Installing Software

[lgc4evr]

Hello,

I am a new linux user who has recently installed Debian 4.0r5 Etch for the i386 architecture on my desktop PC and am having difficulty installing software on this new operating system.

For example, Debian 4.0r5 Etch for i386 comes on 21 CDs, the first one contains the operating system itself and the other 20 contain additional software. When I put in disc 2 it doesn't automatically open and ask me if I want to install anything (I'm guessing it's not supposed to) and when I open the disc and browse through it, I don't see any icon that I can click on to execute an installation. I read on another forum something about going to the terminal and typing apt-cdrom add. I tried that and then it said that it did something like added it to the 'sourcing' or something but I didn't know what to do after that.

I also downloaded OpenOffice because I wanted to install it, even though I know it's on one of the other 20 CDs that are a part of Debian. After I downloaded it, I double clicked on its icon and it didn't install it just opened. I could browse through it but once again I couldn't find any icon that I could click on that would install it - they were basically just like folders that lead to other folders that contained .txt documents. I read on another forum something about going to the terminal and typing in some code to load it but I didn't try that.

I don't mean to sound naive, and I have basically been using Microsoft Windows all my life so maybe I'm spoiled, but there has got to be an easier way to install software without having to go to the terminal and type in some magic code.

Does anyone know how to install software on Debian without using the terminal? Is there an easy way to install the contents of the other 20 CDs? Do you always have to use the terminal in order to install software?

I had absolutely no difficulty installing the operating system itself - and I thought that would be the hard part. I had no idea that installing software would be this difficult.

Any feedback would be helpful.

Thanks.

[oz]

Welcome to the forums!

You can check this HowTo for a number of different ways to install software under Linux.

Generally speaking, and especially for new users, it's best to use the default package tools that come with your distribution to install software. Under Debian, that would be something like Apt. Of course, you can use Synaptic as a front end for Apt if you don't want to work from the command line.

Hope you have lots of fun running Linux.

[iwanabeguru]

use synaptic , this is a frontend for debians package manager.
if not installed yet you need to do it manually.

apt-get is a command line frontend for dpkg the debian package manager
to install synaptic login as root and type into the terminal
apt-get install synaptic

this command will install synaptic on your system.
If it can't then you need add the cd's to your sources.list file but i suggest you to forget about the cd's and add some internet mirrors.

deb http://ftp.debian.org/ etch main contrib non-free
deb http://security.debian.org/ etch/updates main contrib non-free
deb http://www.debian-multimedia.org etch main

Open your /etc/apt/sources.list fiel with a text editor and add the three above lines to it and delete or comment out the existing lines by adding a # to the front of the lines. Save

now update your package database with

apt-get update

command

After this step you can install anything.
Install synaptic if you want.

And read the users guide and system administrators guide on
Debian -- Documentation

Good luck!