On Thu, 9 Jan 2003 08:07, Alex Malinovich wrote: > On Wed, 2003-01-08 at 13:23, Colin Watson wrote: > > On Wed, Jan 08, 2003 at 10:36:08AM -0800, Daniel L. Miller wrote: > > > Will the Redhat binaries work under Debian? > > > > Hard to say. Executables will work fine (or can be made to work fine by > > installing additional packages, if you happen to get link errors). I get > > the impression that this is a kernel module, though, and it's not clear > > to me that Red Hat kernels are module-binary-compatible with Debian > > kernels. > > > > There's unlikely to be any harm in trying. If it doesn't work, you'll > > know. > > Having been in a similar position when I first started messing around > with Debian, I'll try and give you the "straight" answer about Red Hat > stuff. First off, Colin is right about the kernel modules. There's no > harm in trying, but don't expect them to work. What I'll try to cover is > the right way to go about things like this. > > Most of the programs you find floating around on the net for linux are > usually released in two forms, RPMs and source. Your first instinct > then, coming from either a Windows or Mac or even Red Hat or Mandrake > background is to download the easiest form of the package and use it. So > you download the RPM and use it. And maybe you find out about the > "alien" command in Debian that can convert RPMs to DEBs. And that works. > But that's the wrong way of going about it. > > Debian has the incredibly useful and powerful apt system. If you want to > find a package, you just type "apt-cache search searchwords", where > searchwords are what you want to find, and it shows you matching package > names. When you find the packages you want, it's just a matter of > "apt-get install packagename". > > Sometimes, however, there doesn't yet exist a Debian package for a > program you want. In that case, I always suggest building from source. > Debian has a nice way of seperating compiled from source packages from > the rest of the system. They all go into /usr/local/* as opposed to > /usr/* or even /*. This way it's relatively easy to get rid of them > cleanly in the future. Also, most Makefiles nowadays have an "uninstall" > target, so after you compile and install a program, uninstalling it can > be done from the same source tree. > > Finally, to get to the point of the kernel modules, just as with the apt > system, it's always best to check what you have before you start > downloading stuff. Just about every major piece of hardware nowadays is > supported directly in the kernel. If you roll your own kernel it's quite > easy to select which drivers you need during compilation. If you run a > Debian packaged kernel, it will come with just about every module that > could possibly be compiled in the kernel. Then you can just load those > modules using modprobe or modconf. > > If you were to download the RPM of the drivers and use that, it would > most likely just place the driver in your kernel modules directory. I > hope that makes sense and, more importantly, I hope the above clarifies > a few things about starting out with Debian. It's always good to catch > bad habits such as using alien before they start. :) Good luck and > welcome to Debian. :) > > -Alex
Well spoken. I am still rather new to Debian. I often find myself doing a Google search for what I want to do. Then when I find some likely software(s) I follow with a local search of my debs for the program(s) name I found on Google. Mostly the neccessary debs are there. Bob -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
