There doesn't seem to be a special group for Debian Newbies, so I hope y'all don't mind me bringing up some questions here. I did a lot of reading on Linux and Debian, but I now have a copy of Debian 2.1 and am trying to get a system up.
Background: Dutch, teacher, location: Taiwan, 32, shortwave DXer. System1: Pentium 200MMX, 64 MB RAM, 3.2+6.1 GB HD, S3 Trio64, Soundblaster AWE64. System2: Twinhead Slimnote 486-33, 8 MB RAM, 305 MB HD, VGA monochrome monitor. What I did sofar: Installed Debian 2.1 with base system on the Twinhead, with 9 floppies. Aim: Connect a parallel port CD-ROM (Shuttle EPIA) and install the rest of the system. Remarks: I cleaned the HD and reformatted it as one partition (305 MB). However, Debian 2.1 installation couldn't get cfdisk going and thus I used the second console to manually partition and set the swap. Questions: 1) What is an easy way to go to the previous directory, e.g. I am in /usr/bin and want to go to /usr? 2) With the base system installed I can't open man pages, that is, when typing "man ls" for example, the system returns with "command not found." In /bin and /sbin I also can't see any man-binary. There are man pages stored, but in .gz format. Is it normal that the man command is not installed? How to open/read .gz files. 3) I tried to create some scripts, very simple ones, but they refuse to run, or the system says "command not found." Example: #! /bin/bash # echo The time and date is.. date Saved as "telltime," then mode changed with chmod -v u+x telltime. With cat I can still see the contents of the file as plain text. Is this normal? As said, when executing "telltime" the system returns "command not found." I know that you have to watch the path, but even when I put this script in / or /bin it still won't run, while installed commands like "date" do run from almost every directory. What do I do wrong? 4) Any hints to where to find some in dept Debian specific FAQs? I know there is a lot around, and believe me I've been reading, but most tutorials/FAQs assume that the system is running smoothly and hardly deal with problem solving. Thanks for the help. Hans I was riding on the e-train I was whistling to the rhythm I was thinking 'bout my livin' I was feeling pretty fine....I asked the time.... .........Got a poke in the eye. (Sheryl Crow, The Globe Sessions)
