Newbey Questions

[Scottyb1]

Hi all..

Brand new user to linux (windows lappy broken, this is my temp replacement)

Couple of questions really, and if you could "simple" the answers please..

The OS im using is Linux - Linos 2.6.21 (VERY Basic i know)
And its on a ELONEX ONEt

1) It has Pidgin Messenger installed on it but it wont make any noise when i get a message, I have checked all the sounds are enabled and made sure all the speakers are working and correct.. But no sound no matter i do??

2) (Posted about this earlier) aMSN is supposed to be better but i cant get anything to install it comes up with "Open" and Properties which just brings up a gerneral tab.. how do i get this installed? If i can?

3) Youtube videos, how do i play them? It says my flash player is out of date or something like that?

4) When i use pidgin to try open my MSN hotmail INBOX it comes up with the following message maunal command sent but no command made? (Or something like that)

I hope someone can help me with some of these questions... & Thank You

[Rubberman]

1. Right-click on the task-bar icon for pidgin. Amoungst the check boxes there is one toward the bottom for muting sounds. See if it is checked. If so, uncheck it.
2. I don't know about aMSN, though I've heard about it. I use Pidgin all the time.
3. YouTube videos need the flash player plugin for your browser. Using your browser (Firefox?), go to the Adobe.com web site, and download / install flash for linux.
4. Don't know about this. I don't use it to access mail services.

Sorry I couldn't help with items 2 & 4. Perhaps some other folks watching this forum can help better for those things.

[Scottyb1]

Ok i got Sound working on Pidgin Messenger now, It was nothing to do with the sounds being muted but after abit of looking around on google i found i had to type some words and numbers under the sound tab / and then the drop down box on COMMAND....

Im about to try get the latest flash player from Adobe, but theres a couple of options which one do i use?

YUM For Linux
.tar.gz For Linux
.rpm For Linux
.deb For Ubuntu

Any ideas on what one i download??

[Rubberman]

Ok i got Sound working on Pidgin Messenger now, It was nothing to do with the sounds being muted but after abit of looking around on google i found i had to type some words and numbers under the sound tab / and then the drop down box on COMMAND....

Im about to try get the latest flash player from Adobe, but theres a couple of options which one do i use?

YUM For Linux
.tar.gz For Linux
.rpm For Linux
.deb For Ubuntu

Any ideas on what one i download??

It depends upon the package manager your system uses. If it uses yum (Red Hat based systems use this) then select the YUM option. If it uses rpm, then get the .rpm file. If it uses apt-get, then get the .deb file. Otherwise, any distribution should be able to use the .tar.gz file (tarball). So, if you aren't sure, get the .tar.gz file. Make sure and follow Adobe's instructions to install whichever one you do get. If you get confused or have problems, reply back here.

[Scottyb1]

So i downloaded the file as adviced, and i un-zip (un-pack) it, and there leaves 2 files which are

Adobe_Media_10_linux (Or something very similar)
And then some random letter bits,

Both files come up with a ? near them, and i cant open them, or do anything with them..

And im not sure what else to do now ......

[Rubberman]

So i downloaded the file as adviced, and i un-zip (un-pack) it, and there leaves 2 files which are

Adobe_Media_10_linux (Or something very similar)
And then some random letter bits,

Both files come up with a ? near them, and i cant open them, or do anything with them..

And im not sure what else to do now ......

How did you unpack it - just with unzip? Since it is a tar file, you need to unpack and unzip it. Usually the command(s) go like this: gunzip -c name.tar.gz | tar -xvf -
That will unzip (without removing) the tar file, then untar it into the local directory - usually creating a subdirectory in the process (not necessarily). You need to cd into that directory and follow the installation instructions from there.

[i92guboj]

At least with GNU tar, nowadays a simple "tar xf filename" will suffice. It can guess if compression is being used and unpack it if needed befere untarring.

Note that in some distros the package manager can handle flash, so depending on your distro you might not need to do any manual work. In Gentoo for example you would just do "emerge adobe-flash" and that's all. So it might worth checking the docs or guides for your distro.

[Rubberman]

At least with GNU tar, nowadays a simple "tar xf filename" will suffice. It can guess if compression is being used and unpack it if needed befere untarring.

I'm aware that tar will expand a compressed tarball, though I thought one had to specify the z option. In any case you have to wait for it to finish uncompressing before seeing what's being output if you select the verbose option. That's why I usually do the "gunzip/bunzip2 -c tarball | tar -xvf - " thing so it starts unloading the tarball at the same time it is decompressing it. It's faster thay way as well, especially in a multi-core system since gzip/bzip and tar can run on separate CPU's. At least it seems faster to me.

[i92guboj]

I thought one had to specify the z option.

To be fair, I think that it used to be that way. I am not sure when the autodetection was added

[reed9]

These are the installation instructions from the Adobe Website:

1. Click the download link to begin installation. A dialog box will appear asking you where to save the file.
2. Save the .tar.gz file to your desktop and wait for the file to download completely.
3. Unpackage the file. A directory called install_flash_player_10_linux will be created.
4. In terminal, navigate to this directory and type ./flashplayer-installer to run the installer. Click Enter. The installer will instruct you to shut down your browser(s).
5. Once the installation is complete, the plug-in will be installed in your Mozilla browser. To verify, launch Mozilla and choose Help > About Plug-ins from the browser menu.