"

Add	Server name	directory on server
http	ftp.gwdg.d	pub/linux/misc/suser-guru/rpm/9.3/
p	packman.iu-bremen.de	suse/9.3/
http	ftp.belnet.be	mirror/ftp.suse.com/suse/i386/9.3/
http	fr2.rpmfind.net	linux/SuSE-Linux/i386/9.3/
ftp	ftp.gwdg.de	/pub/linux/suse/ftp.suse.com/suse/i386/supplementary/KDE/update_for_9.3/yast-source

or look at the pictures below:

I recommend You to put packman and ludwig server in the place 1 and 2, also not like in my picture  ;-)

SuSE 10 and openSuSe 10 are out!

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Category: SuSE 10.0

Published on Friday, 07 October 2005 00:00

Written by Administrator

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 You can grab the latest SuSE version since the 5 october

So many names but more or less the same...

1. Box version: (buy it in shops) OSS core - licensed applications - commercial limited time applications, technical support - manual
2. Eval version: OSS core - licensed applications
3. OSS: is the OSS core only, if you decide to try this one but feel you can not live without Acrobat (instead of Kpdf), flash, real player, java etc, just add the directory suse/suse/i386/10.0/SUSE-Linux10.0-GM-Extra/ to YaST (this let you choose in YaST and install the missing package between OSS version and Eval version)

ISO filename explanations:

• SUSE-10.0-CD-i386-GM-CD*.iso 5 CDs i386 for installation from CD-R or from an ftp server with mounted iso images. Other network transfer protocols are available, too.
• SUSE-10.0-EvalDVD-i386-GM.iso Same content as CDs on one DVD
• SUSE-10.0-EvalDVD-x86_64-GM.iso Same packages for x86-64 as one the DVD above
• SUSE-10.0-LiveDVD.iso   Live DVD, boot from it and enjoy SUSE Linux without actually installing it (no data written to disk)

Download! Download! Download!

• ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/suse/i386/10.0/
• Bittorent SuSE 10.0 DVD 32 bits
• Bittorent SuSE 10.0 DVD 64 bits

Yast Supplemental sources for

• Kde: ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/suse/i386/supplementary/KDE/update_for_10.0/yast-source
• Gnome ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/suse/i386/supplementary/GNOME/update_for_10.0/yast-source 

3rd party repositories:

• ftp.packman.iu-bremen.de/suse/10.0
• ftp.gwdg.de/pub/linux/misc/suser-guru/rpm/10.0 (guru)
• http://pi3.informatik.uni-mannheim.de/~schiele/suse/10.0 (Robert Schiele)
• http://opensuse.linux.co.nz/apt/suser-agirardet/10.0 (super)
• ftp.gwdg.de/pub/linux/usr-local-bin/10.0  (usr local bin)
• ftp.gwdg.de/linux/misc/suser-crauch/10.0  (GnuCash)

More soon, I will be updating 3 PC this week (ladtop, 2 desktops)

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A desktop review

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Category: SuSE 9.0 reviews

Published on Thursday, 26 August 2004 00:00

Written by Administrator

Hits: 7582

This page was last modified on Mon, 16 Aug 2004 17:06:24 GMT

SUSE 9.0
a desktop review
My experience installing Linux and some throughts...
When you finish this article, You may want to read the round 2 HERE

-> this page is getting bigger and bigger with the time, I will also start soon a SUSE section and divide this page into smaller sections.

I decide to buy the professional edition instead of downloading all cd from ftp.suse even if I have a 2MB internet line. You must support company like Suse or Mandrake which develop linux distributions and buy their package. All versions or patchs can be acquire freely and download from their FTP or HTTP mirror..

If you still hesitate about Linux, I would recommend You to try a Live Eval of Linux. A live eval is a set of applications and a fully functionnal Linux (nearly 2Gb) compressed on 1 CD and It does not require a hard disk to start!

* can be download freely

Test system:

One more time, here is my system, The Linux experience you will have is very depending on hardware (and also drivers).....

My Background:

Can be read HERE and my experience with Linux? I am using Cygwin with ssh at work to connect to the HPUX development system, deployment, release management is done with ANT and bash scripts.So I am only a user but I use to write some FAQs in the past when I was using Linux at highschool (a small part is reproduced HERE, sorry it is in french ).

My collegues of XDreamTeam have installed a SUSE on a dual AMD64 Opteron server, and they will write a review soon.

Some sentences you may hear about Linux:

Linux user interface is ugly, Xp is better!
Who can still says this?, look at this KDE 3.2 pictures

Moreover you can choose another desktop manager, instead of KDE, a lot of people prefer Gnome. If you still can't live without Windows, try this windows manager under linux http://www.xpde.com/index.php

Suse (or Linux in general) is difficult to use!
Not so much, in fact the tool YAST: "Yet Another Setup Tool" do a great job when dealing with the configuration of your computer, softwares and hardware can be configured in a hierarchical control panel. I found it even better than the equivalent of "Windows world". What can be disturbing is the organisation of files and program on disk. I would say that someone who never use Windows before will have the same learning curve and encounter more or less the same difficulties with linux, the only drawback I see is that no so much friends can help you (and give you tools for which you have no licence ;-) ) since Linux as a desktop is not so much floating around. Now if you are a Windows user like me (since 10 years), you will encounter some difficulties, I prefer to say "forget some bad Windows habits", like

• Windows make no differences between upper and lower case filename, but Linux does! which is normal because we also make this distinction when we write letters and office documents.
• Windows use drive letter and this is a pain to maintain especially when you need to configure software, Linux use a directory base mapping, symbolic links can be created on files or directories. Example: 2 documents folders can have different name but point to the same folder:
  For example you have a website which is located in a directory "MywebsiteV1.12" and you want to have only one reference in all program that use your homepage (typically in configurations files), all you have to do is to open a terminal and type:

  ln -s MywebsiteV1.12 httpdocs

  and use everywhere httpdocs instead of the path to MywebsiteV1.12 in configuration files. The same apply if you want to alias office documents or media files (reference the same file under different names but always use the same target)
  this is a lot more powerful than the Window's shortcuts.

• Windows has a limited command line size, and limited number of subdirectories.
• Even on XP, you must sometimes restart your PC because the program XX has freeze and can not be terminate.
  Bill Gates said in an interview: "instability do not come from Windows itself, but merely from applications installed" For Me, a good OS must protect the user/itself from system crashing, XP isn't good at this, Linux is a little better.
  On Unix a # kill -9 pidProcess has a lot of chance to succeed and you can even restart some part of the system, without restarting the whole (restart the network server or the soundcard). Try also CTRL-ALT- ESC to kill graphically a process!

Why choosing Linux now?

http://www.mandrake.tips.4.free.fr/switchsuccess.html A very good article, how you can switch with success and what your motivation can be

Here are the personal reasons why I am switching to Linux, You may find a lot of website which may present You better arguments:

• Suse (replace with any Linux distribution) come with a lot of applications (= packages) to do almost everything, not all of them are of the same qualities, or can be compared to commercial applications, but in linux world they do not require any licences! (some of them are freeware, giftware, shareware through)
• I want to live in a world where, I can search and solve problems instead of restarting the machine which is for me not a solution....(I am a developer and like challenges, restarting is like loosing a race fsor me) yeah as today 16.12.2003 I am FREE with LINUX, even if this freedom will have a cost (a relative complexity in usage at the beginning)
• Virus threat, less virus are living in Unix world. At least till today.
• You can still run Windows and Linux together thank to a great multi boot menu (no System commander, Partition Magic, old text based LILO required)
• Real Multi users system, program are running with user right privileges.
• Linux is gaining market place, I do not want to loose connection with the market reality.
• The community is extraordinary! they develop at a speed never seen before, even If I am convince that too much project are started and do the same things with more or less success . Look at Mono (.NET platform on Linux) which already support 99% of .NET ASP. Ximian (acquired at the beginning of 2003 by Novell and Suse) will continue to support the effort of Mono development.
• Linux is modular, there is like 120 distributions, 30 are dying per year and are replace instantly. Look at Flonix (Linux on a USB stick 64Mo, burning, browsing internet, webserver, GUI), or Knoppix ("From zero to GNU linux in five Minutes") this is great. Linux can be start on nearly all plattform (portability) and does not require good machine (Windows Longhorn will require 1Gb of memory (dixit Microsoft) so understand 2Gb to work flawlessy).
  Linux was first developed for 32-bit x86-based PCs (386 or higher). These days it also runs on Compaq Alpha AXP, Sun SPARC, Sun UltraSPARC, Motorola 68000, PowerPC, PowerPC64, ARM, Hitachi SuperH, IBM S/390, MIPS, HP PA-RISC, Intel IA-64, DEC VAX, AMD x86-64 , CRIS architectures. This includes Handled, celullar phone, gaming station like Xbox, Dreamcast.
• Everything is free, thanks to the open source community: Apache is the best/most used webserver, Tomcat the best servlet runner. Of course, the open source community has to find now a economical model. I am convince that developing is like speaking, you can not stop people to talk or think.
• Each days, I enjoy the use of CygWin under windows (for developing or maintaining this homepage), combining unix tools like: grep, sed, awk, and others...using ssh is now natural and I am feeling sad when I must start the poor Windows command.com terminal.
• I am using products from the open source coomunity since 3 years now, at work: mainly the Apache Fundation and their frameworks, at home a lot of tools: virtual dub, videolan, GIMP, ... and this all under Windows 2000. I am totaly satisfied by these tools, so why not replacing also windows by a totally free and open source system.
• I can install Suse Linux everywhere (on all PC I have, currently 3 desktop) and has no annoying licence scheme or registration process and even give it to friends as long as I give it for free.
• There is a difference between "choice" and "apparence of choice", before choosing an OS (Operating System) was easy:

- On one side Windows, which cover more than 90% of the market, is shipped with new PC, has many softwares of good qualities. All your friends (normal users not geek), companies or your office, are certainly running under Windows. This is good but you do not install Windows because it is your choice, you install it because it is common to install it.

- On the other side, alternatives OS: Mac, Linux, BeOS (I am also a big fan of BeOS) are installed by people who want to try something different, (remember the moto "think different" from Mac corp). Geek users accept some instabilities because they want to improve the system, or even help at the source code level. End users give a try or installed it at home because they discover it at their universities.

This was before, before mean "Linux without good support of hardware ( I remember installing Mandrake 9.0 and fighting 10 minutes to find a USB driver for my Microsoft mouse), without good desktops manager (Now this time is over thanks to KDE and Gnome), without a huge base of applications" Now this is slowly changing, On the server side, there is already a big change, HP, IBM and major actors are now committed to Linux and that is great. Now you have the choice, because now you can hesitate between Linux and Windows and/or even dual boot both (It has never been so easy as today because dual boot is integrated in many Linux distributions)

SUSE home for the version 9.0 is http://www.suse.com/us/private/products/suse_linux/i386/index.html
SUSE has a page which present 10 reasons to choose Linux Suse http://www.suse.com/us/private/products/suse_linux/i386/10_reasons.html
SUSE has also a FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page here: http://www.suse.com/us/private/products/suse_linux/i386/faqs/index.html

Choose a file system
ext2 or ext3 or ??? a good articles can be found here: http://www.linux-mag.com/cgi-bin/printer.pl?issue=2002-10&article=jfs

Installation

Great menu everywhere for installing the OS, 10s after having insert the CD (and choosing a resolution with F2 - default is 1280x1024), the linux Kernel is loaded and guide you through the installation process.

Personnaly what I dislike is the number of "package" (understand application, with strange name and strange revision number) given, like 10 tools to do the same task...I know I do not want to see any new Microsoft take the advantage under linux, but why the open source community does not concentrate on GUI. A user will remember that the GUI was horrible even if the program has done its job. That is my point of view. As a developer, I do not care but as an end user....

I decide to install everything, this take nearly 3 Gb of hard disk, Yes it is much but do not forget that XP take alone 1.2Gb without any office, photoshop, and so on. In this case the installation took 37 minutes, too long? You can also send complaint to hard disk manufacturer!

The partition manager compute the best option depending on your configuration, in my case I reserved 80Gb for Suse but on my secondary disk. By default linux want to modify the primary disk (and move windows data if needed), I switch to manual mode and only say click on "use everything" of the second disk. YAST then install then a small graphical boot manager on disk 1. This allow me at boot to start Windows if it is needed.

One page display a resume of all settings choosen, you may change the value of each section by clicking on the topic title. No technical words at all, You must only choosing some options in selection boxes.

Due to the huge number of Linux tools, you must also deal with 5 cd or one double face DVD, each disk may copy data during 15 minutes depending on options you have selected. (I forget to say that my CD drive is an old 16X). The estimated time to complete installation is quite accurate.

After completing the first disk the system restart and continue on CD2, a windows show you the list of package copied in realtime, you must just wait (Suse is made of more than 7000 packages or programs).

The system asks then for the root password, You can use the whole keyboard layout (letters, numbers, special characters) except accent (éà è) and umlaut (öüë), I choose a highly complex root paswword and write it down, till I have time learn it. Some word about security, program on unix system are running under user privileges, that mean that a potential virus MAY only destruct your data, and no data of others users (most of Unix virus try to replace some binary executable to gain a higher level access or may install a trojan horse)

The 2 integrated networks card were detected automatically (mainboard ASUS nforce 2 desluxe has a 3COM and Nvidia 100MB network card),

The system then ask if you want to download new packages and security upgrades from internet. This is higly recommended. No compagny in the world can ship a perfect code, this is True even in Linux world. I am pretty convince bugs handling is better in opensource paradigm, because nearly all users can see the source code (OK, I admit NO all users are developers, but there is a lot of great skilled developer which in their spare time review code, not to speak about university students which may have a lot of time :-) ). On the other side, take any business compagny:

• They first try to reproduce the bugs and know how many users are affected (which is OK),
• Worse, They try to minimize effects resulting of a bug (to avoid some political problems with clients, but correct the bug as fast as possible in the background),
• They speak about money all the time (but I am happy to get paid as a developer ;-) ), can we ship in delay? can we not correct this for the next release?

In opensource world, Linux developer consider this as a hobby and may try to correct everything or at least move the delivery date.

Back to the installation, I choose stand alone, because I do not want to use this linux box as a server. In Mandrake, this is a little better, since you can choose the security level: (Mandrake install may activate the firewall for You during the install), or block installation of some packages which can help a hacker (like ssh, webserver, VNC).

I strongly recommend You to deactivate auto login, security come always at a cost, I do not want that somebody simply restart the computer to gain access to my data and read private documents: Yes you will have to enter your password at each restart. Password is limited to 8 characters...which is somehow strange The password length is limited to 8 character because the default password encryption methd is set to DES (most compatible but SUSE also allow md5 or blowfish which have no length limit but at the cost of more cpu power and the loss of backward compatibility across other systems or old software). You can change this under Yast - Security and Users Password settings

Finally the release note of suse 9.0 is displayed, You can read it to be sure that nothing has changed since the manual printout.

YAST, then dectect hardware and set a graphical resolution.

ATTENTION, always use the test button to validate any refresh rate and resolution before applying changes, otherwise you may have a black screen at the next logon! If it ever happen, the only way is to reboot and choose "safe mode", logging as root, go to /etc/X11 and open the file X86Config....or rename the previous backup done by YAST (backup named X86Config.YAST). I have also done this mistake

Manual upgrade of all drivers to the their latest status
In my case I went to www.nvidia.com and download all latest rpm (rpm are like setup.exe in windows world),

To resume: Suse has now a very good and reliable installation system. YAST is now mature, detection of most hardware is good (at least on my system). I think it is even easier to install SUSE than an equivalent Windows system, mainly because partiioning is better support in YAST

How to install RPM

There is many ways to install RPM. In facts, choose the one you prefer. Note that you must be loogged as root to install any application.

Method 1: With Konqueror: click on RPM filename and after the download completion right click and choose "install packet with YAST"
Methhod 2,3,4,5 can be found on this page http://portal.suse.com/sdb/en/2002/04/wessels_packageinst.html

Install divx codecs and drivers

For some legal issues, SUSE can not deliver Divx drivers in the distribution, but they can be download at www.divx.com/divx/linux/
This internet page propose binary version of all major Linux program http://packman.links2linux.org

One of the best player can be found at www.xinehq.de , Caffeine (installed as default) is only a frontend GUI and use the runtme libs from Xine.

Emulation

You can use one of the following to use some of your windows applications: www.winehq.com and for directX games www.transgaming.com (even without recompiling the game!!!) and this even without installing Windows! Vmware www.vmware.com is a commercial alternative but required a fully licensed windows images. MORE TO COME...

Killer apps

These applications are installed as default,
Open Office (OO), which can open nearly all Microsoft office documents, GUI is not as good as MS Office but it do the job. Some powerpoint made with MS Office have some strange alignment, but MS Office represent correctly document created with OO.
GIMP a program for manipulating 2D images (like photoshop), run also on Windows because of the porting of GTK (open source 2D library)

Playing DVD, MP3, all tasks can de done under Suse without having any licence!!!! I recommend you to donate some money to the authors if you like their programs (so that they can pay their homepage hosting at least)
Opera Opera is a religion. All those features, mouse gestures, keyboard shortcuts, embedded mail client, drag-around panels, skins, GREAT standards-support, it's so fast, easyness of bookmarking, the "magic-wand"... and the list goes on and on...It is not open source but I like it so much.

Files manager

I am a big fan since 1991 of Norton Commander (I was using NC 1.0 on floppy disk), In windows I am using Windows Commander a lot to order million of files.
http://www.rmonet.com/commander/ This page contains nearly all file commander clones of Norton Commander.
http://www.xnc.dubna.su/ XNC 5.0
http://krusader.sourceforge.net/

Forums and Help

French
www.linuxfrench.net
www.linuxquestion.org

English
http://librenix.com/ news site on linux
Great forums

Others reviews you can submit me a new link HERE

http://www.unixreview.com/documents/s=8925/ur0310l/
http://www.arstechnica.com/etc/linux/index.html
http://madpenguin.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=503
http://www.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=03/11/11/1929234
http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=5157
http://www.linuxnetmag.com/de/issue9/m9rh_suse1.html Suse vs Redhat
http://www.internetwk.com/breakingNews/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=17300233

How to/tutorials

http://www.usalug.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=8161 Step by step install of SUSE 9.0 using FTP (non need to download and burn the iso's)
http://homepages.ulb.ac.be/~secollet/ Linux on HP Compaq NX7000 (that's my notebook at work)

Links

http://distrowatch.com/index.php?language=EN "This site is an attempt to provide a basic feature list and a package comparison table of major, minor and regional Linux distributions"

Links with reference to this article

When you finish this article, You may want to read the round 2 HERE

Dealing with Suse 9.3 problems

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Details

Category: SuSE 9.3

Published on Friday, 06 May 2005 00:00

Written by Administrator

Hits: 6998

I've installed SuSE 9.3 on a Notebook HP Nx7000 and a AMD desktop without any major difficulties except the fact that for some legal reasons, Novel has removed the ability of SuSe to play out the box any Divx, Xvid, mp3. In fact If You have a acess to internet, the online update tool may resolve some of these issues (You will have to download what Novel call "Multimedia pack" ). After using 2 years long SuSE 9.0, 9.1, 9.2 and now 9.3 I found pathetic that I still need to remove this crappy noatun, kaffeine and xine because they simply do not work as good as Mplayer or even better Videolan (VLC). Note that both Videolan, or VLC can not be install through YaST, and I think that it is really a big mistake.
So let repair this by:

• Installing APT-GET packaging system (a lot simpler than YaST as It deal with package conflicts!!!), First read this page, then If You are interested read on :-)
• Decode encrypted DVD  under Suse 9.3
• Install Videolan (VLC), the best multiplattform video player

 Before deciding to buy it, download it (FTP source are here), or starting Your favorite Bittorent client, You can

• Have a look at O’Reilly’s OSDir screenshots Suse 9.3 (94 sreenshots)
• Read some reviews:
  • Mad Penguin, one of the most complete review
  • Linux magazine has a online PDF: Suse 9.3 Professional - the latest Suse comes with new software, lots of improved Yast modules, and some other significant change [PDF, 287 kB]
  • QuebecOS (French) • Tux Journal (Italian) • eWEEK • Pro-Linux (German) • The Inquirer • Cool Solutions • USA LUG • linux-noob • Geektime Linux • James' Blog • Cool Solutions

Read more: Dealing with Suse 9.3 problems