Pdaxrom On My 6000, Now What?, newbie needs help Options

[johnw]

I finally decided to get rid of the default Sharp ROM on my 6000L, and decided to use PdaXrom since everyone seems to like it. I followed the instructions posted on http://www.pdaxrom.org & installed 1.1.0 RC 10 Kathrin. (In the process I resized my root partition to 45MB as recommended.)

Following the instructions I logged in as root & changed my root password.

I had to manually create /home/root because when I rebooted I a message came up on the screen saying it did not exist.

So far everything seemed pretty good. Then I typed "startx", and instead of seeing a beautiful user interface, I see an X-window terminal screen & a copy of xclock running. Thats it. Nothing else. There are no user settings. No programs. No menus. No way to log out!

Is this what I am supposed to see? What do I do next?

It seems the documentation does not include such information.

Please help me. I don't want to go back to the Sharp ROM.

-John

[johnw]

Ok. I figured out how to suspend since its running TWM. I guess what I need at this point is a little advice.

From reading the forum, it seems the most used window manager is matchbox, but I have a choice of KDE or FVWM if I want.

I am familiar with KDE since I run that on my desktop, and I haven't run FVWM in years, although its is probably less resource hungry than KDE. I don't know anything about matchbox.

Here are my questions. (Remember I'm new to pdaXrom.):

(1) Which window manager is the most stable, and which would you recommend I use?
(2) What are the packages I need to download to use it?
(3) What is the command sequence to install the package.

I would like to connect to the internet through my WiFi router. Do I need to download a package to do that?

I would also like to install AbiWord, Gnumeric, xmms, gaim, Firefox, and an email client (either Thunderbird or Sylpheed).

Could I get a JDK running on my 6000 with pdaXrom?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

John

[theindefiniteart...]

Ok.  I figured out how to suspend since its running TWM.  I guess what I need at this point is a little advice.

From reading the forum, it seems the most used window manager is matchbox,  but I have a choice of KDE or FVWM if I want. 

I am familiar with KDE since I run that on my desktop, and I haven't run FVWM in years, although its is probably less resource hungry than KDE.  I don't know anything about matchbox.

Here are my questions.  (Remember I'm new to pdaXrom.):

(1) Which window manager is the most stable, and which would you recommend I use?
(2) What are the packages I need to download to use it?
(3) What is the command sequence to install the package.

I would like to connect to the internet through my WiFi router.  Do I need to download a package to do that?

I would also like to install AbiWord, Gnumeric, xmms, gaim, Firefox, and an email client (either Thunderbird or Sylpheed).

Could I get a JDK running on my 6000 with pdaXrom?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

John

In xterm, type "m" and hit [tab] twice. You'll see a list that includes some of matchbox's programs, which you can run from the command line. (If you have trouble getting a command to work, google: "man 'command name'" for the manual page on that command, though this shouldn't be necessary for any of the matchbox progs.) The bad part is that everything runs in a separate window. So , for example, the panel is not imbedded in the desktop. In theory, this gives you all the functionality you want, but it's not in a nice package. I'm still trying to get that to work for me. I've seen the same problem before, when using debian, x and nautilus, but I can't remember how to fix it. I think maybe it still needs a widget set.

Most of the programs you want can be downloaded from, or are linked by, the pdaxrom site. (Downloads -> IPK Feed) I think that you can then simply install them with ipkg, though there is a package manager with a gui that i haven't tried. The manager can also access online feeds easily, or so i've read.

zach

[Chero]

Hi,

Most packages will be :
http://212.10.30.205/rc10/Zaurus-SL6000/feed/ (which is a specific SL6000 feed)
or
http://www.pdaxrom.org/unstable (user contributed packages)

Package manager is available from the first mentioned feed. It's quite easy to set different feeds.

About wifi :
take a look at this thread (post 17 to be more specific).

To install from command-line :

CODE

# ipkg install xxx (installs package to root)
# ipkg -d /mnt/card install xxx (installs package to SD)

Default window manager = matchbox
KDE = huge (nice to play, not for daily use)
my favorite = xfce4
other window manager with great support = fvwm

Chero.

[theindefiniteart...]

I finally decided to get rid of the default Sharp ROM on my 6000L, and decided to use PdaXrom since everyone seems to like it.  I followed the instructions posted on http://www.pdaxrom.org & installed 1.1.0 RC 10 Kathrin.  (In the process I resized my root partition to 45MB as recommended.)

Following the instructions I logged in as root & changed my root password.

I had to manually create /home/root because when I rebooted I a message came up on the screen saying it did not exist.

So far everything seemed pretty good.  Then I typed "startx", and instead of seeing a beautiful user interface, I see an X-window terminal screen & a copy of xclock running.  Thats it.  Nothing else.  There are no user settings.  No programs.  No menus.  No way to log out! 

Is this what I am supposed to see?  What do I do next? 

It seems the documentation does not include such information.

Please help me.  I don't want to go back to the Sharp ROM.

-John

If you haven't already gotten it working, do this:

Go here:
http://externe.net/zaurus/guylhem-rom/
and read the README. Follow the "Installation instructions for Guylhem ROM for the Sharp Tosa SL-6000" and then flash with pdaxrom using whatever instructions you used before.

[johnw]

Thanks for you (and Zack's) replies. The previous set of instructions (found here) told me I needed to resize my root partition. I did to the recommended 45MB. I've read other people say on the forums here that the 6000's partition should NOT be resized. Which is it?

Thanks again,

John

[miskinis]

... I did to the recommended 45MB.  I've read other people say on the forums here that the 6000's partition should NOT be resized.  Which is it?

This seems like a very important answer to get! I was afraid to repartiton,
and didn't yet. I don't want endanger my new (used) SL-6000 the first day!

John

[ken]

Please help me.  I don't want to go back to the Sharp ROM.

No idea why you'd be afraid to go back to the Sharp ROM. It can do a lot.

example of what it can do on the 6K:

http://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Applic...6000L/Sharp_ROM

[nevarrie]

For those interested try this site to get pdaxrom working on the 6k.

I still think pdaxrom needs alot of work but I have a usable gui now that i did not have for the last 3 hours.

Nevarrie

[karlto]

Hi

I don't think anyone has mentioned to check the last configuration step when installing - see this page:

http://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=How_to_install_pdaXrom

Note the step at the bottom that involves untarring default settings - this creates the home directory and settings so that 'startx' will start matchbox and you will be straight into the easy stuff within seconds. (less than 3 hours anyway!)

(No manual creation of home directory, or setup of window manager - it just works!)

Karl

[nevarrie]

That was the page I forgot to include in my last post. Though after gettign that working I followed the instructions on http://gefechtsdienst.de/uman/Zaurus_C-860...etup/index.html so that I could run e17 on my 6k. I run enlightenment on all of my Linux desktops so it is nice to have it on my Z also.

I am still working on getting wifi and my Targus Keyboard working. Though we will see what I think of it after a few days.