Quick Hacks V

Summary:

• {=7.1} Installing XFree 4
• {= 7.1} Second Windows Partition 'Disappears' After LM Installation
• {=7.1} Proxy Problems With '~MandrakeUpdate'
• {=7.1} 'Divide by Zero' Error During Installation
• {=> 7.1} RPM 4 Packages

{=7.1} Installing XFree 4

(Contributed by Hoyt, edited)

"I installed 7.1 and selected the option to use XFree86 version 4.0. The config part of the setup procedure barfed, so I wisely chose NOT to boot into X by default. I finally made it configure, but it installed the 3.3.6 version of XFree, not version 4. (I suspect that my dual head setup caused it some confusion as it detected my second head as my primary display).

It seems the link at '/etc/X11/X' {

ls -l /etc/X11/X

{

ln -sf /usr/X11R6/bin/XFree86 /etc/X11/X

To generate a version 4 compatible config file:

XFree86 -configure

Read the instructions to test it and then copy the file to '/etc/X11'

If you want to install version 4, there are two rpm files on the first CD that are identified as version 4. Install them and then follow the directions above."

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{= 7.1} Second Windows Partition 'Disappears' After LM Installation

(Contributed by Andy Leese, edited)

I have 2 disks, the first disk containing Win98 and Win2000 and /boot and the second more or less all for mandrake.

When I installed 7.1, it changed the partition type of my Win98 Ext to Linux Extended and for some reason I couldn't then boot Win2000 (not sure why? as this isn't my Win2k disk), anyway, using

fdisk

cfdisk

{This is a known bug in LM 7.1. LM 7.1 Last Minute Fixes has the details.}

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{=7.1} Proxy Problems With '~MandrakeUpdate'

(Contributed by Gösta Ljungdahl, edited)

I've had some problems to get '~MandrakeUpdate' to work. I'm sitting behind a firewall and used to believe that proxy-settings only had to be done once in the KDE environment.
Just today I learned from the obscurely located help file that these settings also had to be made for 'wget' (that update uses) in the file '/etc/wgetrc' {...}.

{The proxy layer in '~MandrakeUpdate' will be rewritten for the next release.}

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{=7.1} 'Divide by Zero' Error During Installation

(By Christopher Molnar, LM Developer. Edited)

"I think I figured out the pattern to the "divide by zero" and "can't get square root" error {...} and I can repeat it.
If a partition is over 10 GB, I have been getting the 'divide by 0' errors. It drove me nuts for a while this evening. If you pull the size of the drive down to under 10 GB it seems to go away. (yes I know I have to much HD space - I have 120 GB on my machine). I do not know if 10 is the magic number but it seems to fix it."

{Problem is known and will be fixed in the next release.}

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{=> 7.1} RPM 4 Packages

Red Hat 7 uses RPM version 4 to build their packages. All RPM versions prior to 3.05- which is included in LM 7.2 - will refuse to install these packages. So if you are using a pre-LM 7.2 version and encounter strange error message when trying to install new RPMs, consider upgrading your RPM version to the one included in LM 7.2. Upgrading to RPM 4 won't work, because the RPM 4 rpm itself has been built with RPM 4.

LM user Philip Wood shared this idea:

"A binary i386 version of RPM 4.0 can be found by installing it from a Red Hat 7.0 distribution available on the Net."

Download the file, do a

chmod 755 rpm

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Related Resources:

Mandrake-Linux Bug-Tracker
Mandrake Linux Update and Security Advisories

Modified: Nov. 02, 2000
Author: Tom Berger

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