--- Philippe Landau wrote:

Maura Edelweiss Monville wrote:

...

Therefore X was messed up ... how come ? It worked fine up to the night before. I turned off the computer in the end of my working session. An update could be the culprit.

I noticed that my laptop is being updated pretty frequently. When I am notified that some new patches are ready I am at a loss whether to install them or not.

...

In short I had to reinstall SuSE 10.3 which fixed the problem. But the serious difficulty was to save three directories where I have all my recent developments. I thought through knoppix I could mount both the internal and external hard drive and make copies. Apparently knoppix mounts the peripherals in a read-only mode (???) so .. forget about it. No, it does to protect users, but right-click a drive on the desktop and choose the option to make them writable.

Thank you. I did not know that. The previous time I used knoppix was over 2 years ago. But I would expect a technician that I pay as the Linux "expert" to know that. I saw this guy groping for a solution just like me.

...

Fortunately I have a web site on a remote server. So from the simple text- mode I could compress and ftp my directories to my web site from which I could recover them after reinstalling SuSE 10.3

As a consequence I fell behind my schedule. To prevent future emergencies I am thinking of getting another laptop/notebook. You are right, if you depend on your computer, you need a backup computer at the ready.

I am planning to get another laptop. A dual core. I have no time to update myself about what is available put together a configuration. Thank you, Maura

Kind regards Philippe -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Maura Edelweiss M. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Maura Edelweiss Monville wrote:

--- Philippe Landau wrote:

...

Maura Edelweiss Monville wrote:

...

Therefore X was messed up ... how come ? It worked fine up to the night before. I turned off the computer in the end of my working session. An update could be the culprit.

I noticed that my laptop is being updated pretty frequently. When I am notified that some new patches are ready I am at a loss whether to install them or not.

Maura, You can generally rely on the online updates not breaking things. I haven't followed the entire thread, but from the list, it seems that 64bit systems are more prone to an update glitch than the 32bit systems. I regularly (every few days) make sure I am completely updated with online update or zypper up and I haven't experienced any serious problems on my Toshiba laptop. I have had ATI driver problems after updates, but nothing that prevented me from using the display. The problem were with disappearing 3D acceleration, ATI driver lockups, etc. I could always use the display, but compiz, etc. would become unusable. Generally every week or so I will use software management to "update all packages if newer version is available." These can be significant package updates involving 400 - 800 Meg of updates. With the exception of xorg 7.3, I haven't had any problems with these updates either. I second the good advise about waiting several days after an update is released before installing it if it is on a critical computer. You can always check the list and if there is an update problem, most likely it will be found within a day. What graphics card do you have? ATI, nVidia? Also, do you have an update source for your graphics card added as a repository? These can be problematic, especially if you have an ATI card. Good luck -- David C. Rankin, J.D., P.E. Rankin Law Firm, PLLC 510 Ochiltree Street Nacogdoches, Texas 75961 Telephone: (936) 715-9333 Facsimile: (936) 715-9339 www.rankinlawfirm.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Sun, 20 Jan 2008 18:35:02 +0100 Philippe Landau wrote:

Maura Edelweiss Monville wrote:

...

Since I have to use MS Office every now and then I would consider to run alternatively Windows and SuSE through WMware. Now I run MS Office through CrossOveR. Is WMware stable and reliable ? Yes, others recommend VirtualBox though (free too). Or if it is just for that: Crossover Office, which is not free. Which one is easier to install and backup ?

I found Virtualbox to be a bit easier to install than VMWare. However, VMWare, Virtualbox, WINE and Crossover Office (essentially WINE +) are all excellent products. I think I would recommend using CrossoverOffice for Maura. CrossoverOffice and WINE are Linux native programs (and libraries) that fool Windows applications into believing they are running on Windows. Therefore, all your files can be kept on your Linux file system and available to you from Linux. VMWare, VirtualBox, and other virtualization products actually run full blown Windows on your system, but the virtual machine drive is essentially hidden from the host OS. The advantage of using a VM is the cases where you need to have some Windows applications or services that are simply not available under Linux. Last summer, I did this because my wife needed to use RealPlayer with a licensed feed, and the authentication had to be through Windows. I could authenticate through MSIE under Crossover, but it also needed RealPlayer 10, which does not run under Crossover Office. The solution was VMWare at the time. (Actually, the solution ended up by fixing up an old laptop). I was using VMWare server since it was free. VMWare Player would have been a better choice, but for some reason I didn't find a pre-built WindowsXP VM and Ubuntu had VMware Player in its installation database. -- -- Jerry Feldman Boston Linux and Unix PGP key id: 537C5846 PGP Key fingerprint: 3D1B 8377 A3C0 A5F2 ECBB CA3B 4607 4319 537C 5846

On Fri, 2008-01-25 at 08:44 +0100, Jos van Kan wrote:

Jerry Feldman schreef:

...

On Sun, 20 Jan 2008 18:35:02 +0100 Philippe Landau wrote:

...

Maura Edelweiss Monville wrote:

...

Since I have to use MS Office every now and then I would consider to run alternatively Windows and SuSE through WMware. Now I run MS Office through CrossOveR. Is WMware stable and reliable ? Yes, others recommend VirtualBox though (free too). Or if it is just for that: Crossover Office, which is not free. Which one is easier to install and backup ?

I found Virtualbox to be a bit easier to install than VMWare. However, VMWare, Virtualbox, WINE and Crossover Office (essentially WINE +) are all excellent products.

I think I would recommend using CrossoverOffice for Maura. CrossoverOffice and WINE are Linux native programs (and libraries) that fool Windows applications into believing they are running on Windows. Therefore, all your files can be kept on your Linux file system and available to you from Linux.

I found CrossOverOffice excruciatingly slow when using an Access database to print labels in Word. (About the only use I have for XP, apart from playing bridge on the net. :-) Now I use XP on Vmware and access my Linux filesystem with Samba (or whatever it is called now, cifs I believe). I also print via Samba, although in theory XP should be able to access the CUPS-server, but I never could get that to work. VMware is stable as a rock and in my set up you must not forget to restart the smb and nmb deamons after a Samba security update. :-) In short, YMMV.

Regards, -- Jos van Kan registered Linux user #152704

Jos, Crossover works great with word, excel and powerpoint not Access. BTW I do not know anybody (:-) using Access, even MS do not use access for what I heard (?). There are a zillion way to print labels. This is my approach: I use evolution for my list of contacts and I do the labels under OO. If you need to use Access then you are using the correct approach: VMware etc or multiboot. -=terry=- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

--- "Carlos E. R." wrote:

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The Sunday 2008-01-20 at 09:11 -0800, Maura Edelweiss Monville wrote:

...

...

Therefore X was messed up ... how come ? It worked fine up to the night before. I turned off the computer in the end of my working session. In short I had to reinstall SuSE 10.3 which fixed the problem. But the serious difficulty was to save three directories where I have all my recent developments.

If the X session was broken, you should have been able to switch to text mode and from there done a backup to an external usb disk, for instance, and/or try to repair. You should get familiar with the procedures so the next time you are caught unawares.

I succeded in switching to text mode. But I did not know how to mout the external hard drive or memory stick or DVD/CD R+W drive. I do not know how to start an email client even less a network browser without a graphic interface.

You can even use email in text mode - I do. There are http browsers, file managers, editors, etc, in text mode. Including googling! :-P

...

...

As a consequence I fell behind my schedule. To prevent future emergencies I am thinking of getting another laptop/notebook. Since I have to use MS Office every now and then I would consider to run alternatively Windows and SuSE through WMware. Now I run MS Office through CrossOveR. Is WMware stable and reliable ?

Hum! Quite... as far as things as complex as that go, yes. But it is closed source, you know.

Isn't there a free WMware and a commercial one ? Thank you, Maura

- -- Cheers, Carlos E. R.

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Maura Edelweiss M. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 The Monday 2008-01-21 at 23:19 -0800, Maura Edelweiss Monville wrote:

...

If the X session was broken, you should have been able to switch to text mode and from there done a backup to an external usb disk, for instance, and/or try to repair. You should get familiar with the procedures so the next time you are caught unawares.

I succeded in switching to text mode. But I did not know how to mout the external hard drive or memory stick or DVD/CD R+W drive.

You have to use the command "mount". The procedure would be to look at the log just after plugging the usb disk to see what device name it has; you may use 'dmesg' to see the messages. If it '/dev/sda1' you could use: mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/somewhere or mount -t vfat /dev/sda1 /mnt/somewhere Or you could have it prepared in advance editing a line in the fstab file. In my case it is easy, because I always mount manually.

I do not know how to start an email client even less a network browser without a graphic interface.

:-) Not many people do know, nowdays. But it can save your day. Mail: mail, pine, mutt (in order of increased complexity and features). I use Alpine (new Pine) for most of my mail even in graphics mode, because text is text, anyway, and it is very, very fast. http browsers: lynx, links, w3m... I even use some of them in graphics mode beacuse they are fast and low in memory. File manager: Midnight comander, 'mc'. Full of features and fast, I use it in preference to konqueror or nautilus for many operations: it can look inside rpms, for instance, connect by ftp or ssh, compress directories, edit files, view files like html, and within limits, pdf, word... Editors: mcedit (comes with midnight comander, menu driven and easy); joe, aka jstar, jmacs, jpico (it is included in the suse rescue dvd now). Then there is the feature full 'emacs', which you proably will not like, but is interesting to know about, and 'vi', which I'm almost sure you will not like, but comes by default in all linux or unix systems and is thus important to know the baresbones of its ussage for an emergency. If you search for it, you will find flame wars beetwwen people prefering vi or emacs for ages. Both have lots of features, but both need a lot of getting used to: their interfaces are quite awkward if you are used to graphic interfaces or windows or msdos (my case). I mention this because I'm almost sure someone will pop into this thread and say “this one is beeter” ;-)

...

...

Is WMware stable and reliable ?

Hum! Quite... as far as things as complex as that go, yes. But it is closed source, you know.

Isn't there a free WMware and a commercial one ?

Yes. I use vmware in the "server" version, which is free like in beer, and works pretty well: so far I have not needed the workstation version. It is a fine piece of software, although some times it has curious side effects. I believe the workstation version (which you can try for a limited time) is a bit faster and has more features, but I don't know exactly which ones. You can find some more info here, for instance: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vmware - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.4-svn0 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFHlcnatTMYHG2NR9URAq0rAJ41b99YsgpW04n3z/2tIOhFcAg+vQCfXoxC 8GKKajSqdefcemo3aA4yNbU= =UECJ -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----