Going from Windows to Linux

[lokiju]

I'm in process of installing SUSE 10.1 on one of my PC's to try and give this Linux thing a try, done installs in the past but the biggest issue for me is not knowing equivalent command prompt commands coming from a Windows back ground and also not know HTF to install apps since it requires compiling which I just don't understand at this point.

So..

I was wondering if those of you that have done the same already have any pointers or recommended reading or sites to help someone who is coming from a Windows back ground.

:beer:


EDIT:

Does anyone want to hold my hand and guide me in the correct direction for getting my wireless PCMCIA NIC working in my laptop with SUSE 10.1?

My NIC is a Linksys WPC54G if that helps.

EDIT 2:

OK now I got the card working according to ndiswrapper -l it states "driver installed, hardwdare present"

But when I do modprobe ndiswrapper I get "error inserting ndiswrapper (/lib/modules/2.6.16.21-0.13-smp/updates/ndiswrapper.ko) : Invalid argument"

and if I do "ifstatus wlan0" I get the error "interface wlan0 is not available"

What gives?


EDIT 3:

So I got tired of messing aruond with SUSE and decided to give Ubuntu 6.06 a try, good news is I got the NIC to come up bad news is I can't get an IP and when I do a dmesg | grep ndis I get the following.

Any ideas?

I can see my wireless network and the neighbors and set it to connect to mine but still don't get an IP, I even tried a static IP with no luck either (couldn't ping anything). I currently have my wireless wide open just to try and get this thing working but still nothing.

Also if it helps my wired internal NIC works fine.

 

[FoBoT]

you don't have to compile your own apps
the install of any major distro will let you include almost any mainstream app you'll need

 

[Wapp]

Try out Ubuntu.

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: Wapp
Try out Ubuntu.

Whats the advantages over SUSE?

 

[deftron]

Originally posted by: Wapp
Try out Seppuku.

fixed

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: deftron

Originally posted by: Wapp
Try out Seppuku.

fixed

You might be on to something there...

Might be easier.

 

[nweaver]

The biggest advantage of Ubuntu (or debian) is the package manager, I prefer apt to yast (esp. for remote package installs)

Figure out how to use yast or whatever package manager comes with your distro to install apps, much much much better. you will find yourself hating the windows way soon

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: nweaver
The biggest advantage of Ubuntu (or debian) is the package manager, I prefer apt to yast (esp. for remote package installs)

Figure out how to use yast or whatever package manager comes with your distro to install apps, much much much better. you will find yourself hating the windows way soon

Well at least I can have a functional OS (hopefully) that doesn't cost any money!

 

[azev]

I am in exactly the same boat as you are... I have extensive windows background, but very very little linux. I have a friend who is a unix master, and re recomended me to install gentoo stage 1 to learn linux. It has been 3 days since I tried, and I have not been successfull yet. If I can get it to work by this weekend, he is going to give me a walkthrough of how to get it done the right way, and whats every command means.
Good luck......

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: azev
I am in exactly the same boat as you are... I have extensive windows background, but very very little linux. I have a friend who is a unix master, and re recomended me to install gentoo stage 1 to learn linux. It has been 3 days since I tried, and I have not been successfull yet. If I can get it to work by this weekend, he is going to give me a walkthrough of how to get it done the right way, and whats every command means.
Good luck......

Thats nice that you have someone to show you the basics.

Thinking about taking a class or something at this point to get the basics of Unix and Linux down.

 

[kamper]

Isn't there a recent thread about how suse 10.1 shipped with a busted package manager? That might be a reason to go with ubuntu over suse, at least for now.

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: kamper
Isn't there a recent thread about how suse 10.1 shipped with a busted package manager? That might be a reason to go with ubuntu over suse, at least for now.

I actually was reading through that just a few mins ago, I'm installing SUSE now with all the updates to see how it goes. If it gives me any issues I'll install ubuntu.

 

[doornail]

?The Easiest Linux Guide You?ll Ever Read - an introduction to Linux for Windows users? - a book by Scott Morris

Free, 162 page PDF.

 

[imported_LoKe]

I started with Ubuntu and still run it and I've yet to run into any major roadblocks. I love my apt. However, i believe SuSe comes with XGL and Compiz pre-loaded, which would make things a hell of a lot cleaner.

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: doornail
?The Easiest Linux Guide You?ll Ever Read - an introduction to Linux for Windows users? - a book by Scott Morris

Free, 162 page PDF.

Awesome!

Thank you

 

[Alienwho]

I ran Suse 10 for a while and loved it. Then ubuntu 6.06 came out and I liked that even better. It has a beautiful install process and it's just great. Then Suse 10.1 came out and I was excited to give that a shot. I was disapointed with the install process (compared to Ubuntu) but it didn't really bother me that much. What did bother me was the fact that my wireless on the laptop I installed it on no longer worked correctly...which really pissed me off because it worked FLAWLESSLY in Suse 10. That alone pushed me back to Ubuntu Dapper on my laptop and I've loved it since.

I really want to use SUSE, cause I feel biased towards them because i've done work for Novell...but Ubuntu works better for me right now. I hope the next version of Suse will turn me back.

 

[lokiju]

Does anyone want to hold my hand and guide me in the correct direction for getting my wireless PCMCIA NIC working in my laptop with SUSE 10.1?

My NIC is a Linksys WPC54G if that helps.

 

[SleepWalkerX]

Your card uses a broadcom chipset. Your best bet would be to use ndiswrapper. Ndiswrapper is included in the install cds/dvd I believe so get that installed first.

Download your windows drivers for that card and extract them to the Desktop or somewhere. Then open up the terminal (alt+f2 and type gnome-terminal (for a gnome setup) or konsole (if you use kde)). Type su to become root. Assuming you've extracted them to the Desktop use the cd (change directory) command to navigate to your Desktop, "cd /home/<username>/Desktop". Then run "ndiswrapper -i <file>.inf", there will be one .inf file along with a .sys file and maybe some others make sure to do this to the inf file. Now unless ndiswrapper gives some error, we're done with that.

Now go to Yast, Network Devices, and Network Card. I'd personally recommend using the ifup method, but if you want to see if NetworkManager works I guess you can try it. It doesn't work too well with me. Go to Add. Just set Device Type to Wireless and for the Module Name type ndiswrapper (don't worry about selecting pcmcia). Then hit next and fill out any necessary network information like static ip, dns, and then you'll fill out the essid and wep/wpa encryption. Then that should be it.

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: SleepWalkerX
Your card uses a broadcom chipset. Your best bet would be to use ndiswrapper. Ndiswrapper is included in the install cds/dvd I believe so get that installed first.

Download your windows drivers for that card and extract them to the Desktop or somewhere. Then open up the terminal (alt+f2 and type gnome-terminal (for a gnome setup) or konsole (if you use kde)). Type su to become root. Assuming you've extracted them to the Desktop use the cd (change directory) command to navigate to your Desktop, "cd /home/<username>/Desktop". Then run "ndiswrapper -i <file>.inf", there will be one .inf file along with a .sys file and maybe some others make sure to do this to the inf file. Now unless ndiswrapper gives some error, we're done with that.

Now go to Yast, Network Devices, and Network Card. I'd personally recommend using the ifup method, but if you want to see if NetworkManager works I guess you can try it. It doesn't work too well with me. Go to Add. Just set Device Type to Wireless and for the Module Name type ndiswrapper (don't worry about selecting pcmcia). Then hit next and fill out any necessary network information like static ip, dns, and then you'll fill out the essid and wep/wpa encryption. Then that should be it.

Gives me the error message "couldn't copy wlipnds.inf at /usr/sbin/ndiswrapper line 135"

Now what?

 

[kamper]

Did you run it as root?

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: kamper
Did you run it as root?

Yes did as told and did "su" then put in my password after it told me "with great power comes great responsibility" and then ran the above commands.

 

[kamper]

Did you do it from the same directory that you extracted the driver in (as in if you 'ls' do you see the inf file in the list)?

 

[lokiju]

Originally posted by: kamper
Did you do it from the same directory that you extracted the driver in (as in if you 'ls' do you see the inf file in the list)?

Yep.

I even found by googling this which didn't work, still get that line 135 error.



1. Use Synaptic to get ndiswrapper-tools
2. Get the windows drivers, and copy the .sys and .inf to somewhere (say /home/<yourusername>/Linksys/)
3. Open terminal, and enter the following commands:
3a. cd Linksys
3b. sudo ndiswrapper -i <name>.inf (mine was lsb something, but I just renamed it to linksys.inf as it makes it easier). The screen should show something about Forcing parameter RadioState|0 to RadioState|1... mine had 4 lines.
3c. cd /etc/ndiswrapper/
3d. Edit all the .conf files, look for the line RadioState|1 and change it to RadioState|0 (to do this, I had to type sudo gedit and open the files from the GUI... gedit didn't quite like opening files with \: from the command line, not sure why) I'm not sure if just changing one or two files will work, but I just changed all 4.
3e. sudo modprobe ndiswrapper
3f. (optional) sudo echo ndiswrapper >> /etc/modules
3g. sudo iwlist wlan0 scan (look for your access point in the list)
3h. sudo iwconfig wlan0 channel <X> essid <ESSID> mode Managed (the X and ESSID should come from the iwlist)
3i. sudo ifup wlan0


If I can't get my wireless nic working there isn't much reason to stay with SUSE

Hopefully theres a solution, I just feel like such a noob.

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: lokiju
I just feel like such a noob.

Don't. Running binary drivers from another operating system is not a pretty thing. The best thing in the long run is to buy chips from companies that release enough documentation for proper drivers to be written.

 

[Alienwho]

Originally posted by: lokiju

Originally posted by: kamper
Did you do it from the same directory that you extracted the driver in (as in if you 'ls' do you see the inf file in the list)?

Yep.

I even found by googling this which didn't work, still get that line 135 error.



1. Use Synaptic to get ndiswrapper-tools
2. Get the windows drivers, and copy the .sys and .inf to somewhere (say /home/<yourusername>/Linksys/)
3. Open terminal, and enter the following commands:
3a. cd Linksys
3b. sudo ndiswrapper -i <name>.inf (mine was lsb something, but I just renamed it to linksys.inf as it makes it easier). The screen should show something about Forcing parameter RadioState|0 to RadioState|1... mine had 4 lines.
3c. cd /etc/ndiswrapper/
3d. Edit all the .conf files, look for the line RadioState|1 and change it to RadioState|0 (to do this, I had to type sudo gedit and open the files from the GUI... gedit didn't quite like opening files with \: from the command line, not sure why) I'm not sure if just changing one or two files will work, but I just changed all 4.
3e. sudo modprobe ndiswrapper
3f. (optional) sudo echo ndiswrapper >> /etc/modules
3g. sudo iwlist wlan0 scan (look for your access point in the list)
3h. sudo iwconfig wlan0 channel <X> essid <ESSID> mode Managed (the X and ESSID should come from the iwlist)
3i. sudo ifup wlan0


If I can't get my wireless nic working there isn't much reason to stay with SUSE

Hopefully theres a solution, I just feel like such a noob.

This is the reason why I went back to Ubuntu after trying Suse 10.1. The wireless just plain freaking works, you don't have to do anything. Oddly enough, it will probably work just fine for you if you try SUSE 10.

Try Ubuntu Dapper. You can download it, it's just one cd, like 600 megs.