[SLUG] Fwd: Re: OLD PC

[Gavin Baker]

On Mon, 2002-09-23 at 23:56, Jamie wrote:
> Can anyone offer Clive any suggestions?
> 
> ----- Forwarded message from Clive Davies <clive at clivedavies.com> -----
>
> Hello
> 
> I have solved a few problems but I have a few real simple one's at the 
> minute.
> 
> I don't seem to be able to 'see' my CD drives on the desktop. I can't 
> even open one of them if I am running Redhat, although I can 'see' it 
> in the hardware search thing.

Use your favorite text editor and edit /etc/fstab (or just "cat
/etc/fstab"). Is there a cdrom line in there? 

Can you mount the cd with a command like "mount /mnt/cdrom"? If not, has
the kernel detected the drive? (check with the command "dmesg | more").

If you can mount the CD from a console, you can add an icon for it to
KDE with right-mouse-button -> Create New CD-Rom device and something
similar for GNOME.

If you can't mount the CD from a console, you will need to configure
your /etc/fstab. Let me know if this is the case.
 
> And how do I log in as the 'root' user? I assume I need to do this to 
> stop me logging in each time I want to change some of the system 
> settings.

At the login prompt, just use "root" and root's password. Or as your
normal non-root user, type "su" in a console/x-terminal-emulator and
give roots password.

> I know it exists, but how do I get  a Linux version for a Mac.

Which Mac is it? 

If its an old Motorolla 68000 family CPU, debian is one of the few
distributions that support it.

If its a newer Mac (Like a powermac/imac), You have more choices, debian
(debian.org), Yellowdog (yellowdoglinux.com) and SuSe (suse.com) are all
popular distributions for these PPC based Macs.

Debian and yellowdog can be downloaded off the net, or bought for cheap
from cheeplinux.com/linuxemporium.co.uk etc. SuSe don't make versions
available for download...

(Im using an iMac with debian at the moment)

Regards,
Gav