On Wed, 2009-11-04 at 04:00 -0800, Microbe wrote: > Hey folks, > > I thought I would share my experience installing Ubuntu. As > background, I am the guy friends, family and neighbours call when they > have trouble with their Windows PC and am pretty good at it. I can > also find my way around a Linux terminal OK. > > Having read about how good desktop Linux is nowadays I thought it was > time to give it a go. > > The install of 9.10 was easy as you could want. The whole thing works > well and boots and shuts down quick smart. > > I should add that the computer I was experimenting on is in my shed > (don't ask!) so not much at stake. All i do is listen to music, Skype > sometimes and look up something about my latest tinker project. > > Well, the first problem was listening to music. MP3s were associated > with the movie player. I managed to sort that out easy enough but > even when I pointed MP3s at Rhythmbox, no go...it can't play layer1 > MP3s or something. Not a good start. > > OK, let's get Skype going. I downloaded the proper version only to > have the install fail with the friendly message about a dependency > needing dbus >= 4.3 I think it was. At this point I can imagine the > average mug giving up and I wouldn't blame them, but I was > determined. > > It took me a while to find dbus to download but I did it. Oh shucks, > it depended on something or another XML. I grabbed that and guess > what...on and on it went. It was just too hard. > > The long and short of it is that I never did get skype or music > working and can only assume that the idea that Linux is ready as a > windows replacement for the average punter is someone's fantasy. > > It is a shame really because there needs to be an alternative (apart > from a Mac) but right now, this isn't it. > > This is not meant as a troll, I am genuinely disappointed and look > forward to hearing from people about what you think...maybe even some > solutions, but I fear it is going to be ongoing dramas every time I > try to install something. > > Which reminds me, a couple of games I from the built in installer? > Guess what.... > > Over to you, penguins. >
1. Follow the instructions at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Medibuntu to add the medibuntu repository (which has skype in it) 2. go to System -> Administration -> Synaptic Package Manager 3. Search for skype in synaptic, check box next to it to install it 4. search for ubuntu-restricted-extras in synaptic, check box next to it to install it 5. click Apply 6. Do whatever you want while the system downloads and installs skype, as well as a pile of media codecs, flash, and java, and any dependencies they have. 7. listen to mp3's, use skype, etc. Instead of Synaptic you can also use Applications -> Ubuntu Software Centre to do the installing if you like. HTH Lisa -- ubuntu-au mailing list ubuntu-au@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-au
