Difficulty transitioning into and or finding the right aswr:

English Applications
#1

First off I’m Andrew (forum newbee please excuse out of normal posting if it occurs)I tried to section bullet information for clarity.

For the BULLET POINTED request for help scroll to the HELP>>>>> section below the rest is background of why I want linux and how I cannot get it to do what I need it to.

My dive into LINUX

My hardware

(On my LINUX test computer running AMD DURON 800Mhz 512 PC133 35 gig hard drive) other that I would love to network in AMD 2.8 x 2600 512 DDR soon to be 1gig and a sizable hard drive…HP wireless laptop dv9000 series 2 gigs of RAM turion 2.0 ghz processor good hard drive all have at least g force 4 graphics integration.

My TIMELINE of events

Sick of Vista OSX and XP need I say more. I’ve known Linux to be good so I figured I would try it, its been 2 months and 70-160 man hours on research and trying to do anything with it remotely close to what I need and I am sad to say I’ve gotten as far as install every version I can find on the distro page and tried it…I settled with OpenSUSE as it flows well and is VERY quick and has a functionality I can understand best for learning Linux I think (correct me if Im wrong please lol). I tried Mint, Ubuntu, Mandriva, Fedora, and Saybayon before trying OpenSUSE.

HELP>>> Ok so I can hardly find support to install or uninstall programs, I tried finding alternatives to programs I use like iTunes or adobe suite programs and (I hate to say the word) Microsoft office apps. I also learned about windows emulators and tried WINE with no luck I know its on my computer but I cant make it do anything, and I cant find the information from searching for it on forums and other sites to learn how as of yet.

  1. After I installed iTunes (the 0.1 something version apple said was the Linux version I went further to download the current versions windows use) I can’t find the icon for it to launch it or find instructions online to launch it through the terminal. I copy and tested launch strings online forums mentioned but they didn’t work for me the terminal sat there glaring at me with a grin.

  2. How to see and search through files on additional hard drives that I hook up with a mess of windows files on it or if I can even perform this task. I did some searching online about this but didn’t find anything yet. I did see some info on partitioning drives which was kool. OpenSUSE does it for you in a sense. I wasn’t too keen on how to change the partitioning options though to maximize my hard drive space.

  3. I need a place I can ask find answers to questions I need answered that’s the most important thing cause if I could find all my answers I wouldn’t have to bug you all. lol (Or is that the point of this forum if so get used to me lol as I might be hitting you up frequently or searching through postings)

  4. I see through research that Adobe Master CS3 or 4 is most likely not going to run on Linux even with an emulator but what about M Office 03 or 07?

  5. How do you get the WINE to do anything or what emulator is best and would work

  6. Maybe I should be asking which distro is most like windows in functioning, install/uninstall software, using software known to windows

My OS needs…

I have been quite acquainted with various Windows for many years. I build computers, repair them, build websites and perform flash and graphical editing with Adobe Master Suites like Photoshop CS4 and Dreamweaver CS4 and flash CS4. I perform files storage and data transfers to and from with customer’s personal files before reformatting or replacing their computer hard drives. I constantly must create and use Microsoft’s words .doc files and the excels .xls along with PowerPoint’s (.ppt). I haven’t found out if the linux office compatible programs will save or create in these formats.

I would be happy if I could use all this software on LINUX
I love Linux its smooth and quick and no extra junk and very simple functions. My low amount of knowledge I know inhibits me greatly but I am trying to work on that.

#2

Hi Andrew,

First off, the first thing you must learn about the forums is to post all of your problems in the correct section of the forum. Different people have expertise in different areas and me be unable to lend you their expertise if they can’t find your question.

Here’s a tutorial on using WINE in openSUSE, courtesy of geoff

Geoff’s Linux tips - wine

To answer your question about Microsoft Office. Here’s search results for it working under WINE WineHQ - Microsoft Office (installer only)

Otherwise there’s openoffice.

That’s all the information I can give for now. If you need anymore help just post back here and others will chip in or I’ll be back on later.

Good Luck,

Ian

#3

quite a laundry list but at least you came to the right place. software installation does differ quite dramatically from windows as you’ve noticed, and i’ll explain as best i can and try to keep an eye on this thread for a while(ready and willing to lend a hand^_^)

it is often not such a great idea to download programs from sites directly as it was in windows, IMHO the yast system for administration makes things easier(biggest challenge is setting up repo’s).

as for the list of needs from your machine, there are applications for linux other than itunes to handle file management on ipods(haven’t personally tested as i don’t have an ipod) combined with the fact things installed via yast tend to populate the application launcher immediately where as things compiled from source seem to lag from time to time in that respect.

open office allows for the saving of a variety of file formats and windows formats should be among those so you shouldn’t have any problem there.

emulation tends to be a bit shaky at best ie works for some people and not for others. but i have seen everything in yast that you are looking for.
just open your application launcher then system then yast. enter your root password and click software management. might have to play with the search a little bit to get a handle on filters ie use ipod instead of itunes(gets a treasure trove of apps) things like image manipulation(photo shop) might have a different name and look/feel, GIMP for example is a wonderful alternative to photoshop that has the same functionality. description filters will generally allow you to look for what you want to do but i suggest using yast to find what you need instead of trying to reach into the vastness of the net.

also if you shorten the thread to one issue at a time its easier to find answer;)

#4

Thank you entreatos and ijbreakey for the information I’ll see where I go from here I really want to convert to LINUX it just seems that I’ve been hitting the wall with a basis of information

I will remember shorter postings and try to find the right places to post them.

Thanks again

#5

well we are a helpful bunch(most of the time;))

suse has a pretty wicked learning curve in the beginning but it is definately worth the work to learn^_^

#6

HELP>>> Ok so I can hardly find support to install or uninstall programs, I tried finding alternatives to programs I use like iTunes or adobe suite programs and (I hate to say the word) Microsoft office apps. I also learned about windows emulators and tried WINE with no luck I know its on my computer but I cant make it do anything, and I cant find the information from searching for it on forums and other sites to learn how as of yet.

Installing software on Opensuse is actually quite easy, instead of using .exe’s we use package managers.
Yast is where you needed to start, I know its hard to get out of the Windows mindset of going to site A, site B, site 3 and site #% for software.
But you could have saved your problems sooner by starting on a forum in the first place, the forums for opensuse are well documented.
A good way to learn about something is to ask :slight_smile:

  1. After I installed iTunes (the 0.1 something version apple said was the Linux version I went further to download the current versions windows use) I can’t find the icon for it to launch it or find instructions online to launch it through the terminal. I copy and tested launch strings online forums mentioned but they didn’t work for me the terminal sat there glaring at me with a grin.

Itunes is a waste of time anyhow, we have plenty of alternatives for listening to music and managing a ipod.
Now if you used itunes to download music, well there is the only thing we cant fully replace.
But overall itunes is not worth your time on linux when there are so many alternatives.

  1. How to see and search through files on additional hard drives that I hook up with a mess of windows files on it or if I can even perform this task. I did some searching online about this but didn’t find anything yet. I did see some info on partitioning drives which was kool. OpenSUSE does it for you in a sense. I wasn’t too keen on how to change the partitioning options though to maximize my hard drive space.

This is very possible, if you need help just ask

  1. I need a place I can ask find answers to questions I need answered that’s the most important thing cause if I could find all my answers I wouldn’t have to bug you all. lol (Or is that the point of this forum if so get used to me lol as I might be hitting you up frequently or searching through postings)

Well this is the place to find answers.

  1. I see through research that Adobe Master CS3 or 4 is most likely not going to run on Linux even with an emulator but what about M Office 03 or 07?

I am unsure of Adobe master, but MS office will run under wine.
But a better app for installing office is called Crossover office, its not free but it sometimes does better then wine when concerning office

  1. How do you get the WINE to do anything or what emulator is best and would work

You may need to play around with wine using wine config.
But mind you Wine is not perfect, its not meant to be a full drop in replacement for windows so not everything will work in it.
You can also try to run windows via something called virtualbox, and if you need help with it again just ask :smiley:

  1. Maybe I should be asking which distro is most like windows in functioning, install/uninstall software, using software known to windows

No linux distro will offer this, your biggest issue here is you think that all operating systems are like windows…
wrong.
Nothing will work exactly like windows except windows, simple as that.
But as a community we can do our best to aid you when possible.

I perform files storage and data transfers to and from with customer’s personal files before reformatting or replacing their computer hard drives. I constantly must create and use Microsoft’s words .doc files and the excels .xls along with PowerPoint’s (.ppt). I haven’t found out if the linux office compatible programs will save or create in these formats.

As suggested Openoffice covers this
Linux has a lot of great alternatives to a lot of MS software.

I would be happy if I could use all this software on LINUX
I love Linux its smooth and quick and no extra junk and very simple functions. My low amount of knowledge I know inhibits me greatly but I am trying to work on that.

Well it doesnt hurt to ask, again thats why we have forums.
I know its like walking on another planet but once you learn it will stick :smiley: