Re: v5.2>v6.1 upgrade pitfalls?

[Bob McClure Jr <robertmcclure earthlink net>]

I will try to restrain myself because I have some stong opinions about
RH6.1.

Re: Your X problem: XFree86 v3.3.5 claims to support your SIS 6326.

Once you get X up, use printtool to configure your printer.  Your
current symptoms indicate you have specified the wrong printer device,
so lpd is looking into empty space.  The default printer in 5.2 was
/dev/lp1.  To find out what you actually have, do a "dmesg" to see what
was discovered by the kernel during bootup.  I think nearly any HP
Deskjet selection should work for you.  By the way, in 6.1, you will
find the default printer device is /dev/lp0.  

Since you don't have much invested in your RH5.1 installation, I would
save off my /etc directory in another partition (if you have one to
spare) so you can save some of your configuration stuff, and then do a
regular install, not an update.  I also would not be too scared to do a
"custom" install rather than the canned "server" or "workstation"
install. I feel about the latter like I do about automatic
transmissions: they don't always do what you want.

I have done two RH6.1 installs, one workstation install and one upgrade
to 5.2.  The former was missing several things I needed, so I had to get
out the CD and manually add what I wanted.  The latter has been plagued
by apps that now segfault on startup, I suppose because of some library
problem.  I'm still investigating that.

My preferred approach has been to have a minimum of two partitions that
can take a full installation, and I copy the current root filesystem to
the spare, and reconfigure it to make it bootable so I have a fallback
position.  Then I install/upgrade the other partition.

<RANT>

In 5.2, RedHat had a wonderful set of ppp tools in "netcfg" and
"usernet". I've never found such a painless and convenient way to set up
and run my multiple PPP connections.

In 6.1, they have transmogrified them to an abortion called rp3, which,
I guess is supposed to work with the way linuxconf configures things.
Last night I tried to make use of linuxconf, and not only could it not
properly parse the files I had made with netcfg, and after fixing the
fields, wrote back fairly hashed up versions of the original, but it
could not create the proper files if I made a new ppp entry. At some
point, rp3 was appending logging information to
/etc/ppp/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-ppp0! Unfortunately, that is
the machine I upgraded, and now netcfg (which is a python script)
segfaults when I start it. Fortunately I have backups and know how to
set up the system from scratch anyway.

I am concerned that RedHat is becoming the Microsoft of Linux. If I see
much more of trash like linuxconf and rp3, I'm going to start installing
Debian or SuSE.

</RANT>

On Wed, Dec 22, 1999 at 09:43:51AM -0800, Leroy Smith wrote:
> This message is to find out from all you RedHat Linux gurus out there what
> advice you might have for me since I have decided to upgrade from RedHat
> Linux v5.2 to RedHat Linux 6.1.
> 
> I have a Celeron Pentium II clone, Samsung 4.2G HD, a Packard Bell model
> PB8539VG VGA monitor (that I now have all the stats on), a 40X CD Rom, an
> Elpona SIS6326 AGP video board with 8M ram, and a HP DeskJet 682C printer.
> 
> I installed v5.2 in October, and I love it.  Even though it doesn't quite
> work too well as of yet.  Hopefully 6.1 will help me overcome the 2 main
> problems I am having with my Linux system:
> 
> Problem #1.  My printer prints fine when I use Windows 3.1 applications, but
> will not print from Linux.  When I send print jobs to lpr, lpq says "waiting
> for lp to become ready (offline?), and lists jobs in the queue.  I enabled
> all in lpc, but no joy.  Printcap says ##PRINTTOOL3## LOCAL cdj550 300x300
> letter {} Deskjet550 1 {} so I suspect the wrong driver has been loaded.  It
> did not give me a choice of a DeskJet 582C when I installed it.  Maybe v6.1
> will?  I tried to run printtool, but the display was wrong, presumably
> because of problem #2:
> 
> Problem #2:  X windows will not work.  I have run Superprobe and
> XConfigurator about a dozen times and I don't think it recognizes my SIS6326
> SVGA video board.  Since it does not give me an SIS chipset option, I hope
> 6.1 will do better.
> 
> My root file system was on its knees for a while, but I finally figured out
> (with the help of this list-serve) to run fsck from a single user mode, and
> it fixed it.  And now I use the shutdown command when I leave Linux, and
> everthing is working fine.  I have several databases that I use grep & awk
> on, but I can't get the syntax down 'cause I haven't printed out the mans yet...
> 
> So we come full circle.  If anyone can suggest some tips to avoid my 2
> problem pitfalls it would be greatly appreciated.  Also, when I set up the
> partitions I hope to hell that disk druid works better than it did on v5.2.
> 
> I have read the install HOWTO, backed up both my windows files and Linux
> files, and will be installing v6.1 from a CD ROM.
> 
> Thanks in advance.  I will be sitting in the middle of my living room floor
> in the Lotus position chanting my mantra "Linux is good.  Bill Gates is the
> anti-christ" over and over and over...
> 
> Leroy C. Smith
> LCS Creations
> 
> 
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> 
> Nicotine-free since 10/26/93
> Microsoft-free since 10/4/99
> 
> 
> -- 
>   PLEASE read the Red Hat FAQ, Tips, Errata and the MAILING LIST ARCHIVES!
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-- 
Bob McClure, Jr.            |
Bobcat Open Systems, Inc.   | Linux: The Ultimate NT Service Pack
robertmcclure earthlink net |
'98 Rotator Pursuit