Please someone explain

[Hariharan]

Hi i am completely new to Linux environment.....I have now installed Ubuntu 8.04 and i am stuck up with lot of terms,
GNOME, KDE (I am told ubuntu uses GNOME)
Nautilus,
can someone explain......
And how can i use applns like gtalk, antivirus,Photoshop .....
I am not able to install adobe flash player too....

[oz]

Welcome to the forums!

Gnome and KDE are desktop environments.

Nautilus is a file manager.

Check out WINE for the possibility of running any Windows apps that you want to run under Linux.

Google can help you find lots of good information on these subjects, too.

Hope you have fun with Linux.

[elija]

OK, I'll have a go.

Firstly welcome to the forums.

Gnome and KDE as well as others are what are known as desktop enviroments. If you are using Ubuntu then the Gui is Gnome Linky

Nautilus is the file manager application within Gnome

You don't really need an anti-virus but more on this in a minute

The GIMP is the OS equivalent of Photoshop, the interface is different but with a bit of time you will get used to it.

I don't know what gtalk is.

To install software in Ubuntu (or any distro) the recommended way is to use the package manager. In Ubuntu you can find it under System -> Administration -> Synaptic Package Manager.

The first thing you will need to do is make sure all the repositories are enabled under Settings -> Repositories make sure all the boxes are ticked and click OK and click Reload from the main toolbar.

Now you can just just search to find your software. For Flash (and various other items) you would search for and install ubuntu-restricted-extras. I believe their is an anti-virus called clamav in the repo.

Hope this helps

[Manchunian]

You don't need an anti-virus with Linux. Welcome to the world of Freedom to surf safer than you've ever surfed before without an antivirus! The only need for one is to check files that you may want to transfer to Windows.

[carlosponti]

gtalk is googles chat im program correct? if thats the case pidgin is the program equivilent. its an all in one IM program that has the ability to connect to gtalks network. it also connects to msn yahoo aol and several others.

ps flash gets installed when you go to the add remove programs screen select in the show drop down all available applications and select Ubuntu Restricted Extras. it installs flash java and dvd playback.

[Cabhan]

First off, I'd like to point you to the Ubuntu wiki. They have documentation on how to install lots of common programs:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/

For instance, for installing Flash Player:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Mu...20installation

I'd like to explain a bit more about desktop environments.

Gnome and KDE are both desktop environments. This means that they are essentially a suite of applications with some common backend, as well as a nice display and window manager. Linux consists of several layers:

At its heart, we have the Linux kernel. On top of that is the shell, which allows you to run applications. One such application is the X Server, which allows you to do graphics. Another such application is Gnome, which provides libraries for many common tasks, applications employing those libraries, and does this graphically by employing the X Server.

So for instance, Gnome has a terminal emulator called "GNOME Terminal", KDE has one called "Konsole". Gnome has a web browser called Epiphany, KDE has one called Konqueror (though most Linux users use Firefox). And so on, so forth.

I hope that helps explain exactly what these are.

[Manchunian]

This reminds me, Cabhan, of one of the things that put me off Gentoo. I wanted Kde, although now that KDE has become very heavy with Kde4 and Gnome has improved I prefer the latter. However, Firefox is a GTK application, whereas Kde uses the qt library. Doesn't this reduce some of the interest in Gentoo? I mean, one of the big reasons for using it is that you can specify USE flags. If you're using Kde and you want Friefox, you have to put the GTK flag up..and you multiply this as you add more and more programs. The result is that you end up with a Gentoo that is little leaner than a standard binary distribution. This isn't an attack against Gentoo, by the way; I'm just curious how the performance gain argument for using it can stand up to this fact.