I just can't get any love from linux

[cleverhandle]

Originally posted by: Atheus
Just get another distro if fedora's not working for you out of the box. Try ubuntu.

I give the opposite advice. If you want to learn anything, stick with one distro and learn how to make it work for you. Obviously, you can take that to ridiculous extremes, but just bopping around between distros and never doing much past installing them and praying isn't going to make you any more comfortable with the system.

Since it sounds like the forcedeth drivers might work in newer kernel versions, I would go that route rather than try to install the nvidia drivers, at least to start with. You can find 2.6.15 kernel RPM's here. There are several versions there, in fact, so you can try others if the first doesn't work. Use a Windows computer to download those and burn them to a disk (USB key would probably work too, but the CD is a bit more foolproof). Log into Linux, open the CD under "Computer" and copy the kernel RPM to your home directory. Open a terminal, type

sudo rpm -Uvh kernel

...then hit TAB to complete the packagename for you, then enter. That should install the new kernel for you and give a choice for it in the Grub menu after you reboot. If the hardware autodetection doesn't work, try a

sudo /sbin/modprobe forcedeth

and see what you get. As a matter of fact, you might at least try the last command before you bother with any of the downloading, because it's not clear that you've actually given the current forcedeth driver a shot yet.

If you get hung up somewhere, I would highly recommend doing some Googling. Search on the command you don't understand or the error message you get. Reading up a bit on command-line and linux basics would be a good idea too. Like, what does sudo do? (Hint: man sudo) Or, why does /sbin/modprobe work, but plain modprobe doesn't? (Hint: $PATH). People can (and will) keep answering your questions here, but if you're going to be happy using Linux, you need to get used to searching, and reading, to find information on your own. And you only get better at that with practice. I think the FedoraFAQ is a pretty nice starting place.

 

[coolred]

Originally posted by: cleverhandle

Originally posted by: Atheus
Just get another distro if fedora's not working for you out of the box. Try ubuntu.

I give the opposite advice. If you want to learn anything, stick with one distro and learn how to make it work for you. Obviously, you can take that to ridiculous extremes, but just bopping around between distros and never doing much past installing them and praying isn't going to make you any more comfortable with the system.

Since it sounds like the forcedeth drivers might work in newer kernel versions, I would go that route rather than try to install the nvidia drivers, at least to start with. You can find 2.6.15 kernel RPM's here. There are several versions there, in fact, so you can try others if the first doesn't work. Use a Windows computer to download those and burn them to a disk (USB key would probably work too, but the CD is a bit more foolproof). Log into Linux, open the CD under "Computer" and copy the kernel RPM to your home directory. Open a terminal, type

sudo rpm -Uvh kernel

...then hit TAB to complete the packagename for you, then enter. That should install the new kernel for you and give a choice for it in the Grub menu after you reboot. If the hardware autodetection doesn't work, try a

sudo /sbin/modprobe forcedeth

and see what you get. As a matter of fact, you might at least try the last command before you bother with any of the downloading, because it's not clear that you've actually given the current forcedeth driver a shot yet.

If you get hung up somewhere, I would highly recommend doing some Googling. Search on the command you don't understand or the error message you get. Reading up a bit on command-line and linux basics would be a good idea too. Like, what does sudo do? (Hint: man sudo) Or, why does /sbin/modprobe work, but plain modprobe doesn't? (Hint: $PATH). People can (and will) keep answering your questions here, but if you're going to be happy using Linux, you need to get used to searching, and reading, to find information on your own. And you only get better at that with practice. I think the FedoraFAQ is a pretty nice starting place.

I did try the modprobe command, I posted about it about 3-4 posts up. It didn't work, but it could be because of the kernel. I will stick with fedora for a while. I wasn't planning to change, but I am not ruling out other distros, liek you said, i just think i should stick with one for now. And thanks for the advice, off to do more reading and searching I guess. Thanks

 

[TGS]

you will have to give it the path to the .run file.

IE. "sh /[path to file]/NFORCE-Linux-x86-1.0-0310-pkg1.run"

I would stuff it in your home directory so you can work with it under normal user. Though if you are pulling from a usb drive I would assume you can do a chmod on it. IIRC when you download that file, it will be read only. You should be able to " chmod 755 /[path to file]/NFORCE-Linux-x86-1.0-0310-pkg1.run" to make it executable.

You can edit the sudoers file, "/etc/sudoers" though (you can do more damage this way) a simple "su" "(enter password)" will log you in as root. I find it easier to have my normal login in one terminal, and a root login in a second terminal.

If you are using the stock kernel, you should hopefully have a prebuilt driver. If not you should still be able to pull the kernel sources from your CDs. *I just did a quick search on that and I might be wrong*

Install Kernel Source says that the kernel sources are not part of the default media. Though it says you may be able to use the kernel headers found on CD4. Hopefully that may work if the nvidia defaults don't pan out for you.

 

[cleverhandle]

Originally posted by: coolred
I did try the modprobe command, I posted about it about 3-4 posts up. It didn't work, but it could be because of the kernel.

You didn't try the command as I posted it - you didn't sudo. That's why you got "Operation not permitted." Basically, you were trying to install a device driver as an unprivileged user, so it failed.

 

[silverpig]

Originally posted by: coolred
It is a marvel ethernet adaptor, but it is from and nvidia chipset, so I assume it applies as nvidia. I tried the modprobe forcedeth, I got bash: modporbe: command not found. Thought maybe I need the /sbin/ again, tried it with that and got
Fatal: Error inserting forcedeth (/lib/modules/2.6.11-1.1369_FC4/kernel/drivers/net/forcedeth.ko): Operation not permitted.

So the I downloaded the nvidia drivers to my usb key and tried installing them. It says to type sh NFORCE-Linux-x86-1.0-0310-pkg1.run to get them to install. That did not work, I am not sure if i need to save it somewhere other then the USB key, or type something else to let it know its on the usb key. Do I need the /sbin/ in front of it? Do I need to be using the sudo command? Anfd when I try to log onto the sudo account, it says my username is not in the sudoers file.

I believe the Marvell GigaLAN adapter uses the sundance module.

modprobe sundance

should do it.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: coolred
It is a marvel ethernet adaptor, but it is from and nvidia chipset, so I assume it applies as nvidia. I tried the modprobe forcedeth, I got bash: modporbe: command not found. Thought maybe I need the /sbin/ again, tried it with that and got
Fatal: Error inserting forcedeth (/lib/modules/2.6.11-1.1369_FC4/kernel/drivers/net/forcedeth.ko): Operation not permitted.

So the I downloaded the nvidia drivers to my usb key and tried installing them. It says to type sh NFORCE-Linux-x86-1.0-0310-pkg1.run to get them to install. That did not work, I am not sure if i need to save it somewhere other then the USB key, or type something else to let it know its on the usb key. Do I need the /sbin/ in front of it? Do I need to be using the sudo command? Anfd when I try to log onto the sudo account, it says my username is not in the sudoers file.

Loading drivers requires root, so sudo would be necessary.

Operation not permitted. should tell you that you don't have the necessary permissions to perform the action, try it with sudo.

You'd need to be root to install the nVidia drivers too.

 

[coolred]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey

Originally posted by: coolred
It is a marvel ethernet adaptor, but it is from and nvidia chipset, so I assume it applies as nvidia. I tried the modprobe forcedeth, I got bash: modporbe: command not found. Thought maybe I need the /sbin/ again, tried it with that and got
Fatal: Error inserting forcedeth (/lib/modules/2.6.11-1.1369_FC4/kernel/drivers/net/forcedeth.ko): Operation not permitted.

So the I downloaded the nvidia drivers to my usb key and tried installing them. It says to type sh NFORCE-Linux-x86-1.0-0310-pkg1.run to get them to install. That did not work, I am not sure if i need to save it somewhere other then the USB key, or type something else to let it know its on the usb key. Do I need the /sbin/ in front of it? Do I need to be using the sudo command? Anfd when I try to log onto the sudo account, it says my username is not in the sudoers file.

Loading drivers requires root, so sudo would be necessary.

Operation not permitted. should tell you that you don't have the necessary permissions to perform the action, try it with sudo.

You'd need to be root to install the nVidia drivers too.

I tried that, but when I use sudo it says ""my username" is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.

So I am assuming I need to edit the sudoers file to include my username. From what I have figured out, I need visudo to edit the sudoers file. But I can't seem to find out how exactly to use visudo.

 

[pm]

Sudoers should be in /etc/sudo, or /etc/sudo/sudoers You can edit it however you like - "vi" is one way. A more user friendly way might be "gvim /etc/sudoers" - vi can be tough to pick up and start using, gvim adds buttons and more graphical help. Another alternative that is easy to pick up is "pico" - "pico /etc/sudoers" - add your name and then save it using "control-X".

Bear in mind that you need to be root to edit "sudoers". 🙂 So, do a switchuser using "su root" to change yourself to root, edit sudoers using your editor of choice and then switch back to your self "su <username>" and then sudo should work fine from there on out.

 

[drag]

most of the time pico is missing nowadays.

Nano has replaced it... Although on my Debian box pico is a symlink to nano.

At this point the easiest would just to switch to root.

use the 'su' command, then give the root password, then run the command you need.

 

[n0cmonkey]

pico isn't free, nano is a free pico replacement. 😉