Need some help with a couple things in debian

[funnyperson1]

1. Is it possible for me to install the newest driver for Ati cards in Linux even if it is an rpm? I already tried using alien to make it a .deb package and using dpkg to install it, that failed.

2. What is the proper configuration for a ps2 mouse with scroll button in XF86Config? I have gotten mine to work, but for some reason KDE crashes, and I dont know how to get scroll working.

3. Where can I get a debian version of the drivers for my Cmedia 8738 onboard sound.

4. When I say apt-get upgrade mozilla, how come it doesnt do anything when I have Mozilla 1.0. Or better yet, how do I enable to installing of unstable packages.

Thanks for your help!

 

[funnyperson1]

Also if I downloaded a normal gzipped package I can still configure and compile like with any other linux distro right? I dont have to use some wierd debian command?

 

[klingens]

1. Yes it is possible. Don´t make a deb out of an rpm with alien, this always fails. Make a tar.gz and unpack the needed files to the proper locations manually. You don´t have those files in your packagemanagement but for X drivers this is no big deal. Edit your X11 configfiles to use the new drivers tho.
2. dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86 got mine working properly without fiddling around. If you can´t get it working, google for "linux wheel mouse howto". Directions in there should be applicable to debian as well.
3. Drivers are kernelmodules, not anything distro-specific. You get them here: http://www.alsa-project.org/alsa-do...Media&card=CMI8738&chip=CMI8738&module=cmipci or http://www.cmedia.com.tw/edl8738.htm
One is alsa, the other manufacturer driver, probably OSS.
4. edit /etc/apt/sources.list and replace every occurrence of "stable" or "woody" with "unstable", then run apt-get update;apt-get dist-upgrade. Then you will have unstable debian. or (the better way) add a line with an "unstable" repository in sources.list and apt-get -t unstable mozilla. That will only install mozilla from unstable. Be warned tho: unstable packages are just that and can and will break frequently.
5. Yes of course you can still compile yourself. dpkg won´t know anything about it tho and might balk if it´s a library and a program you want to install via dpkg depends on that self-compiled library. alternatively there is apt-get source <packagename> which is a way to get a tar.gz you can compile and which will generate a nice tidy deb-package
4.

 

[Christoph]

1) Yes. Just do apt-get install rpm and you can use rpm to install. I haven't tried it, so I can't say whether it'll be happy about dependencies. In the worst case, you can force it to ignore dependencies.

2) Here's what relevant in my XF86-Config-4 for my 5-button MS optical mouse with a scroll wheel (I forgot the name )

Section "InputDevice"
        Identifier      "Configured Mouse"
        Driver          "mouse"
        Option          "CorePointer"
        Option          "Device"                "/dev/psaux"
        Option          "Protocol"              "ImPS/2"
        Option          "Emulate3Buttons"       "true"
        Option          "ZAxisMapping"          "4 5"
EndSection
 
Section "InputDevice"
        Identifier      "Generic Mouse"
        Driver          "mouse"
        Option          "SendCoreEvents"        "true"
        Option          "Device"                "/dev/input/mice"
        Option          "Protocol"              "ImPS/2"
        Option          "Emulate3Buttons"       "true"
        Option          "ZAxisMapping"          "4 5"
EndSection

3) That's supported in the kernel. Look for it under "sound" when you run menuconfig.

4) edit /etc/apt/sources.conf and change anything that says "stable" to "unstable".

 

[funnyperson1]

1. Yes it is possible. Don´t make a deb out of an rpm with alien, this always fails. Make a tar.gz and unpack the needed files to the proper locations manually. You don´t have those files in your packagemanagement but for X drivers this is no big deal. Edit your X11 configfiles to use the new drivers tho.

how would I make a tar.gz from an rpm and what locations would I need to copy to? Sorry but I am very much a begginer with Debian and linux in general.

 

[funnyperson1]

Ok, the install stopped saying that dependencies werent satisfied. It wants glic2.3 for a lot of them. If I didnt want any of these packages to be installed how could I stop the dist-upgrade yet install all the stuff that does have its dependencies>

 

[Too Smart]

You should probably go and get that glic package from here:
http://www.debian.org/distrib/packages

I had a very bad first experience with Debian. I wanted to install some program, but it wouldn't install saying it required some other packages to be installed first. So I went to debian's website and downloaded those packages, and all of them would not install, because they each requried some packages which I did not have. So I downloaded those packages, and they also required more packages. I ended up downloading sixty-three packages before I could get the original package to install properly. It's very frustrating.

 

[Christoph]

You should probably go and get that glic package from here:
http://www.debian.org/distrib/packages

I had a very bad first experience with Debian. I wanted to install some program, but it wouldn't install saying it required some other packages to be installed first. So I went to debian's website and downloaded those packages, and all of them would not install, because they each requried some packages which I did not have. So I downloaded those packages, and they also required more packages. I ended up downloading sixty-three packages before I could get the original package to install properly. It's very frustrating.

Did you add some mirrors to your /etc/apt/sources.list file? The whole point of Debian is that you pick a couple of mirrors, add them to /etc/apt/sources.list and run apt-get update. Then when you want to install a package, it will automatically download all the dependencies you need from the mirrors you chose. Usually the most interaction required is to tell apt that you do want it download packages that you didn't explicitly tell it to.
Please don't go crazy because you did all that work for nothing.

edit: vbulletin tag mess-up

 

[Too Smart]

Actually I didn't know that. But even if I did it wouldn't of helped me because I couldn't get my winmodem to work with Debian (there was no linux driver for it). I had to download the packages on my other computer then connect that hard drive to the computer I was running Debian on and install the packages that way.