For all those who couldn't be there, here's a rough synopsis of what
happened at the ILUG blr meeting on Saturday 27th Nov, 1999. Sorry for the
size, lotsa things happened.
Well, to start off we had a strict cut-off on the time we had (4pm to 7pm)
so we all landed up there pretty early . To our
dismay, the hall that we had booked was busy and the occupants refused to
clear out - leading to multiple conspiracy theories and grim mutterings of
plans hatched at Redmond, USA. To add some more spice to the dying "Linux
India and Debian" thread, Atul handed Sidcarter aka Khader a bunch of Debian
CD's and told him that he had volunteered for a Debian install demo. All
of us unanimously cheered ;-)).
Finally, at about 5, things warmed up and the meeting official started with
the customary 15 min ramble-all-over-the-place by Atul. He spoke amongst
other things of IT.COM, the Redhat seminar, plans by the IT dept of
Karnataka, initiatives at Goa, etc etc. The basic precis of the whole speech
- Things are looking up for Linux in India and everywhere else as well. He
ended (rather characteristically) with news of the DOJ's trial...
Then he also sat thru a bash PCQ phase, wherein all of the install woes that
everyone had with the PCQ CD got thrown at him. These included - please ask
if you need more details, first RTFM, thou, on second thoughts,
RTFA as well. Problems discussed in some detail with solutions:
0) ./pcqupdt
edit /etc/hosts, remove appended actual machine name on the first line. Then
DNS, gatewaying etc will all work with the install script.
1) printers not working
/etc/conf.modules
alias parport_lowlevel parport_PC
2) PPPD dying. Discussed on LI.
/etc/ppp/options
no auth
3) 6215C. Need I say more? SiS in general.
xsis.rpm is now promised somewhere on the LI site. KD?
4) Mouse dying at the last screen of the install + kudzu picking it up next
time
Shift from Com1 from Com2 or change settings in BIOS - Atul, specifics
please.
5) kppp dying
Sometimes, the first call after a boot will fail - it needs the module in
mem.
Atul has promised to put up a site with info on it on the PCQ
install problems. I guess that if enough of us mail him, he will. So, you
guys and gals know what to do. Some other weird errors that were discussed
included KDE as default, "password module not found", Sound cards problems,
Hard disk stuff, etc. Hanish followed in with some heavy duty solutions,
which as usual flew over most heads!!! Other tech stuff discussed later
included the DU problem raised by Chetan , kdesound +
midi files, linuxconf problems, printing on HP670C.
KD then took over to step us through a painless install of KDevelop,
considering that the QT libs and the kde-devel-libs were not correctly
placed, leading to all sorts of problems. His explanation was as usual
completely accurate and completely perfect, thou finally, KDevelop
stubbornly refused to work ;-))))). He has promised a complete and total
work around to be posted to both lists ASAP. Hanish, to note again, added
some total high fundoo stuff, including waving around a copy of KDevelop
Beta 4, which made all of us turn a nice shade of green.
Since we had one hour left, as well as a "baseline" Atlon 500Hz machine
, we now handed the mike to Khader who now proceeded
to show us how easy it was to install Debian. Well almost. Heh, heh. The
install got stuck right at the start with a md.c message. We all sat around,
trying hard not to crack crazy puns , and
trying even harder to maintain a straight face, considering the machine had
happily installed and was running RH6.1!!
Finally, after a lot of tinkering and switching CD's Atul and all of us
rushed to Khader's rescue, considering the machine
was an assembled one, and there were lots of problems that could come up. We
however, unanimously decided to ensure that the next LUG would definitely
have a full Debian install, something that we would plan, rehearse and check
b4 we meet. Just to make things VERY clear - all the ribbing was done in a
FRIENDLY vein - please do NOT flame me, I really want to
try Debian. At this point, CDs were exchanged . To
finally announce, the "Linux India and Debian" thread is officially dead.
Kaput. Finito.
Food, including nutritious stuff was served. We also
set up a slideshow of the photos taking at IT.COM, so we could watch and eat
!! Photos were individually dissected and comments galore were passed,
adding to the fun considering we were sipping hot cups of good coffee to
boot. Given that the photos are 22MB overall - this took quite some time.
Mugshots of the volunteers added to the jazz. KD has
promised to set up the photos so that everyone on LI can access them. KD?
The meeting was a lot of fun overall. For the folks who were together at
IT.COM, it let us remember the fun we had. For the rest of the folks, , it was a time for them to see what stuff happened
there. Lots of tech stuff got cleared, some email id's and phones nos. were
exchanged. Basically, it was good to meet all the people whose posts are
about the major form of communication that we share. Wish everyone could have been here, let's hope everyone can make it to the next
LUG, so we can have an even bigger bash.
The next LUG will most probably be held in Jan. As
Atul put it, "cmon, we have a life even with Linux in it...". We, please
note, vacated the place nearly exactly at 7. Till the next LUG, this is
Gandalf signing off...