Below is the List [ Big Homework ] i came up with that most of the newbie's come across while using linux.Assume i m not connected to internet or any Network/LAN etc.You can skip most of the questions if you want to,but questions in categary Maintenance & tweaks is i think must for me.Other questions are not my current problems but in future chances are there that i will face them.

Maintenance:-

What are the Tools in Linux Window managers for following operations-
1. To find and correct many types of errors on hard disk (Like Scandisk In Windows OS)
2. To Maintain Disk using defragmentation Tool (Disk Defragmenter In Win)
3. To Clean up the Disk space With garbage files like Temporary Internet Files,Trash,Temp Files,Downlaoded Cookies/internet files etc.(Disk Cleanup In Win)

Upgrade/Modify/Update/ :-

1.How to update Kernel?
2.How to update window managers?
3.How to convert RPM to debian without using ALIEN? (For Debian Distros)
4.New Linux kernel 2.6 not work on RAM 128,(e.g.Mendrake 10)How to install the New distros with 128 MB RAM?


Devices:-
1. My CD Writer is Not recognised by Linux,How can i Add this device and get driver for it?
2. Is there any Imagedrive software Linux have? (E.g.Nero image drive)


Tweaks:-
1. Simmilar to Windows XP,Is there any tweaks available for Linux to speed up boot time and free resources i.e.Is there any possibility that i can disbale some services that i do not require?
2. If computer is not connected to internet/LAN which services i can disable? Which packages i can remove ?

Please help me to find answers of these questions,thanks in advance.

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Maintenance:- What are the Tools in Linux Window managers for following operations- 1. To find and correct many types of errors on hard disk (Like Scandisk in Windows OS) 2. To Maintain Disk using defragmentation Tool (Disk Defragmenter in Win) 3. To Clean up the Disk space with garbage files like Temporary Internet Files, Trash, Temp Files, Downloaded Cookies/internet files etc. (Disk Cleanup in Win)

1.) Depends on your file system. If you run ext2 or ext3 it is e2fsck, but you usually don't need to run it yourself. It will be run during bootup if your partitions were not unmounted properly last shutdown. If you want to force a check of your partitions you should shut down your computer with the command shutdown -F and all the partitions will be checked during next boot.

2.) No need to, Linux is much better at keeping things in order than Windows. There are tools, but I have never used them. If you still want to you could move all the files from one partition to another and then back again... that should do it.

3.) As far as I know there are no such tools, there is really no need to, but here is how you get rid of such files:

Temporary Internet Files: Since the browser isn't tied in with the operating system as it is with IE and Windows you'll have to make the browser get rid of it's own files the same way you'd be doing with Firefox in Windows. Edit/Preferences/Privacy/ and then choose "Clean" to the right of cookies and cache. That should do it. There are also other things you can "clean" there. If you are using another browser than Firefox there may be somewhere else you'll find these settings.

Trash: Linux doesn't have a "native" trash folder like Windows does, but I guess that KDE or GNOME might have a trashfolder. You can probably empty it by rightclicking on it and choose "Empty Trash". I don't use GNOME or KDE so I'm not sure.

Temp Files: Are stored in the folder /tmp and it is cleaned everytime you boot your computer. And you could probably clean it yourself by deleting the files in that directory. You can only delete the files that are owned by the user.

Log files: They are usually kept in /var/log and they are "rotated" every week or so... (eg. file.8.log is renamed file.9.log and file.7.log is renamed file.8.log and so on until file.log is renamed file.0.log There is this week's logfile file.log and the last ten weeks logfiles, but that is it... you can remove them manualy but there will not be more than 10 weeks of logfiles.) You can usually decrease the amount of logfiles kept or disable login altogether and that is done within the program in question.

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Tweaks:- 1. Similar to Windows XP,Is there any tweaks available for Linux to speed up boot time and free resources i.e. - Is there any possibility that I can disable some services that I do not require? 2. If computer is not connected to internet/LAN which services can I disable? Which packages can I remove ?

1.) Not that I know of except of turning off stuff you don't use. eg.

CUPS isn't needed if you don't have a printer.
SAMBA isn't needed if you don't have a network.
NFS isn't needed if you don't have a network.
SSHD isn't needed if your computer isn't connected to a network.
TELNETD is never needed (It is a security risk if you are connected to a network)
APACHE isn't needed unless you need it for some webbased configuration tool like webmin.

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Devices:- 1. My CD Writer is not recognised by Linux, how can I add this device and a get driver for it? 2. Is there any Imagedrive software Linux has? (E.g. - Nero image drive)

Not recognized? I would need your boot-log to see what isn't detected. Is it detected as a CD-rom or isn't it detected at all? How is it connected? IDE? USB? SCSI? S-ATA?


2.) There is no need. The support is built into the kernel. I'm not sure about proprietary formats though, but regular ISO is fine.

You do it like this: type this on a command line. mount -o loop -t iso9660 /path/to/your/file.iso /directory-where-you-want-it-mounted

After that the content of the CD-image should be available in the /directory-where-you-want-it-mounted directory.

You should of course exchange my examples for the real path to the file and the directory name for a real one.


/LinuxSam

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Upgrade/Modify/Update/ :- 1.How to update Kernel?

These questions are kind of hard to answer without you having an Internet connection so I'll first answer them as if there where an Internet connection available.

1.) There might be a GUI-tool available for you to do this but here is what works on all Debian based distributions.

You first update your database of packages available to you:

apt-get update

then you search for a suitable kernel

apt-cache search kernel-image

this should provide a list like the following (this is just a short part of it):

CODE

kernel-image-2.4.27-2-386 - Linux kernel image for version 2.4.27 on 386 kernel-image-2.4.27-2-586tsc - Linux kernel image for version 2.4.27 on Pentium-Classic kernel-image-2.4.27-2-686 - Linux kernel image for version 2.4.27 on PPro/Celeron/PII/PIII/P4 kernel-image-2.4.27-2-686-smp - Linux kernel image for version 2.4.27 on PPro/Celeron/PII/PIII/P4 SMP kernel-image-2.4.27-2-k6 - Linux kernel image for version 2.4.27 on AMD K6/K6-II/K6-III kernel-image-2.4.27-2-k7 - Linux kernel image for version 2.4.27 on AMD K7 kernel-image-2.4.27-2-k7-smp - Linux kernel image for version 2.4.27 on AMD K7 SMP kernel-image-2.4.27-speakup - Linux kernel image for version 2.4.27-speakup kernel-image-2.6-386 - Linux kernel image for version 2.6 on 386. kernel-image-2.6-686 - Linux kernel image for version 2.6 on PPro/Celeron/PII/PIII/P4. kernel-image-2.6-686-smp - Linux kernel image for version 2.6 on PPro/Celeron/PII/PIII/P4 SMP. kernel-image-2.6-amd64-generic - Linux kernel image for version 2.6 on generic x86_64 systems kernel-image-2.6-amd64-k8 - Linux kernel image for version 2.6 on AMD64 systems kernel-image-2.6-amd64-k8-smp - Linux kernel image for version 2.6 on AMD64 SMP systems

Let's say you are using an AMD Athlon CPU, then you should use the kernel image named kernel-image-2.4.27-2-k7. If you have a system with an AMD Athlon64 you should use kernel-image-2.6-amd64-k8. If you have a system with an Intel CPU better than a Pentium II then you should use kernel-image-2.4.27-2-i686. If you are running a dual CPU system then you should use a kernel with -smp at the end. The kernel kernel-image-2.4.27-2-i386 should work on all PCs. (Not MAC or other platforms.)

After you have decided what kernel to use (let's say you have choosen kernel-image-2.4.27-2-i386), you type:

apt-get install kernel-image-2.4.27-2-i386

Follow any directions you get and the kernel should be installed for you. At bootup you might then have the chance to choose between your old kernel and your new one.

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2. How to update window managers? 3. How to convert RPM to Debian without using ALIEN? (for Debian Distros) 4. New Linux kernel 2.6 not working on RAM 128, (e.g. Mandrake 10).  How to install the New distros with 128 MB RAM?

2.) Same thing as with the kernel.

Decide what window manager you want. Then you install it with apt-get. eg.
apt-get update

and then

apt-get install wmaker or apt-get install gnome or apt-get install sawfish or apt-get install icewm or apt-get install kde, whichever window manager you decide that you want to use.


3.) Unless you really, REALLY have to, you DON'T. If there are DEBs available you should use them or you might severely screw up your system.

4.) Have never heard of this limitation... sounds more like a limitation of Mandrake 10. I don't think Debian has this limitation. Although I guess 128Mb is recommended.

/LinuxSam

If you have Debian or a debian-based distro on CD, instead of using apt-get update you should use

apt-cdrom -d /cd-rom

/cd-rom is just an example it should point to wherever it is you mount your CD-rom.

/LinuxSam

Thanks for the help,but new installation of gnome is still confused from your side SAM ,you are not specific with the which RPM or TAR file i need to install gnome.
You given information about apt-get but it works with internet connection.
i have Mendrake CD that may carry source for gnome if you know which rpm to use i can install them by converting them to DB.

I need to be clearer?


You should NOT use rpm-files found on your Mandrake CDs to install GNOME on a Debian-based distribution.

And as for using source for that... I don't think that is a viable option. I think the source for GNOME is quite large and no doubt Debian has made some changes to it to make it work fine with other packages in Debian and probably so has Mandrake so even though they have the same origin the sources might differ a little. Enough to make it a bad choice to try to install GNOME on a Debian-based distro using sources from a RedHat-based distro.

And how many CDs do you have for the Mepis distribution that you have installed?

If you have a second CD for Mepis (they talk about it on the Mepis homepage) it should contain a lot of installable packages. You should add that CD to the available packages with

apt-cdrom -d /cd-rom

and if GNOME is available on that CD you should be able to install it with

apt-get install gnome


You say you don't have an Internet connection. How did you get the Mepis CD in the first place? Maybe you could get CD 2 there too?

There are also a lot of information and HOWTOs on the Mepis homepage, read it!
Here is how to use a second CD as source for packages: http://www.mepis.org/node/1324


Or send for an Ubunto CD. Ubunto does include GNOME. And you could possibly use the GNOME packages from the Ubunto CD with Mepis if you are determined to install GNOME in Mepis. At least those two distros are both based on Debian and hence use DEBs.

/LinuxSam

BTW...

here is a User Guide for Mepis http://www.mepis.org/files/MEPIS%20User%20Guide.pdf

Read page 45 and onwards... it has some information about using a graphical tool called Synaptic to install packages that weren't installed during inital installation of Mepis.

/LinuxSam