Tips tricks and issues I have had eith openSuse Linux.
Reply to request for help

Nov, 2007 Linux Forums :SuSE Linux Help: Post Topic: Another Suse 10.3 fstab question...
A little info

"OK... so I was modifying my fstab file to give me the same access to my NTFS partitions that I had when I was using OpenSuse 10.2 and I noticed that the devices were referenced in a rather curious way, compared to what I am used to. For example, my OS partition is referenced as follows:
/dev/disk/by-id/scsi-SATA_Hitachi_HTS5416_SB2E41H7G381SE-part2
Whereas my OS partition was referenced as follows under OpenSuse 10.2:
/dev/sda2
Why the difference? I mean I realize that 10.3 is using the exact device name while 10.2 was using... what, a syslink is it? Or is it just the dynamically created easy device ID that is created when the system boots... I don 't know exactly, but I sorta have an idea...

Just seemed like a curious change for someone who is only vaguely familiar with Linux (recent windows convert... I admit). __________________ - Windaria "

The short answer is new universal, PATA-SATA, drivers instead of PATA or SATA. You could have installed with a switch to use the old drivers and I think the fstab entries would have resembled 10.2. I found this out because I had tried to install to a disk with 16 partitions, the new drivers only supported up to 15 at this time. If you had been using a PATA drive you have also been surprised that they are now reffered to as /sda devices instead of /hda in various places. There also seems to be some issue here with PATA/USB connected drives and hashing the owner/group ID values. I had one with the permissions set for a user/group with the ID 'notme' that several different Linux distros reconized fine. Suse 10.3 sees the user/group ID as '108'. Never had this type of problem with Suse before, though I had similar issues with Mandrake/Mandrivia in the past.

Wabi-sabi
Matthew

Nov, 2007 Linux Forums :SuSE Linux Help: Post Topic: Beryl on Open SuSe 10.3
Another good link for folks Compiz-Fusion needs:

Hi guys,

P.S. I am on a Toshiba laptop with an ATI x1600 Radeon mobility.
Thanks!

Compiz Fusion - openSUSE I sure miss the QT based Beryl Manager, the GTK version with Compiz Fusion sucks in comparison. Also while I have to say Fusion seems a bit more stable it is not nearly as fast for me and a few neat Beryl features have not been intergrated yet. Oh well it is still a great deal , kudos and thankyous for all involved with this project.

Wabi-sabi
Matthew

Nov, 2007 Linux Forums :SuSE Linux Help: Post Topic: Compiz fusion question?
Auto start solution

"i just tried this and when i dragged the icon into the kde/autostart forlder, compiz did start. although my theme was changed it did start, but after reboot it did not start automatically. byronsky"

If you would like to setup autostart of compiz install Compiz Manager:

Click here to install compiz-manager

From the Suse Compiz Fusion page.

Wabi-sabi
Matthew

Nov, 2007 Linux Forums :SuSE Linux Help: Post Topic: How do you change the lizard logo in SUSE 10.3 KDE
Like so...

"How do you change the lizard logo in SUSE 10.3 KDE I'm running SUSE 10.3 in the KDE environment. How do I change that lizard logo to to something else. I love SUSE, but i absolutely despise that logo. __________________ Chad SuSE 10.3 "

The path to the images for the kicker start button on 10.2 is:

/opt/kde3/share/apps/kicker/pics

I think it is the same with 10.3 as far as KDE 3.x is concerned. KDE4.x files will all be located somewhere under the /user tree. There is a gotcha though, the kicker images are of the .mng type, which some type of animated format, you see this with the color change when you click on the start button.

The good news is you can replace them with .jpg images renamed to .mng and the kicker will load them with no apparent harm done. I also do not care for the default openSuse logo. I was going to install the older Suse logo but I happened on something I like better. If you like it let me know and I will email you the alt orientation versions.

openSUSE kicker Chamelon by ~softh on deviantART

Wabi-sabi
Matthew

"I actually like it. You designed this yourself? nice. Thanks a lot for you help, too. I've been looking for a way to change that forever __________________ Chad SuSE 10.3 "

Not my original creation. But to my knowledge I was the first to see it as an excellent Suse kicker icon. I cropped, resized and added transparency, etc in Gimp. If you use it please thank deviant art contributer nicobou as the genius behind the little guy is his. If you like this you will love the rest of his work. For distribution or commercial use of this work please contact nicobou. Otherwise he has stated to me that he has no problem with people using it in this manner. I really like the little guys smirk.

Oh and BTW it will auto resize with sizes changes to the kicker panel, you just have to select it once after changing the panels size.

Wabi-sabi
Matthew

Nov, 2007 Linux Forums :SuSE Linux Help: Post Topic: Managing multiple users on home PC
Partition management

Hi Ryan,

Did you intend to keep your existing Suse install? Though Suse is very good about installing clean, there are always possibilitys of a gotcha in any install. I have over the years learned to keep my existing install and install the new OS in on its own partition setup. For instance I had an ACPI problem with the 10.3 install that required that I manually edit the xorg config file to get X running. It was really nice to be able to do so from 10.2 in KEdit rather that ed, joe or vim from 10.3's console. I was able to compare the files from 10.2 and 10.3 and simply cut/paste the diffs as needed.

There are scores of ways to effect this type of setup, I would be pleased to tell you how I do so in detail if you ask. I can't really expound to much on this now because I do not know what kind of hard drive space, partitioning or backup strategy you use at this time. I have my primary work station setup for several users in the family and even a guest user identity. I play around with several flavors of Linux though as you can see below Suse is my main squeeze. At this time 10.2 is the OS most everyone uses. Suse 10.3 is being setup as I have time. Sabayon is just to play with, and Suse 10.0 is due to be replaced by something else sometime soon.

But basically my current disk setup looks like this:

hda 400 gb disk - 375gb usable
hda1 extended partition - 375gb
hda5 grub partition 1 512mb /boot - Suse 10.0
hda6 grub partition 2 512mb /boot - Sabayon 3.3
hda7 grub partition 3 512mb /boot - Suse 10.2
hda8 grub partition 4 512mb /boot - Suse 10.3
hda9 root partition 1 40gb /. - Suse 10.0
hda10 swap 2gb
hda11 root partition 2 40gb /. Sabayon 3.3
hda12 root partition 3 40gb /. - Suse 10.2
hda13 swap 2gb
hda14 root partition 4 40gb /. - Suse 10.3
hda15 root partition 4 200+gb /virtual - VMWare and ISO's


hdb 300 gb disk - 280gb usable
hdb1 extended partition - 280gb
hdb5 grub partition 1 140gb /kommon - shared directorys
hdb6 grub partition 2 140gb /personal - personal directorys

I install all OS files on the 30gb root partitions, including /home. I use the second 300gb disk I use for personal and shared files. I use external USB drives for work related projects backups, archives and etc. A note of importance here, the new IDE system drivers shipped with Suse 10.3 do not support more that 15 partitions per disk at this time.

Wabi-sabi
Matthew

Nov, 2007 Linux Forums :SuSE Linux Help: Post Topic: SuSE special k-menu 10.2
This is one way...

"Alright simple and blunt... I like the SuSE k-menu... but I hate their icon, it's ghey and unrefined... how can I change the icon?
... Those are not the answers I seem to be looking for, please move along
So I cannot change SuSE's menu Icon?... I don't want to change the KDE menu icon... just the icon to SuSE's special menu.
jasexjase"

The path to the images for the kicker start button on 10.2 is:

/opt/kde3/share/apps/kicker/pics

I think it is the same with 10.3 as far as KDE 3.x is concerned. KDE4.x files will all be located somewhere under the /user tree. There is a gotcha though, the kicker images are of the .mng type, which some type of animated format, you see this with the color change when you click on the start button.

The good news is you can replace them with .jpg images renamed to .mng and the kicker will load them with no apparent harm done. I also do not care for the default openSuse logo. I was going to install the older Suse logo but I happened on something I like better. If you like it let me know and I will email you the alt orientation versions.

Sunday February 25, 2007 SUSE Forums > SUSE Help > : Post Topic : Bringing Up Eth0, need to run yast to bring up eth0
Reply to request for help

"After an upgrade from 10.1 to 10.2 eth0 does not automatically start. ifup eth0 gives:-> Interface eth0 is not available dmesg|grep eth0 gives no output. ifconfig lists only lo However if I start yast and go into network setup, eth0 magically appears. Machine is a Lenovo 3000 C100 with reported COMPAL Electronics RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ ( ndiswrapper works for the wireless if anyone is interested ) Anyone know what yast does ( seems to do some 'detection' ) or any way to fix ? Ta"

I hit a similar or the same problem when moving to 10.2 from 10.1. The problem in my case seemed to be related to my Hughes Sat Modem not being fully booted/connected when Suse was booting and thus bringing up eth0. At first I kept running off into Yast2 network hardware config which seemed to fix the issue by reinitializing the NIC and thus eth0. However I found that I could simply reinitialize eth0 by left clicking -selecting on the KNetwork Manager - Wired Network icons in the system tray section of the kicker dock and accomplish the same reinitialization of eth0 without having to supply the su password required for Yast2.

In the end run here I now simply allow the Sat Modem time to boot and connect to the remote server, 30 seconds or so, before booting Suse, thus all the reinitializing of eth0 is unnecessary. It all "just works" again like most things Suse :). There may be some values you could set in ifcfg that tell Suse to ignore eth0 replies/status when trying to bring up the network on boot. However from my experience I would suggest that you make sure your network devices such as routers, switches or cable modems are all fully booted and happy before booting Suse. If nothing else just try reinitializing eth0 connection via KNetwork Manager before fussing over it with Yast2. If you are using Gnome I am not sure what the equivalent utility is as I prefer KDE and have not spent much time with Gnome recently. Hope this helps you.

Matthew

Sunday February 20, 2007 SUSE Forums > SUSE Help > Network/Internet : Post Topic : Swap /home And What Else Can Be Common To Multiple Distributions?
Reply to request for help

"I'm going to be doing some fresh installing (and hopefully some cluster building) this weekend. I am going to have SUSE Pro 9.1 and OpenSUSE 10.2 as well as possibly setting aside some space to play with Solaris. For the two SUSE flavors, I know that swap and /home partitions can remain common between them.

Are there any other partitions that can be common between the two distributions?"

As others have noted sharing /home/"user" and various system directories will cause you grief. I used to separate /home from /. but anymore my partition setup per Linux OS looks like so:

/boot (512mb partitions at start end of drive for the distro boot files so I can play with various new ones non-virtually)
/. (everything else for the distro including /home)
/swap (On 300-400gb drives I usually keep a "installed memory" gb swap partition between "distro" /. partitions and let each distro use as many of them as it wants however it wishes.

Then I create my primary data directories that I wish to share between distros in standalone disk partitions with volume names like so:

/kommon or /kommon/"group" (user group working data files -- /projects, /music, /video, /images, /documents, etc. example /kommon/family/documents or /kommon/music)
/kommon/"user"(users private working data files)
/arkives (external USB connected disk backups of system, user config and data files in common sense directory names like /"distro", /"group", /"user" and /virtual
/virtual (VMWare install images and ISO mastering projects)
/work or /devCVS (programming development specific projects usually on an external USB connected drive)

I usually, but not always, define the mount point for these in fstab under /mnt. I have not felt the need to to use LVM tools very often so far, but they can be handy as well. Usually I simply create links from the /kommon"group", /"user"and /arkives directories or sub-directories in each distros /home directories. This all does take some planning attention in the area of UID and GID and permissions issues as some distros seem to handle assignment and consideration <>ID differently if not explicitly directed to do so in a specific manner. Even then some like Mandrivia seem pretty stubborn in how they wish to do so. From what I remember last, unless it has changed since version 10, Solaris don't play well with others drive wise, it insists on having the whole d*** disk for itself.

Hope this helps Matthew

Sunday February 17, 2007 SUSE Forums > SUSE Help > Network/Internet : Post Topic : > Opensuse 10.2 Live Dvd
Reply to request for help

"Hi People,

Thanks, Linuxnovice."

Same problem with openSUSE 10.2 Live DVD here on a ASUS P4S533-e mother board. Also have had roughly the same results booting in a VMWare session. It is not my DVD , as I am able to boot some other distro's CD and DVD media fine, including Suse 10.0 Live. However Knoppix 5.1.1 DVD fails in a similar manner, that is it is unable to find the media upon what seems the be the 2nd stage of boot. Both of these problem DVD's were purchased from OSDisc.com, to their credit upon my complaint they sent out a duplicate order really fast but alas it had the same problems. I have not contacted them about the failure of the replacements as yet. The other items in the order, all CD media instead of DVD works fine. I have tried the various acpi=off, noacpi, options and in Knoppix have tried several other documented options, I even tried "mount /.CD.real" as a boot option, all to no avail.

I have noted that in VMWare both try and access the DVD as hdc (2ndMaster) though it is really hdd(2nd slave). I can't remember if this was the case with the real boot attempts. Though remember that other CD and DVD media works fine with this quirk. I even went into the VMWare Phoniex BIOS and specified the device as a CD rather than Auto, still not any help. More odd details, k3b reports the media size as 2Kb with 0 and 0 as start and end sectors. Attempts to rip an ISO from these DVD's results in a useless 2Kb file. Konqueror sees the media as an xmms audio CD with no data. Anyone got any new ideas on what is happening here?

Motherboard = ASUS P4S533-e
I/O Chipset = SiS 645DX North Bridge and SiS 962 / 962L South Bridge ITE 8707F LPC Super I/O Chip
CPU = Intel Socket 478 FC-PGA2 Pentium®4 (Willamette/Northwood) 2.2ghz
RAM = 2gb Crucial PC2700 SDRAM
Video = ASUS/nVidia GeForce 5900XT Ultra 256mb AGP
NIC = SiS 962 / 962L integrated 10/100 Mbps Fast Ethernet with Realtek PHY
IDE/ATA Hardrives = 300gb master (hda) 400gb slave (hdb) Seagate and 80gb master (hdc) Hitachi internal PATA drives
SCSI = Symbios SYM 21002 Dual channel LVD/SE + (3) switch powered 37gb Seagate Cheetah LVD SCSI internal + misc SE SCSI2 external drives.
DVD = NEC 3550 16x dual layer DVD/R/RW set as slave (hdd)
USB = Internal multi card reader + various external flash drives, USB/PATA hardrives and cdroms on a Belkin powered 4way USB bus.

TIA 4 da help
Matthew

Hope this helps Matthew

Thursday February 01, 2007 Slashdot : Post Topic : OSDL's Review of Desktop Linux In 2006
Re:Linux needs Control Panel

You mean META level system utility's like Suse's Yast2, Madrivia's MCC, etc. Then there are the tools in KDE or Gnomes control centers, which at least with KDE in Suse also have the capacity to launch Yast2 modules. Personally I find the GUI system management tools in Suse for example far superior to those in Windows XP Pro. I do still ocassionally head off to /etc with a text editor, but it is do things like customize the main menu icon on my kicker panel, that most people would not care to do. As for the use of plain text for most configuration files being a liability, I see it as a strength. I still remember the pain, hassles and hazards of huge monolithic and thus often corrupted binary config files in Windows and OS/2. As for LSB, I would like to see better and more consistent implementation made by distros but it is still far from a "joke".

Wabi-sabi
Matthew

"I am trying to configure VMware Server 1.0.1 build 29996 and it is giving me problems on this area:
Code:

What is the location of the directory of C header files that match your running kernel? [/usr/src/linux/include] /usr/include

The header files in /usr/include are generally for C libraries, not for the running kernel. If you do not have kernel header files in your /usr/src directory, you probably do not have the kernel-source package installed. Are you sure that /usr/include contains the header files associated with your running kernel? [no] yes

The directory of kernel headers (version 2.6.16) does not match your running kernel (version 2.6.16.21-0.25-default). Even if the module were to compile successfully, it would not load into the running kernel.

I just installed the kernel-source package and tried it again with no luck. I hav ebeen referred to this post: http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/sus...on-source.html

How do you make that source package match my kernel version? Thank you."

(And btw: I'm testing it on my OSS 10.1 x32 workstation at work. When I get home I'll slap it on my SLED10 laptop.)


Test box: Kubuntu Server 7.04
Laptop: Slackware 11

Hi, I hit this as well in SUSE 10.0 and 10.1 VMware server installs. With the 10.0 install I tried linking the kernel as described by the previous poster. It did work for a while, sort of. But I had to manually init the modules and it eventually crashed horribly, plus I had other problems with VMWare tools not installing. After said crash I never could get VMWare to load properly again, plus it killed ksysv and it would not reinstall which made the manual init process even more tedious.

I got busy at work and did not have time to play anyway but a few weeks later I got SUSE10.1 installed on a new drive so I decided to just start fresh with VMWare as well. Of course I hit the same mess with the rotten vmware-config.pl and its reversed logic for accepting the license. It seems you got past that though(answer Q for prompts and screen changes and answer N or no for Y or yes, go figure). Note the NY logic reversal is for the license only, the rest seems to work normally.

The fix, your best bet is to install the kernel source for your existing kernel. That way it is a better bet that VMWare will run properly and safely. I included a link to the kernel-source-2.6.16.21-0.25 source below. Best to install it as with most ancillary stuff on SUSE 10.0 by right clicking on the downloaded RPM and selecting "Open with" --> "Install software". DO NOT let the zen installed handle it, it seems still broken to me. If you try via YAST software manager you will probably not find it in the list, but this depends on the sources you have in your list. Just download it from the link below. I forgot the details now but you may have to dig around in /usr/src to find the correct path to feed the VMWare script.

Matthew http://hypersynergy.com

kernel-source-2.6.16.21-0.25
http://rpm.pbone.net/index.php3/stat....i586.rpm.html