Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[shane]

Whenever i download something, it opens it in something like tkm or something close to those letters. But my downloads just show the files and sometimes the programing in them. How do i get it so that i can actually use what i downloaded?

[Flash]

What sort of thing are you downloading? Programs I assume.

There is a bit to be learned about installing programs in Linux, especially Puppy. In general, it is not as easy as Windows. Having said that, Pupgets are as easy. DotPups may be as easy to install as Pupgets, but I haven't tried any of them yet.

If you are downloading any other kind of program it will take a bit more than clicking on it to install it, and you have to install it before you can run it.

[papaschtroumpf]

dotpups are really easy to install:
- download them (by default in /root/my-documents)
- find them in rox-filer
-click on it to launch the installer

that's it!

[Rich]

sounds to me that you're looking at the tarball - a zipped file consisting of the components you need to install.
Treat it like a winzip situation. The files need extracting to the specified paths.

There is often a read-me file detailing the install requirements.

[shane]

i am brand new to linux, i know i sound a bit dumb but could you guys tell me it in a little less linux vocab, i learned windows by trial and error so i am not so good on vocab. thx for helping, i just need it in my language lol

[shane]

oh yeah and for what im downloading, i know they are linux programs it was aimsniff and firefox

[Rich]

Shane,
Post the link for the place where you were downloading the files from.
If you do this then one of us can duplicate the download and try to put the solution in plain English for you.

ALSO, what version of Puppy are you using ( don't know if this matters, but it might make a difference. )

[shane]

aimsniff.com im using the puppy one that just came out its 1.0.3

[Lobster]

For now use Pupget and dotpup (as they are designed to work with Puppy)

Start / Setup

When you are happy downloading and using your files. (I would suggest several months) then you might move on to unleashed being installed as alien packages.

You took several years to learn Windows.
Some of that knowledge will be useful. Some not so.

Here is a Linux guide
http://www.icon.co.za/~psheer/book/index.html.gz

Check some of the links at the bottom of this page
http://www.goosee.com/puppy/wikka/AbsoluteBeginners

If you wish to unzip a file you have downloaded then learn to use tkzip
and Rox - trial and error will get you there as will "aquitted" and "success"

Good Luck


PS. Do I sound as if I know what I am on about? Pah. Still learning basics . . .

[Rich]

Here you are then Shane..........In laymans terms !

I've just downloaded aimsniff . The file is named aimsniff-0.9d.tar.gz

<< .tar indicates a compressed file. This means that ( usually ) there are a few files, bundled together and compressed to simplify downloading and data transfer. It's just like a Winzip file in windows >>

So you have the file on your pc...now what?
click on the start menu and select Utilities>TkZip Archiver

<< this opens the program needed to uncompress the downloaded file and save the contents.>>

In the left hand window, select the directory/path that the downloaded tar file is in ( when you get the path selected you should be able to see the file in the right hand window ) . Double click the file and another window opens. This window shows you all the files in the .tar download ( affectionately referred to as the TarBall. )

There's a file called README. double click on this ( or select it and click the view button ) and the file opens for reading - if you want to .

To extract all the files and write them to your system, click the 'select all' button at the top of the panel - this highlights all the files in the tarball.
Then simply click 'extract'. Another window opens asking you to specify where to extract the files to. Here you want to select your /root directory. Click extract on the new window and it's done.

All the files are extracted to a directory called aimsniff-0.9d in the /root directory.

That should be enough to get you started !

[Ian]

Read the README file carefully especially the Dependencies section.