[lug] debian

[Paul E Condon]

On Thu, Sep 18, 2003 at 03:40:18PM -0400, Hugh Brown wrote:
> I'm beginning to play with debian and haven't had a whole lot of luck.
> 
> I did a net install with the floppies and got woody installed. 
> Unfortunately, it doesn't know what to do with my video card (Nvidia Ge
> Force 2 Go) nor my wireless card.  
> 
> I tried dselect'ing a 2.4 kernel but every time I boot into it, the
> system won't respond to keyboard input.
> 

When you transition to 2.4 kernel in woody, you need to hand edit your
lilo.conf. Did you?

> I added testing to my sources.list and did a dist-upgrade.  Booting into
> the 2.4 kernel still got my to a system that wouldn't respond to
> keyboard input.
> 

Don't use testing for beginning your debian experience. Don't use Sid.
Stick with Woody (stable). You can't directly install testing because of
known issues. It is being tested with a view to fixing its known problems.
Maybe by the end of the year it will be ready for learners, maybe not.
There is active support for Woody on the debian-user list. Look at
www.debian.org for how to sign up and to look at the archives.

> So, my question is this:  what's the best way to get Debian installed
> with a 2.4 kernel and a recent version of Xfree86 (the laptop is working
> fine with Redhat 9 w/o the NVIDIA drivers).

Laptops usually need pcmcia support. Is your wireless card pcmcia? If yes,
you need to install the pcmcia package that matches the kernel that you
installed. If you did a net install, maybe you didn't get pcmcia with 2.2.
Maybe you don't need 2.4 kernel.

> 
> I've gone lightly over some of the debian documentation but haven't had
> much luck with it.  What should I be reading to get myself more familiar
> with Debian?
> 

For reasons to get to know Debian, look at the Debian Policy Manual. It
tells where every file should be located on the system and why. It discusses
all sorts of issues about how a computer should be set up and why. The 
reasoning is very 'professional'. It is a good system, because the people
are good at what they do.

For details about howto, look near where you find the policy manual on their
web site.

HTH
-- 
Paul E Condon           
pecondon at peakpeak.com