Re: LINUX Installation Re: Top 10 IDL Requests

[Kenneth Mankoff <mankoff(at)lasp.colorado.edu>]

Hi David,

The first thing i would do is just try to run the install program. The
newest flavor of redhat works out of the box. This includes internet,
xwindows, and sound. Getting your printer and stuff to work will take
longer, but thats quite a ways away at this point. But i myself have
installed Redhat6.2 with out any tweaking at all. 

I have installed it on a Dell Inspiron 7000, (but according to the
maillist mentioned below that i used to be a part of, they are the same.)
An Inspiron 7500, and a gateway solo 9300.

Redhat is not the most secure of all the linux flavors, but is the easiest
to install, and fairly easy to secure. And fairly unnecessary to secure if
its behind a good firewall.

Should you run into trouble, search for "Dell Laptop Linux" and you will
find pages with people explaining step-by-step how to install it.

There is a linux-on-dell-laptop specific mailing list
(inspiron-linux@thot.net), i think. You can get on to ask qustions. Its
archive should be enough to get you through everything.

Craig is right, though... if/when you run into trouble, it will probably
be getting X working correctly.  But the installers are improving each and
every day at detecting the hardware on your system.

IDL is very very simple to install on linux. Just run the install.sh
program as root, and thats it. You will have to edit the license file
also.

good luck, and feel free to ask me (by email if you want, or this
newsgroup) any questions.

-ken.

>> I've decided to bite the bullet and install some flavor
>> of LINUX on an old portable I have around here that has
>> no hope of running Windows 2000. 
>> 
>> Any suggestions for the neophyte LINUX installer?
>> 
>> I'm putting it on a DELL Latitude portable.