On 10/15/2012 10:25 PM, Wally Lepore wrote: > On Mon, Oct 15, 2012 at 3:54 PM, Ralf Mardorf > <ralf.mard...@alice-dsl.net> wrote: >> On Mon, 2012-10-15 at 13:51 -0400, Wally Lepore wrote: >>> Hi Lisi, Brian, Lee, Joe, Neal, Dom, and Ralf, [snip] >> >> Since you've got knowledge about computers, it will be easy for you to >> switch to Linux. You should take a look at "shell globbing" and take a >> look at some beginners guide for "shell scripts". To handle Debian >> packages by a GUI I recommend to use Synaptic. >> >> There are three easy to remember shell commands that are very helpful: >> >> top >> killall -9 NAME_OF_AN_APPLICATION >> hwinfo >> >> Instead of top there are derivatives of top you might prefer and instead >> of hwinfo there are different other useful commands, but IMO top and >> hwinfo are very helpful for a beginner, I'm still using them today. >> killall -9, perhaps with some additional switches is a command that's >> important for every user. >> >> Assumed something wicked does happen, run top, it might show you what >> happens. If there for example is a process busy, can't be stopped >> anymore, a killall -9 NAME most of the times will finish it. >> >> hwinfo gives information about hardware. >> >> You also should take a look at "common linux shortcuts" some are equal >> to Windows others are for Linux only. >> >> COMMAND_NAME -h or --help >> >> and >> >> man COMMAND_NAME >> >> does show information, but can be cryptic for beginners. Getting good >> results for Internet investigations and understanding --help and >> man(pages) given time will become easy for you too. >> >> You should find an editor you like, that can be used without a GUI. IMO >> the easiest editor is mcedit, I was a vi(m) user in the past, but >> switched to mcedit a while ago. > Hi Ralf, > > That was very useful. Thank you very much. But I'm still stuck on > where to start. Are you saying that all these commands are used > strictly in "Terminal"? > > Also, I'm still searching for how to log in as 'root' to fix my GRUB > menu boot. Grub is not recognizing my windows 2000 drive in a > dual-boot configuration set-up. > > Thank you
On Linux you actually almost NEVER need to log-in as root. Instead you open a terminal with your GUI (while being logged in as normal user) and then BECOME root by issuing "su" and entering your root password. The shell will then be a "root-shell" -- all commands you enter there will automatically be executed as root. All of the commands suggested and the "fdisk -l" are to be entered in a terminal. Some of these (like fdisk -l) need you to be root in order to work correctly. (On my system fidsk -l as non-root does not prodocue any output). If you really want to log in as root (although it is not required, especially in your case) you can go to a virtual terminal via [CTRL]-[ALT]-[F2] and log in for a command-line only session (you may return to your graphical environment via [CTRL]-[ALT]-[F7]). But most of this has already been suggested... you only need to find it in the various mails you got for reply. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/507c7b75.4090...@web.de
