Give me a hand installing Ubuntu?

Factual Questions
41

Zsofia: fwiw, I spent around two days reading/learning about various Ubuntu ‘distros’ and minimum hardware, etc, etc and I found a few things notable. May or may not apply to you.

Many times, the burning of a CD/DVD will be ‘bad’ if burned too fast, so try setting burning to slower speed. Also do a checksum on all the downloads/burns to make sure of integrity/accuracy. I found my first 600+MB download failed the checksum, so download again, and it worked fine. From here - “Before burning a CD, it is highly recommended that you verify the md5 sum or sha256 sum (hash) of the .iso file. For instructions, please see HowToMD5SUM and HowToSHA256SUM. For the current list of Official Ubuntu SHA256 hashes, see the SHA256SUMS file for the release you’re using under http://releases.ubuntu.com (and optionally the PGP signatures in the SHA256SUMS.gpg file); hashes for the older MD5 algorithm are in the same directory. UbuntuHashes currently has only md5sums. Checking the hash ensures that the file was not damaged during the download process and is 100% intact.”

I chose Xubuntu as I wanted a decent GUI (‘desktop’ version, not the ‘alternate’ install, but both are burned just in case, fwiw) and made a ‘liveCD’ and then changed the boot order (of course) and plopped it into the (older) Toshiba Satellite A135 laptop that has painfully slow Vista upon it (and Vista is refusing to update or act normally anyways - with no Toshiba recovery disks/ISO available, of course). Within moments, I clicked the ‘run without installing’ and no problems at all. Firefox worked fine (included), but I did have to set wireless config (no downloading needed) - easy and nearly automatic once I entered the WPA2 stuff. Cable modem made by arris, model WT552, if it matters.

Firefox ran MUCH faster and GIMP (included as well) opened up as fast as my HP QuadCore machine does with Vista (versus Celeron(M) in laptop with 512meg of RAM). I’m sure I will have to do some tweaking once I do a ‘full install’ and lose Vista (on laptop), but I am confident it will be doable.

I got Xubuntu 9.04 from here if it matters. My intent is making that oldish laptop ‘stable’ so a terminally-ill stuck-at-home relative/friend can get online and do web/e-mail from home (lives over an hour away from us). Vista was much too slow to do much on the laptop, so I thought I’d dive into Ubuntu. Have learned quite a bit myself, and am no longer anywhere near as shy about losing Windows crap now.

Now, I am hoping I can get Flash player working, LOL, but not holding my breath on that aspect. Seems doable from what I have read - we shall see… I am no fan of Farmville, but it’d make this dying person happy to play it (or other Flash-based games) upon the laptop, so effort will be made. I see more learning for me today!

Good luck with it, honestly.

42

I’m a bit surprised people are still having such significant problems with Linux - I used to have problems like these ten years ago, but recently, it’s developed into a fairly stable and usable product - I’ve got Ubuntu dual-boot with WinXP on this compuater and I use them about equally. Wireless configured itself and the only time I’ve had to tinker with command lines (in the last couple of years) is to tidy up the boot menu after an update inserts new entries when the kernel gets upgraded.

OK, I work in IT, so I have to decipher and follow other people’s technical instructions all the time, but I haven’t found the need to do so for Linux for ages. I thought we were past the difficult times.

43

Oh, when it’s installed, it’s generally fine ( until a hard disk starts failing, but that applies to all OSes ) and is superior. And anything beats playing with the Windows Registry…

As for automatic configuration of wireless etc., one brilliance of Linux is that one doesn’t have to install chipset drivers ( or upgrade them ) before proceeding, and that SATA drives were a breeze whilst even XP still needed drivers. In fact, driver problems aren’t an issue unless there’s a particular piece of hardware without any, such as some printers: but that’s down to the manufacturers.

44

It’s most likely a driver issue. Not all hardware manufacturers release the code for their drivers and Ubuntu is pretty anal about only including open-source in their release.

Try posting your problem in the Ubuntu forums. I wager that someone else has had your problem and solved it.

45

Okay, I’m trying again, but I don’t understand how I can use those instructions for the checksums if I can’t get it to boot in the OS at all. Am I just dumb? Because those instructions seem to me to be for, you know, Linux. Which I don’t have. Because I’m trying to install Linux.

46

Checksums are for verifying that the download is correct, the file isnt corrupted and its the right one etc. They can be checked in any system with the right software or you can just skip that step.

47

Which is what, for Windows 7? (Or my mac?)

48

I don’t know, I’ve never touched either. Go to download.com and search for “checksum” and snag a free one. There are different varieties of checksums, but it’s probably md5 or SHA-something so make sure to get something for the right one, or get something that does both.

49

Checksums are not Linux specific ( although Linux offers quicker ways to check them ). A checksum is simply a long string of numbers/characters generated by checking the integrity of the downloaded file, which you compare with the originally given string ( such as: FC867FE1AB2E0A9796F9E4D155B44EA6998F4874 ). If one differs even slightly from the other you have a bad download.

Different algorithms can be used, so simply choose the type for which you have an offered checksum, usually MD5.
Here’s one for Windows 7. Quick Checksum Verifier 1.1.5

‘You can easily create checksums of files and verify their integrity in the future. The operation is very easy, just two steps. Load the file and paste the predefined checksum.’

50

Hey, never mind, the alternate installer is working! Actually working! Humming along!

51

…And Ubuntu is fast and cheerful and wants nothing to do with my wireless adapter. Of course, every fix either involves the word “kernel” in the first sentence or starts off with “download” which, yeah.

52

Never mind! I found a million solutions with kernels and stuff, and one that had me type in a couple things. It works! Seriously, it works! I am on it right now!

Which is probably not so hot for me actually getting any writing done, but whatever. I feel all accomplished now. :slight_smile:

53

Congratulations.

<Darth Vader style voice>Welcome to the Dark Side</Darth Vader style voice>

Si

54

Yeah, I probably should have kept it un-hooked-up and maybe I’d finish the book!

55

In a few updates some new open source broadcom drivers should be available!

Zsofia, I am glad you stuck with it. Good work.

56

I just opened this thread and was scrolling down and saw this, which I thought was a new post but is 11 days old. Anyway, I’ve never used ubuntu but it’s probably the same and this should work for Firefox. Go to the flash site and download the flash player plugin, untar or unzip it and put libflashplayer.so in ~/.mozilla/plugins. Voila, yer done!

57

No dont do that! Go to applications, down to software center and type in restricted extras. select the version of ubuntu you are using and install it. You’ll get flash and a bunch of other things too like sound and video codecs.

58

Like the previous poster said: Don’t download from the web and install. Use the package manager.

It’s probably the most common mistake ex-windows user make when trying to switch to Linux. They find some file on the web, try to install it and it fails due to missing dependencies. Then they get upset and say “Linux is not ready for the desktop” and go back to windows.

Always use the package manager! It will resolve all dependencies autmagically, and do the whole install for you. Once you get used to the package manager you’ll consider the windows way as crude and primitive. Want something? Look it up in the package manager, click install, and you’re done.

The cool thing about the package manager is that it will always keep your entire system, every single package and application you ever installed, up to date. No little balloons in your systray nagging you this or that update is available. Rather it checks and tells you “x number of updates available”. One click and everything is updated. 90% of the time there’s not even a reboot required.

59

What dependencies does flash have? It’s only one file, it has no sound and video codecs. I’m not against using a package manager, and if flash is in there that’s probably the best method, it’s just that flash is so simple and updates are so rare, you can snarf the file and use it for years.

It’s actually in the mozilla faq:

60

Flash is in the Ubuntu repository, which is why I recommend installing it that way. I’m seeing flash updates fairly regularly. At least every few months there’s an update.

It’s also good not to get any “bad habits”. Flash is simple enough that you could manually install it, but when it’s in the package manager repository it’s better to do it the “right way”. Especially for a new user just getting started with Linux.