From news.hwcn.org!informer1.cis.McMaster.CA!hone!torn!newsfeed.direct.ca!howland.erols.net!news1.ispnews.com!news11.ispnews.com!terracom.net!kiesling Tue Aug 18 12:48:41 1998 Path: news.hwcn.org!informer1.cis.McMaster.CA!hone!torn!newsfeed.direct.ca!howland.erols.net!news1.ispnews.com!news11.ispnews.com!terracom.net!kiesling From: kiesling@terracom.net Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.announce,comp.os.linux.misc,news.answers,comp.answers Subject: Linux Frequently Asked Questions with Answers (Part 1 of 3) Followup-To: poster Date: 17 Aug 1998 00:57:33 GMT Organization: ISPNews http://ispnews.com Lines: 1009 Approved: news-answers-request@MIT.EDU Message-ID: <6r7v5t$e16$1@news12.ispnews.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: long.distance.net X-Trace: news12.ispnews.com 903315453 14374 209.69.148.254 (17 Aug 1998 00:57:33 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: 17 Aug 1998 00:57:33 GMT Originator: kiesling@terracom.net Xref: news.hwcn.org comp.os.linux.announce:10568 comp.os.linux.misc:278174 news.answers:123049 comp.answers:26206 Archive-Name: linux/faq/part1 Posting-Frequency: weekly Linux Frequently Asked Questions with Answers $Date: 1998/08/16 22:32:14 $ This is the list of Frequently Asked Questions about Linux, the free Unix for just about every computer hardware platform on the planet. Originally written for 386/486/586 Intel/ISA bus machines, versions are available for Alpha, MIPS, ARM, 680x0 and PPC processors, and many others. (See the question, "What is Linux?" below.) This document should be read in conjunction with the Linux Documentation Project's HOWTO series. ("Where can I get Linux material by FTP?" and "Where can I get the HOWTOs and other documentation?") The INFO-SHEET and META-FAQ, which are found in the same place, also list sources of Linux information. Please look at these documents, and "You still haven't answered my question!" before posting your question to a news group. See "Formats in which this FAQ is available." for details of where to get the PostScript, HTML, and plain ASCII versions of this document. 1. Introduction and General Information * 1.1 What is Linux? * 1.2 Where do I start? * 1.3 What software does Linux support? * 1.4 Does Linux run on my computer? What hardware is supported? * 1.5 What ports to other processors are there? * 1.6 How much hard disk space does Linux need? * 1.7 How much memory does Linux need? * 1.8 How much memory can Linux use? * 1.9 Is Linux public domain? Copyrighted? 2. Network sources and resources. * 2.1 Where can I get the HOWTOs and other documentation? * 2.2 Where should I look on the World Wide Web for Linux stuff? * 2.3 What newsgroups are there for Linux? * 2.4 Where can I find out about Linux and the Millennium (Y2K) bug? * 2.5 Where can I get Linux material by FTP? * 2.6 I don't have FTP access. Where do I get Linux? * 2.7 I don't have Usenet access. Where do I get information? * 2.8 What mailing lists are there? * 2.9 Are the newsgroups archived anywhere? 3. Compatibility with other operating systems. * 3.1 Can Linux share my disk with DOS? OS/2? 386BSD? Win95? * 3.2 How do I access files on my DOS partition or floppy? * 3.3 Does Linux support compressed ext2 file systems? * 3.4 Can I use my Stacked/DBLSPC/etc. DOS drive? * 3.5 Can I access OS/2 HPFS partitions from Linux? * 3.6 Can Linux access Amiga file systems? * 3.7 Can Linux access BSD, SysV, etc. UFS? * 3.8 Can Linux access SMB file systems? * 3.9 Can Linux access Mac file systems? * 3.10 Can I run Microsoft Windows programs under Linux? * 3.11 How can I boot Linux from OS/2's Boot Manager? * 3.12 How can I share a swap partition between Linux and MS Windows? 4. Linux's handling of file systems, disks, and drives * 4.1 How can I get Linux to work with my disk? * 4.2 How can I undelete files? * 4.3 Is there a defragmenter for ext2fs etc.? * 4.4 How do I format and create a file system on a floppy? * 4.5 I get nasty messages about inodes, blocks, and the suchlike. * 4.6 My swap area isn't working. * 4.7 How do I remove LILO so my system boots DOS again? * 4.8 Why can't I use fdformat except as root? * 4.9 My ext2fs partitions are checked each time I reboot. * 4.10 My root file system is read-only! * 4.11 I have a huge /proc/kcore! Can I delete it? * 4.12 My AHA1542C doesn't work with Linux. 5. Porting, compiling and obtaining programs * 5.1 How do I port XXX to Linux? * 5.2 What is ld.so and where do I get it? * 5.3 Has anyone ported / compiled / written XXX for Linux? * 5.4 Can I use code or a compiler compiled for a 486 on my 386? * 5.5 What does gcc -O6 do? * 5.6 Where are linux/*.h and asm/*.h? * 5.7 I get errors when I try to compile the kernel. * 5.8 How do I make a shared library? * 5.9 My executables are (very) large. * 5.10 Does Linux support threads or lightweight processes? * 5.11 Where can I get `lint' for Linux? * 5.12 Where can I find kermit for Linux? 6. Solutions to common miscellaneous problems. * 6.1 free dumps core. * 6.2 My clock is very wrong. * 6.3 Setuid scripts don't seem to work. * 6.4 Free memory as reported by free keeps shrinking. * 6.5 When I add more memory, the system slows to a crawl. * 6.6 Some programs (e.g. xdm) won't let me log in. * 6.7 Some programs let me log in with no password. * 6.8 My machine runs very slowly when I run GCC / X / ... * 6.9 I can only log in as root. * 6.10 My screen is all full of weird characters instead of letters. * 6.11 I have screwed up my system and can't log in to fix it. * 6.12 I've discovered a huge security hole in rm! * 6.13 lpr(1) and/or lpd(8) don't work. * 6.14 Timestamps on files on msdos partitions are set incorrectly. * 6.15 How do I get LILO to boot the vmlinux file? 7. How do I do this or find out that ... ? * 7.1 How can I get scrollback in text mode? * 7.2 How do I switch virtual consoles? How do I enable them? * 7.3 How do I set the time zone? * 7.4 What version of Linux and what machine name am I using? * 7.5 How can I enable or disable core dumps? * 7.6 How do I upgrade/recompile my kernel? * 7.7 Can I have more than 3 serial ports by sharing interrupts? * 7.8 How do I make a bootable floppy? * 7.9 How do I remap my keyboard to UK, French, etc.? * 7.10 How do I get NUM LOCK to default to on? * 7.11 How can I have more than 128Mb of swap? * 7.12 Miscellaneous information and questions answered. * 7.13 How do I program XYZ under Linux? * 7.14 What's all this about ELF? * 7.15 What is a .gz file ? And a .tgz ? And ... ? * 7.16 What does VFS stand for? * 7.17 What is a BogoMip? * 7.18 What is the Linux Journal and where can I get it? * 7.19 How many people use Linux? * 7.20 How should I pronounce Linux? 8. Frequently encountered error messages. * 8.1 Unknown terminal type linux and similar. * 8.2 lp1 on fire * 8.3 INET: Warning: old style ioctl... called! * 8.4 ld: unrecognized option '-m486' * 8.5 GCC says Internal compiler error. * 8.6 make says Error 139 * 8.7 shell-init: permission denied when I log in. * 8.8 No utmp entry. You must exec ... when I log in. * 8.9 Warning--bdflush not running. * 8.10 Warning: obsolete routing request made. * 8.11 EXT2-fs: warning: mounting unchecked file system. * 8.12 EXT2-fs warning: maximal count reached. * 8.13 EXT2-fs warning: checktime reached. * 8.14 df says Cannot read table of mounted file systems. * 8.15 fdisk says Partition X has different physical/logical ... * 8.16 fdisk: Partition 1 does not start on cylinder boundary * 8.17 fdisk says partition n has an odd number of sectors. * 8.18 mtools says cannot initialize drive XYZ * 8.19 At the start of booting: Memory tight * 8.20 My syslog says `end_request: I/O error, ...'. * 8.21 You don't exist. Go away. 9. The X Window System. * 9.1 Does Linux support X Windows? * 9.2 Where can I get an XF86Config for my system? * 9.3 xterm logins show up strangely in who, finger. * 9.4 I can't get X Windows to work right. 10. Questions applicable to very out-of-date software. * 10.1 fdisk says cannot use nnn sectors of this partition. * 10.2 GCC sometimes uses huge amounts of virtual memory and thrashes. 11. How to get further assistance. * 11.1 You still haven't answered my question! * 11.2 What to put in a request for help. * 11.3 I want to mail someone about my problem. 12. Administrative information and acknowledgements. * 12.1 Feedback is invited. * 12.2 Formats in which this FAQ is available. * 12.3 Authorship and acknowledgements. * 12.4 Disclaimer and Copyright. 1. Introduction and General Information 1.1 What is Linux? Linux is the free Unix written from scratch by Linus Torvalds with assistance from a loosely-knit team of hackers from across the Internet. Linux aims towards POSIX compliance, and has all of the features you would expect of a modern, fully-fledged Unix: true multitasking, virtual memory, shared libraries, demand loading, shared, copy-on-write executables, proper memory management, and TCP/IP networking. Linux runs mainly on 386/486/586-based PCs, using the hardware facilities of the 386 processor family (TSS segments, et al.) to implement these features. Ports to other architectures are underway. (See "What ports to other processors are there?") See the Linux INFO-SHEET for more details. (See "Where can I get the HOWTOs and other documentation?") The Linux kernel is distributed under the GNU General Public License. (See, "Is Linux public domain? Copyrighted?") 1.2 Where do I start? There are a handful of different Linux distributions. For information about them, and how they are installed, see Matthew Welsh's Installation and Getting Started, or IGS for short. It's located at the Linux Documentation Project Home Page, http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP. There is also an Installation HOWTO at the LDP Home Page. Most of the distributions are available via anonymous FTP from various Linux archive sites. See "Where can I get Linux material by FTP?" There are also a large number of other releases which are distributed less globally, which suit special local and national needs. 1.3 What software does Linux support? Linux supports GCC, Emacs, the X Window System, all the standard Unix utilities, TCP/IP (including SLIP and PPP), and all the hundreds of programs that people have compiled or ported for it. There is a DOS emulator (available at tsx-11.mit.edu/pub/linux/ALPHA/dosemu) which can run DOS itself and some (but not all) DOS applications. Be sure to look at the README file to determine which version of dosemu you should get. Also, see the DOSEMU-HOWTO (slightly dated at this point--it doesn't cover the most recent version of the program), which is located at sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO. Work has been progressing on an emulator for Microsoft Windows binaries. (See "Can I run Microsoft Windows programs under Linux?") iBCS2 (Intel Binary Compatibility Standard) emulator code for SVR4 ELF and SVR3.2 COFF binaries can be included in the kernel as a compile-time option. See the file tsx-11.mit.edu/pub/linux/BETA/ibcs2/README. For more information see the INFO-SHEET, which is one of the the HOWTOs (See "Where can I get the HOWTOs and other documentation?" See also "How do I port XXX to Linux?" Some companies have commercial software available, including Motif. They announce their availability in comp.os.linux.announce--try searching the archives. (See "Are the newsgroups archived anywhere?") 1.4 Does Linux run on my computer? What hardware is supported? You need a 386, 486 or 586, with at least 2Mb of RAM and a single floppy, to try Linux. To do anything useful, more RAM is needed. (" How much memory does Linux need?") VESA Local Bus and PCI are supported. MCA (IBM's proprietary bus) and ESDI hard drives are mostly supported. There is further information on the MCA bus and what cards Linux supports on the Micro Channel Linux Web page, http://glycerine.itsmm.uni.edu/mca. Linux runs on 386 family based laptops, with X on most of them. There is a relevant Web page at http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/kharker/linux-laptop/. For details of exactly which PC's, video cards, disk controllers, etc. work see the INFO-SHEET and the Hardware-HOWTO. (See "Where can I get the HOWTOs and other documentation?") There is a port of Linux to the 8086, known as the Embeddable Linux Kernel Subset (ELKS). This is a 16-bit subset of the Linux kernel which will mainly be used for embedded systems. See http://www.linux.org.uk/Linux8086.html for more information. Linux will never run fully on an 8086 or '286, because it requires task-switching and memory management facilities not found on these processors. Linux supports multiprocessing with Intel MP architecture. See the file Documentation/smp.tex in the Linux kernel source code distribution. See the next question for a (probably incomplete) list of hardware platforms that Linux has been ported to. 1.5 What ports to other processors are there? There is a reasonably complete list of Linux ports at http://www.ctv.es/USERS/xose/linux/linux_ports.html, and at http://www.linuxhq.com/dist-index.html. A project has been underway for a while to port Linux to suitable 68000-series based systems such as Amigas and Ataris. The Linux/m68K FAQ is located at www.clark.net/pub/lawrencc/linux/faq/faq.html. The URL of the Linux/m68k home page is www.linux-m68k. There is a linux-680x0 mailing list. (See "What mailing lists are there?") There is (or was) a FTP site for the Linux-m68k project on ftp.phil.uni-sb.de/pub/atari/linux-68k, but this address may no longer be current. Debian GNU/Linux is being ported to Alpha, Sparc, PowerPC, and ARM. There are mailing lists for all of these platforms. See http://www.debian.org/MailingLists/subscribe. One of the Linux-PPC project pages has moved recently. Its location is http://www.linuxppc.org, and the archive site is ftp.linuxppc.org/linuxppc. There is a Linux-PPC support page at www.cs.nmt.edu/~linuxppc/. There you will find the kernel that is distributed with Linux. Apple now supports MkLinux development on Power Macs, based on OSF and the Mach microkernel. See http://www.mklinux.apple.com. A port to the 64-bit DEC Alpha/AXP is at http://www.azstarnet.com/~axplinux/. There is a mailing list at vger.rutgers.edu. (See "What mailing lists are there?") Ralf Baechle is working on a port to the MIPS, initially for the R4600 on Deskstation Tyne machines. The Linux-MIPS FTP sites are ftp.fnet.fr/linux-mips and ftp://ftp.linux.sgi.com/pub/mips-linux. Interested people may mail their questions and offers of assistance to linux@waldorf-gmbh.de. There is also a MIPS channel on the Linux Activists mailserver and a linux-mips mailing list. (See "What mailing lists are there?") There are currently two ports of Linux to the ARM family of processors. One of these is for the ARM3, fitted to the Acorn A5000, and it includes I/O drivers for the 82710/11 as appropriate. The other is to the ARM610 of the Acorn Risc PC. The Risc PC port is currently in its early to middle stages, owing to the need to rewrite much of the memory handling. The A5000 port is in restricted beta testing. A release is likely soon. For more up-to-date information, watch the newsgroup comp.sys.acorn.misc. There is a FAQ at http://www.arm.uk.linux.org The Linux SPARC project is a hotbed of activity. There is a FAQ available from Jim Mintha's Linux for SPARC Processors page, http://www.geog.ubc.ca/sparclinux.html. The SPARC/Linux archives are at vger.rutgers.edu/pub/linux/Sparc. There is also port ("Hardhat") to SGI/Indy machines. The URL is http://www.linux.sgi.com. 1.6 How much hard disk space does Linux need? About 10Mb for a very minimal installation, suitable for trying it out and not much else. You can squeeze a more complete installation including X, into 80Mb. Installing almost all of Debian GNU/Linux takes around 500Mb, including kernel source code, some space for user files, and spool areas. 1.7 How much memory does Linux need? At least 4MB, and then you will need to use special installation procedures. Linux will run comfortably in 4MB of RAM, although X Windows Apps will run slowly because they need to swap out to disk. Some recent applications, like Netscape, require 64MB of physical memory. 1.8 How much memory can Linux use? A number of people have asked how to address more than 64 MB of memory, which is the default upper limit. Place the following in your lilo.conf file: append="mem=XXM" Where "XX" is the amount of memory, specified as megabytes, for example, '128M'. For further details see the lilo manual page. 1.9 Is Linux public domain? Copyrighted? The Linux kernel copyright belongs to Linus Torvalds. He has placed it under the GNU General Public License, which basically means that you may freely copy, change, and distribute it, but you may not impose any restrictions on further distribution, and you must make the source code available. This is not the same as Public Domain. See the Copyright FAQ, rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/law/copyright, for details. Full details are in the file COPYING in the Linux kernel sources (probably in /usr/src/linux on your system). The licenses of the utilities and programs which come with the installations vary. Much of the code is from the GNU Project at the Free Software Foundation, and is also under the GPL. Note that discussion about the merits or otherwise of the GPL should be posted to gnu.misc.discuss and not to the comp.os.linux groups. 2. Network sources and resources. 2.1 Where can I get the HOWTOs and other documentation? Look in the following places, and the sites that mirror them. * ftp.funet.fi : /pub/OS/Linux/doc/HOWTO * tsx-11.mit.edu : /pub/linux/docs/HOWTO * sunsite.unc.edu : /pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO For a complete list of Linux FTP sites, "Where can I get Linux material by FTP?" If you don't have access to FTP, try the FTP-by-mail servers at ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com, ftpmail@doc.ic.ac.uk or ftp-mailer@informatik.tu-muenchen.de.. A complete list of HOWTO's and Mini-HOWTO's is available in the file HOWTO.INDEX in the docs/HOWTO directory at the FTP sites, or on the Web at http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP/HOWTO/HOWTO-INDEX.html, but here is a (possibly incomplete) list: AX25-HOWTO Access-HOWTO Assembly-HOWTO Benchmarking-HOWTO BootPrompt-HOWTO Bootdisk-HOWTO CD-Writing-HOWTO CDROM-HOWTO Chinese-HOWTO Commercial-HOWTO Consultants-HOWTO Cyrillic-HOWTO DNS-HOWTO DOS-to-Linux-HOWTO DOSEMU-HOWTO Danish-HOWTO Distribution-HOWTO ELF-HOWTO Emacspeak-HOWTO Ethernet-HOWTO Finnish-HOWTO Firewall-HOWTO Ftape-HOWTO GCC-HOWTO German-HOWTO HAM-HOWTO HOWTO-INDEX Hardware-HOWTO Hebrew-HOWTO IPX-HOWTO ISP-Hookup-HOWTO Installation-HOWTO Intranet-Server-HOWTO Italian-HOWTO Java-CGI-HOWTO Kernel-HOWTO Keyboard-and-Console-HOWTO MGR-HOWTO MILO-HOWTO Mail-HOWTO NET-3-HOWTO NFS-HOWTO NIS-HOWTO News-HOWTO Optical-Disk-HOWTO PCI-HOWTO PCMCIA-HOWTO PPP-HOWTO Pilot-HOWTO Polish-HOWTO Printing-HOWTO Printing-Usage-HOWTO RPM-HOWTO Reading-List-HOWTO SCSI-HOWTO SCSI-Programming-HOWTO SMB-HOWTO Serial-HOWTO Serial-Programming-HOWTO Shadow-Password-HOWTO Slovenian-HOWTO Sound-HOWTO Sound-Playing-HOWTO Spanish-HOWTO TeTeX-HOWTO Thai-HOWTO Tips-HOWTO UMSDOS-HOWTO UPS-HOWTO UUCP-HOWTO User-Group-HOWTO VAR-HOWTO VMS-to-Linux-HOWTO XFree86-HOWTO XFree86-Video-Timings-HOWTO 3-Button-Mouse The following Mini-HOWTO's are available from http://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/HOWTO/mini: ADSM-Backup AI-Alife Advocacy Backup-With-MSDOS Battery-Powered Boca BogoMips Bridge Bridge+Firewall Clock Colour-ls Comeau-C++ DHCPd Dial-On-Demand Diald Dip+SLiRP+CSLIP Diskless Dynamic-IP-Hacks Ext2fs-Undeletion GTEK-BBS-550 HTML-Validation IO-Port-Programming IP-Alias IP-Masquerade IP-Subnetworking JE Jaz-Drive Kerneld Key-Setup LBX LILO Large-Disk Linux+DOS+Win95 Linux+DOS+Win95+OS2 Linux+NT-Loader Linux+OS2+DOS Linux+Win95 Loadlin+Win95 Locales MIDI+SB Mail-Queue Mail2News Man-Page Multiple-Disks-Layout Multiple-Ethernet NFS-Root NFS-Root-Client Netscape+Proxy Offline-Mailing Online-Support PLIP PPP-over-minicom Pager Partition Print2Win Process-Accounting Proxy-ARP Public-Web-Browser Qmail+MH Quota RCS Remote-Boot Remote-X-Apps SLIP+proxyARP SLIP-PPP-Emulator Sendmail+UUCP Software-Building Software-RAID Soundblaster-16 Soundblaster-AWE64 StarOffice Swap-Space Term-Firewall Tiny-News Token-Ring Upgrade VPN Virtual-wu-ftpd Visual-Bell Win95+Win+Linux Windows-Modem-Sharing WordPerfect X-Big-Cursor XFree86-XInside Xterm-Title Xterminal ZIP-Drive ZIP-Install In addition, translations of the HOWTO's are available from sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/translations and mirrors worldwide. Translations in the following languages are available: Chinese (zh) French (fr) German (de) Hellenic (el) Indonesian (id) Italian (it) Japanese (jp) Korean (ko) Polish (pl) Spanish (es) Slovenian (sl) Polish (sv) Turkish (tr) The HOWTO's are also on the Web, at the Linux Documentation Project's home page, http://sunsite.unc./edu/LDP. More of these documents are always in preparation. Please get in touch with Greg Hankins, gregh@cc.gatech.edu, the HOWTO coordinator, if you are interested in writing one. The file sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/HOWTO/HOWTO-INDEX contains guidelines for writing a HOWTO. The Guide Series produced by the Linux Documentation Project is available from http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP. Please read them if you are new to Unix and Linux. Here is a list of those available so far: * The Linux Documentation Project Manifesto, by Matt Welsh. * Installation and Getting Started Guide, by Matt Welsh. * The Linux Kernel, by David Rusling. * The Network Administrator's Guide, by Olaf Kirch. * The Linux Programmer's Guide, by Sven Goldt, Sven van der Meer, Scott Burkett, and Matt Welsh. * The Linux System Administrator's Guide, Version 0.5, by Lars Wirzenius. * Text Processing with Linux, by Robert Kiesling. 2.2 Where should I look on the World Wide Web for Linux stuff? Two Web pages in particular provide good starting point for general Linux information: Linux International's Home Page, at http://www.li.org, and the Linux Online's Linux Home Page at http://www.linux.org/. Both of these pages provide links to other sites, information about general information, distributions, new software, documentation, and news. Greg Hankins, gregh@cc.gatech.edu, maintains the Linux Documentation Project Home Page, at http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP. This page refers to all the FAQs and HOWTOs, both those which are available in HTML (WWW) format, and those which aren't. 2.3 What newsgroups are there for Linux? There are a number of international Usenet newsgroups devoted to Linux. comp.os.linux.announce is the moderated announcements group; you should read this if you intend to use Linux: it contains information about software updates, new ports, user group meetings, and commercial products. It is the ONLY newsgroup that may carry commercial postings. Submissions for that group should be emailed to linux-announce@news.ornl.gov. comp.os.linux.answers contains all the FAQs, HOWTOs and other important documentation. You should subscribe to this group also. Axel Boldt, axel@uni-paderborn.de, noted that comp.os.linux.announce is NOT archived on Dejanews or Altavista. The only archive for the news group seems to be www.iki.fi/mjr/linux/cola.html. Also worth reading are the other groups in the comp.os.linux.* hierarchy--you may find that many common problems are too recent to find in this FAQ but are answered in the newsgroups. These groups are comp.os.linux.setup comp.os.linux.hardware comp.os.linux.networking comp.os.linux.x comp.os.linux.development.apps comp.os.linux.development.system comp.os.linux.advocacy comp.os.linux.misc Remember that since Linux is POSIX compatible, most all of the material in comp.unix.* and comp.windows.x.* groups will be relevant. Apart from hardware considerations, and some obscure or very technical low-level issues, you'll find that these groups are a good place to start. Please read "You still haven't answered my question!" before posting. Crossposting between different comp.os.linux.* groups is rarely a good idea. There may well be Linux groups local to your institution or area--check there first. See also "I don't have Usenet access. Where do I get information?" Other regional and local newsgroups also exist--you may find the traffic more manageable there. The French Linux newsgroup is fr.comp.os.linux. The German one is de.comp.os.linux. In Australia, try aus.computers.linux. In Croatia there is the moderated group hr.comp.linux.m. In Italy, there is it.comp.linux. 2.4 Where can I find out about Linux and the Millennium (Y2K) bug? The Debian/GNU Linux people have a statement on their Web site at http://www.debian.org Essentially, Linux uses libraries that store dates as 32-bit integers, which count the seconds since 1970. This counter will not overflow until the year 2038, by which time the library programmers will (hopefully) have upgraded the system software to store dates as 64-bit integers. This, of course, does not mean that applications are not susceptible to the millennium bug, if they do not use the standard library routines. The Free Software Foundation has a webpage about Y2K issues in GNU software at http://www.fsf.org/software/year2000.html There is also a Usenet newsgroup, comp.software.year-2000, for general discussion of Y2K issues. 2.5 Where can I get Linux material by FTP? There are three main archive sites for Linux: * ftp.funet.fi (Finland) : /pub/OS/Linux * sunsite.unc.edu (US) : /pub/Linux * tsx-11.mit.edu (US) : /pub/linux The best place to get the Linux kernel is ftp.cs.helsinki.fi/pub/Linux_Kernel. Linus Torvalds uploads the most recent kernel versions to this site. Of the U.S. distributions, Debian GNU/Linux is available at ftp.debian.org/pub/debian. Red Hat Linux's home site is ftp.redhat.com, and Slackware's is ftp.cdrom.com. The contents of these sites is mirrored (copied, usually approximately daily) by a number of other sites. Please use one close to you--that will be faster for you and easier on the network. * ftp.sun.ac.za/pub/linux/sunsite/ (South Africa) * ftp.is.co.za/linux/sunsite/ (South Africa) * ftp.cs.cuhk.hk/pub/Linux/ (Hong Kong) * ftp.cs.cuhk.hk/pub/Linux/ (Hong Kong) * ftp.spin.ad.jp/pub/linux/sunsite.unc.edu/ (Japan) * ftp.nuri.net/pub/Linux/ (Korea) * ftp.jaring.my/pub/Linux/ (Malaysia) * ftp.nus.sg/pub/unix/Linux/ (Singapore) * ftp.nectec.or.th/pub/mirrors/linux/ (Thailand) * mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/linux/ (Australia) * sunsite.anu.edu.au/pub/linux/ (Australia) * ftp.monash.edu.au/pub/linux/ (Australia) * ftp.univie.ac.at/systems/linux/sunsite/ (Austria) * ftp.fi.muni.cz/pub/UNIX/linux/ (Czech Republic) * ftp://sunsite.fri.uni-lj.si/pub/linux/ (Slovenia) * ftp.funet.fi/pub/Linux/sunsite/ (Finland) * ftp.univ-angers.fr/pub/Linux/ (France) * ftp.iut-bm.univ-fcomte.fr (France) * ftp.ibp.fr/pub/linux/sunsite/ (France) * ftp.loria.fr/pub/linux/sunsite/ (France) * ftp.dfv.rwth-aachen.de/pub/linux/sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/os/Linux/Mirror.SunSITE/ (Germany) * ftp.tu-dresden.de/pub/Linux/sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.uni-erlangen.de/pub/Linux/MIRROR.sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.gwdg.de/pub/linux/mirrors/sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.rz.uni-karlsruhe.de/pub/linux/mirror.sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.ba-mannheim.de/pub/linux/mirror.sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.uni-paderborn.de/pub/Mirrors/sunsite.unc.edu/ (Germany) * ftp.uni-rostock.de/Linux/sunsite/ (Germany) * tp.rus.uni-stuttgart.de/pub/unix/systems/linux/MIRROR.sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.uni-tuebingen.de/pub/linux/Mirror.sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.rz.uni-ulm.de/pub/mirrors/linux/sunsite/ (Germany) * ftp.kfki.hu/pub/linux/ (Hungary) * linux.italnet.it/pub/Linux/ (Italy) * ftp.unina.it/pub/linux/sunsite/ (Italy) * giotto.unipd.it/pub/unix/Linux/ (Italy) * cnuce-arch.cnr.it/pub/Linux/ (Italy) * ftp.flashnet.it/mirror2/sunsite.unc.edu/ (Italy) * ftp.nijenrode.nl/pub/linux/sunsite.unc-mirror/ (Netherlands) * ftp.LeidenUniv.nl/pub/linux/sunsite/ (Netherlands) * ftp.nvg.unit.no/pub/linux/sunsite/ (Norway) * ftp://sunsite.icm.edu.pl/pub/Linux/sunsite.unc.edu/ (Poland) * ftp.rediris.es/software/os/linux/sunsite/ (Spain) * sunsite.rediris.es/software/linux/ (Spain) * ftp.cs.us.es/pub/Linux/sunsite-mirror/ (Spain) * ftp.etse.urv.es/pub/mirror/linux/ (Spain) * ftp.etsimo.uniovi.es/pub/linux/ (Spain) * ftp.luna.gui.es/pub/linux.new/ (Spain) * ftp.switch.ch/mirror/linux/ (Switzerland) * ftp.metu.edu.tr/pub/linux/sunsite/ (Turkey) * unix.hensa.ac.uk/mirrors/sunsite/pub/Linux/ (UK) * ftp.maths.warwick.ac.uk/mirrors/linux/sunsite.unc-mirror/ (UK) * ftp.idiscover.co.uk/pub/Linux/sunsite.unc-mirror/ (UK) * sunsite.doc.ic.ac.uk/packages/linux/sunsite.unc-mirror/ (UK) * ftp.dungeon.com/pub/linux/sunsite-mirror/ (UK) * ftp.io.org/pub/mirrors/linux/sunsite/ (Canada) * ftp.cc.gatech.edu/pub/linux/ (US) * ftp.cdrom.com/pub/linux/sunsite/ (US) * ftp.siriuscc.com/pub/Linux/Sunsite/ (US) * ftp.engr.uark.edu/pub/linux/sunsite/ (US) * ftp.infomagic.com/pub/mirrors/linux/sunsite/ (US) * linux.if.usp.br/pub/mirror/sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/ (Brazil) * farofa.ime.usp.br/pub/linux/ (Brazil) Not all of these mirror all of the other `source' sites, and some have material not available on the `source' sites. 2.6 I don't have FTP access. Where do I get Linux? The easiest thing is probably to find a friend with FTP access. If there is a Linux user's group near you, they may be able to help. If you have a reasonably good email connection you could try the FTP-by-mail servers at ftpmail@ftp.sunet.se, ftpmail@garbo.uwasa.fi or ftpmail@ftp.uni-stuttgart.de. Linux is also available via traditional mail on CD-ROM. The file sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/Installation-HOWTO, and the file sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/docs/distributions/Distribution-HOWTO contain information on these distributions. 2.7 I don't have Usenet access. Where do I get information? A digest of comp.os.linux.announce is available by mailing the word "subscribe" (without the quotes) as the body of a message to linux-announce-REQUEST@news-digests.mit.edu. Subscribe to this list is a good idea, as it carries important information and documentation about Linux. Please remember to use the *-request addresses for your subscription and unsubscription messages; mail to the other address is posted to the newsgroup! 2.8 What mailing lists are there? The Linux developers now mainly use the Majordomo server at majordomo@vger.rutgers.edu. Send a message with the word "lists" (without the quotes) in the body to get a list of lists there. Add a line with the word, "help," to get the standard Majordomo help file which lists instructions for subscribing and unsubscribing to the lists. Most of the lists are used by the developers of Linux to talk about technical issues and future developments. These are not intended for new users' questions. There is a linux-newbie list where "no question is too stupid." Unfortunately, it seems that few of the experienced users read that channel. It does have very low volume. 2.9 Are the newsgroups archived anywhere? The Usenet Linux news groups are archived at http://www.dejanews.com, http://www.reference.com and http://altavista.digital.com sunsite.unc.edu//pub/Linux/docs/linux-announce.archive contains archives of comp.os.linux.announce. These are mirrored from src.doc.ic.ac.uk/usenet, which also archives comp.os.linux, comp.os.linux.development.apps, and comp.os.linux.development.system. There is an "easy to access" archive of comp.os.linux.announce on the World Wide Web at http://www.leo.org/archiv/linux/archiv/ann_index.html. It supports searching and browsing. 3. Compatibility with other operating systems. 3.1 Can Linux share my disk with DOS? OS/2? 386BSD? Win95? Yes. Linux uses the standard MS-DOS partitioning scheme, so it can share your disk with other operating systems. Note, however, that many of these other operating systems are rather picky. DOS's FDISK.EXE and FORMAT.EXE, for example, can overwrite data in a Linux partition, because they sometimes incorrectly use partition data from the partition's boot sector rather than the partition table. In order to prevent programs like these from doing this, it is a good idea to zero out--under Linux--the start of a partition you created, before you use MS-DOS--or whatever--to format it. Type: $ dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hdXY bs=512 count=1 where hdXY is the relevant partition; e.g., hda1 for the first partition of the first (IDE) disk. Linux can read and write the files on your DOS and OS/2 FAT partitions and floppies using either the DOS file system type built into the kernel or mtools. There is kernel support for the VFAT file system used by Windows 9x and Windows NT. For information about FAT32 partition support, see http://bmrc.berkeley.edu/people/chaffee/fat32.html. "What software does Linux support?" for details and status of the emulators for DOS, MS Windows, and System V programs. See, "Can Linux access Amiga file systems?" and, "Can Linux access Mac file systems?" "Can Linux access BSD, SysV, etc., UFS?" "Can Linux access SMB file systems?" There are said to be NTFS drivers under development, which should support compression as a standard feature. There is also supposedly a Win95 driver that allows read-only access to Linux file systems, although I don't know the URL. Call Microsoft technical support. 3.2 How do I access files on my DOS partition or floppy? Use the DOS file system; i.e., type, for example: $ mkdir /dos $ mount -t msdos -o conv=text,umask=022,uid=100,gid=100 /dev/hda3 /dos If it's a floppy, don't forget to umount it before ejecting it! You can use the conv=text/binary/auto, umask=nnn, uid=nnn, and gid=nnn options to control the automatic line-ending conversion, permissions and ownerships of the files in the DOS file system as they appear under Linux. If you mount your DOS file system by putting it in your /etc/fstab, you can record the options (comma-separated) there, instead of defaults. Alternatively, you can use mtools, available in both binary and source form on the FTP sites--"Where can I get Linux material by FTP?". A kernel patch (known as the fd-patches) is available which allows floppies with nonstandard numbers of tracks and/or sectors to be used; this patch is included in the 1.1 alpha testing kernel series. 3.3 Does Linux support compressed ext2 file systems? As of recently, it does. Information about them is located at http://www.netspace.net.au/~reiter/e2compr/. There is also a Web site for the e2compr patches. The code is still experimental and consists of patches for the 2.0 and 2.1 kernels. For more information about the project, including the latest patches and the address of the mailing list, look up the URL at http://debs.fuller.edu/e2compr/ This is according to Roderich Schupp, who adds somewhat cryptically, "There is a program called Zlibc ..." Zlibc is actually a program that allows existing applications to read compressed (GNU gzip'ed) files as if they were not compressed. Look on sunsite.unc.edu in /pub/Linux/libs. The author is Alain.Knuff@imag.fr. There is also a compressing block device driver that can provide on the fly disk compression in the kernel. It is called, "DouBle" and is written by Jean-Marc Verbavatz. The source-only distribution is located on sunsite.unc.edu in the directory /pub/Linux/patches/diskdrives. This driver compresses inodes and directory information as well as files, so any corruption of the file system is likely to be serious. There is also a package called tcx (Transparently Compressed Executables) which allows you to keep infrequently compressed executables compressed and only uncompress them temporarily when in use. It is located on sunsite.unc.edu in the directory /pub/Linux/utils/compress/. 3.4 Can I use my Stacked/DBLSPC/etc. DOS drive? Not very easily. You can also access DOS 6.X volumes from the DOS emulator ("What software does Linux support?"), but it's harder than accessing a normal DOS volume via the DOS kernel option, a module, or mtools. There is a module available for the Linux kernel which can do read-only access of the compressed volume. Look in sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/system/filesystems/dosfs for this package. 3.5 Can I access OS/2 HPFS partitions from Linux? Yes, but Linux access to HPFS partitions is read-only. HPFS file system access is available as an option when compiling the kernel or as a module. See the Documentation/filesystems/hpfs.txt file in the kernel source distribution. "How do I upgrade/recompile my kernel?"). Then you can mount HPFS partition, using, for example: $ mkdir /hpfs $ mount -t hpfs /dev/hda5 /hpfs 3.6 Can Linux access Amiga file systems? The Linux kernel has support for the Amiga Fast File System (AFFS) version 1.3 and later, both as a compile-time option and as a module. The file Documentation/filesystems/affs.txt in the Linux kernel source distribution has more information. See "How do I upgrade/recompile my kernel?". Linux supports AFFS hard-drive partitions only, though: floppy access is not supported due to incompatibilities between Amiga floppy controllers, and PC and workstation controllers. The AFFS driver can also mount disk partitions used by the Un*x Amiga Emulator, by Bernd Schmidt. 3.7 Can Linux access BSD, SysV, etc. UFS? Recent kernels can mount (read only) the UFS file system used by System V; Coherent; Xenix; BSD and derivatives like SunOS, FreeBSD, NetBSD, and NeXTstep. UFS support is available as a kernel compile-time option and a module. See "How do I upgrade/recompile my kernel?". 3.8 Can Linux access SMB file systems? Linux supports read/write access of Windows for Workgroups and Windows NT SMB volumes. See the file Documentation/filesystems/smbfs.txt of the Linux kernel source distribution, and "How do I upgrade/recompile my kernel?" in this FAQ. There is also a suite of programs called Samba which provide support for WfW networked file systems (provided they're for TCP/IP). Information is available in the README file at sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/system/network/samba. There is a SMB web site at samba.canberra.edu.au/pub/samba. 3.9 Can Linux access Mac file systems? There is a set of user-level programs that read and write the Macintosh Hierarchical File System (HFS). It is available at sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/utils/disk-management. 3.10 Can I run Microsoft Windows programs under Linux? WINE, a MS Windows emulator for Linux, is still not ready for general distribution. If you want to contribute to its development, look for the status reports in the comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine newsgroup. A commercial, working product known as WABI is said to provide full MS -- Robert Kiesling kiesling@terracom.net ..No writing gig too small...