eclectica
2004-03-06, 18:47
I decided to try out Linux and I ordered the 7-CD set for $20 from one of the sites listed by debian.org (http://www.debian.org/). The installation was difficult and it asked me several questions during the process, which I didn't know the answer to. After it all was done and installed, I ended up with a command prompt that was unappealing to me. What I needed instead was Linux with a graphical interface. With such a thing Linux could be popular with desktop users. So I tried out Lindows (http://www.lindows.com/), which is basically a Linux operating system that has the graphical windowing appeal of Windows.
At their site they sell the Lindows operating system for varying prices, depending on how you choose to receive it. The Lindows EULA (http://www.lindows.com/lindows_products_OSEULA.php) is more liberal than Microsoft's. But besides that there is nothing to prevent you from breaking the EULA and making several copies for your friends. Lindows does not have an online product registration that is needed to activate it. The cheapest method is to download it for $25 by way of a BitTorrent link, which saves them on their bandwidth. Otherwise the standard purchase is $50 to download it from their site, and $60 plus shipping when you order it by CD to come in the mail. I chose to purchase Lindows 4.5 by CD. But rather than waiting for the CD to arrive in the mail, I decided to download it immediately. Once I purchased it I was able to login at their site with my e-mail and chosen password. The download was a 421 MB iso file. I burned the iso file to a CD, and booted up with it on my laptop.
The installation was very easy and quick. Afterwards I found that it automatically connected to my router on the LAN, and I was able to access the WAN internet. The default installation in Lindows is to install the user as "root". That is the equivalent in Microsoft of "administrator". It means to have full priveleges. While some see a security vulnerability in that, if you are installing it on a home computer rather than a public computer, that is the easiest choice for you.
I noticed that it actually takes Lindows longer to boot up when turning on the computer than Windows XP does.
The File Manager allows you to see all the files on the computer. To see the structure of the files on your hard drive, you would browse into the "System" directory.
Lindows comes with a few basic programs, and has the feel of Windows. It has a text editor, a browser, XMMS mp3 player, K3b CD burner, an image viewer, calculator, and some others. It seems to have used the KDE desktop (http://www.kde.org/) and integrated it into Lindows. In order to add more programs, you can do it the easy way, which is through the Click-N-Run service of Lindows. The problem with that is you would have to pay them $15 a month to access the CNR Wharehouse. Most of the stuff there can be found for free.
Installing programs without using the CNR Wharehouse is more difficult though. I believe Lindows has made it this way because they want to encourage people to pay the subscription for the wharehouse. The good thing about the CNR wharehouse is that it is unlimited, so you could get all the programs you need in a month for the price of $15.
To download programs without using their Click-N-Run service, you would seek all Linux versions of programs to download. They will often have a file extension of tar.gz, known as a "tarball". For example, say you want to download Mozilla (http://www.mozilla.org/). Go to the website and find the version of it for Linux, right-click on the link and select "save link target as". You can save it to an easy directory for you to find from the File Manager, such as "My Documents".
Afterwards you can use the File Manager to see the file on your computer that you've just downloaded. In the example given, it is mozilla-i686-pc-linux-gnu-1.6-installer.tar.gz. Now I find the file and right-click on it, and select "Extract here", and then select to extract all the files. It will then unzip the files. What this gives me is an extracted folder named mozilla-installer. Unfortunately at this point you then have to open up the Console to finalize the process. Going into the Console is like going into the DOS command prompt in Windows. These are the steps I took in the Console, typed in yellow. The computer name is "Dionysus":
Dionysus:~# dir
Desktop Mail My\ Computer My\ Documents Network system-setup
Dionysus:~# cd My\ Documents
Dionysus:~/My Documents# dir
My\ Music mozilla-i686-pc-linux-gnu-1.6-installer.tar.gz mozilla-installer
Dionysus:~/My Documents# cd mozilla-installer
Dionysus:~/My Documents/mozilla-installer# ./mozilla-installer
The command dir lists all files within a directory, and the command cd changes to another directory. You have to be in the same directory as the installation file, so you will have to use cd to change into it. The folders are case sensitive, so typing in cd My\ documents wouldn't work here. I could have shortened the process by typing in two steps directly from the beginning: cd My\ Documents/mozilla-installer and then ./mozilla-installer. Also, the tarball can be extracted directly from the Console, but I prefer avoiding the Console as much as possible, and extracted it using the File Manger instead.
By default Mozilla was created and installed in the directory My Computer/System/usr/local/mozilla. It unfortunately in the installation process didn't create a shortcut in the Programs menu of Lindows. I went into the directory containing the new Mozilla installation and found two shell scripts: one named "mozilla" and the other named "run-mozilla.sh". The reason it's good to know what the shell script files are, is so that if you want to create a shortcut in the Lindows start menu, then you would use the shell script file as the command line. I was actually able to run Mozilla from the File Manager by double-clicking on the shell script. Here's how I added the Mozilla shortcut to the Programs menu: I right-clicked on the Lindows start icon, and chose "Menu Editor". I then went into the folders Programs-->Internet and on top clicked "new item". It asked me the name, which I chose to name as "Mozilla 1.6". Then for the command, which is the path of the shell script file, I chose usr/local/mozilla/mozilla. I couldn't figure how to give it an icon though. The whole Menu Editor process is cumbersome, because you can't directly right click and add or see the properties of the items in the Lindows start menu. You can see the properties of items on the desktop though, by right clicking.
Afterwards I tried to install OpenOffice (http://www.openoffice.org/). That seemed to involve a two-step process. First I extracted the tarball. Then I activated in in the Console. When I examined its newly created folder in My Computer/System/usr/local/OpenOffice.org1.1.0, I thought it would be ready to run after installing it from the Console. I ended up having to run the shell script named "setup", which did the final installation of the program into the created directory My Computer/root/OpenOffice.org1.1.0. That installation created shortcuts in the Lindows start menu. Maybe the reason the Mozilla installation didn't create shortcuts, is because the browser that comes with Lindows is actually Mozilla, and the program refused to create extra shortcuts. They must be closely related except for a few details. When I changed the home page in Mozilla, it also changed in the Lindows browser. The difference between the two is that when you launch the Lindows browser, it says "Lindows Internet suite" on top, and when Mozilla is launched, it says "Mozilla" at the top of the screen.
At their site they sell the Lindows operating system for varying prices, depending on how you choose to receive it. The Lindows EULA (http://www.lindows.com/lindows_products_OSEULA.php) is more liberal than Microsoft's. But besides that there is nothing to prevent you from breaking the EULA and making several copies for your friends. Lindows does not have an online product registration that is needed to activate it. The cheapest method is to download it for $25 by way of a BitTorrent link, which saves them on their bandwidth. Otherwise the standard purchase is $50 to download it from their site, and $60 plus shipping when you order it by CD to come in the mail. I chose to purchase Lindows 4.5 by CD. But rather than waiting for the CD to arrive in the mail, I decided to download it immediately. Once I purchased it I was able to login at their site with my e-mail and chosen password. The download was a 421 MB iso file. I burned the iso file to a CD, and booted up with it on my laptop.
The installation was very easy and quick. Afterwards I found that it automatically connected to my router on the LAN, and I was able to access the WAN internet. The default installation in Lindows is to install the user as "root". That is the equivalent in Microsoft of "administrator". It means to have full priveleges. While some see a security vulnerability in that, if you are installing it on a home computer rather than a public computer, that is the easiest choice for you.
I noticed that it actually takes Lindows longer to boot up when turning on the computer than Windows XP does.
The File Manager allows you to see all the files on the computer. To see the structure of the files on your hard drive, you would browse into the "System" directory.
Lindows comes with a few basic programs, and has the feel of Windows. It has a text editor, a browser, XMMS mp3 player, K3b CD burner, an image viewer, calculator, and some others. It seems to have used the KDE desktop (http://www.kde.org/) and integrated it into Lindows. In order to add more programs, you can do it the easy way, which is through the Click-N-Run service of Lindows. The problem with that is you would have to pay them $15 a month to access the CNR Wharehouse. Most of the stuff there can be found for free.
Installing programs without using the CNR Wharehouse is more difficult though. I believe Lindows has made it this way because they want to encourage people to pay the subscription for the wharehouse. The good thing about the CNR wharehouse is that it is unlimited, so you could get all the programs you need in a month for the price of $15.
To download programs without using their Click-N-Run service, you would seek all Linux versions of programs to download. They will often have a file extension of tar.gz, known as a "tarball". For example, say you want to download Mozilla (http://www.mozilla.org/). Go to the website and find the version of it for Linux, right-click on the link and select "save link target as". You can save it to an easy directory for you to find from the File Manager, such as "My Documents".
Afterwards you can use the File Manager to see the file on your computer that you've just downloaded. In the example given, it is mozilla-i686-pc-linux-gnu-1.6-installer.tar.gz. Now I find the file and right-click on it, and select "Extract here", and then select to extract all the files. It will then unzip the files. What this gives me is an extracted folder named mozilla-installer. Unfortunately at this point you then have to open up the Console to finalize the process. Going into the Console is like going into the DOS command prompt in Windows. These are the steps I took in the Console, typed in yellow. The computer name is "Dionysus":
Dionysus:~# dir
Desktop Mail My\ Computer My\ Documents Network system-setup
Dionysus:~# cd My\ Documents
Dionysus:~/My Documents# dir
My\ Music mozilla-i686-pc-linux-gnu-1.6-installer.tar.gz mozilla-installer
Dionysus:~/My Documents# cd mozilla-installer
Dionysus:~/My Documents/mozilla-installer# ./mozilla-installer
The command dir lists all files within a directory, and the command cd changes to another directory. You have to be in the same directory as the installation file, so you will have to use cd to change into it. The folders are case sensitive, so typing in cd My\ documents wouldn't work here. I could have shortened the process by typing in two steps directly from the beginning: cd My\ Documents/mozilla-installer and then ./mozilla-installer. Also, the tarball can be extracted directly from the Console, but I prefer avoiding the Console as much as possible, and extracted it using the File Manger instead.
By default Mozilla was created and installed in the directory My Computer/System/usr/local/mozilla. It unfortunately in the installation process didn't create a shortcut in the Programs menu of Lindows. I went into the directory containing the new Mozilla installation and found two shell scripts: one named "mozilla" and the other named "run-mozilla.sh". The reason it's good to know what the shell script files are, is so that if you want to create a shortcut in the Lindows start menu, then you would use the shell script file as the command line. I was actually able to run Mozilla from the File Manager by double-clicking on the shell script. Here's how I added the Mozilla shortcut to the Programs menu: I right-clicked on the Lindows start icon, and chose "Menu Editor". I then went into the folders Programs-->Internet and on top clicked "new item". It asked me the name, which I chose to name as "Mozilla 1.6". Then for the command, which is the path of the shell script file, I chose usr/local/mozilla/mozilla. I couldn't figure how to give it an icon though. The whole Menu Editor process is cumbersome, because you can't directly right click and add or see the properties of the items in the Lindows start menu. You can see the properties of items on the desktop though, by right clicking.
Afterwards I tried to install OpenOffice (http://www.openoffice.org/). That seemed to involve a two-step process. First I extracted the tarball. Then I activated in in the Console. When I examined its newly created folder in My Computer/System/usr/local/OpenOffice.org1.1.0, I thought it would be ready to run after installing it from the Console. I ended up having to run the shell script named "setup", which did the final installation of the program into the created directory My Computer/root/OpenOffice.org1.1.0. That installation created shortcuts in the Lindows start menu. Maybe the reason the Mozilla installation didn't create shortcuts, is because the browser that comes with Lindows is actually Mozilla, and the program refused to create extra shortcuts. They must be closely related except for a few details. When I changed the home page in Mozilla, it also changed in the Lindows browser. The difference between the two is that when you launch the Lindows browser, it says "Lindows Internet suite" on top, and when Mozilla is launched, it says "Mozilla" at the top of the screen.