The Linux FAQ page 14 Solutions to Common Problems

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This is the list of Frequently Asked Questions for Linux, the Free/Open Source UNIX-like operating system kernel that runs on many modern computer systems..

Table of Contents

14. Solutions to Common Problems

Q: How Do I Remove (or Change) the Colors in the ls Display?

Q: Why Won't a Program Work in the Current Directory?

Q: How Do I Find Out If a Notebook Runs Linux?

Q: Can Can I Resume an Interrupted Download?

Q: How Do I Remove (or Change) the Colors in the ls Display?

Q: How Do I Remove (or Change) the Colors in the ls Display?

A: If ls is displaying in color and you haven't told it to, you probably have an alias configured for it. Some

distributions ship this way by default.

The shell command, unalias ls, should completely unset the configuration that some distributions

provide as standard.

To permanently make this change, check your initialization script, .bashrc.

A: To change the colors, rather than removing them, refer to the ls man page (man ls).

Q: Why Won't a Program Work in the Current Directory?

A: Because the current directory (i.e., .) is not in the search path, for security reasons, as well as to insure that

the correct program versions are used. If an intruder is able to write a file to a world-writable directory, like

/tmp, presumably he or she would be able to execute it if the directory were in the search path. The solution

to this is to include the directory in the command; e.g., ./myprog, instead of myprog. Or add the current

directory to your PATH environment variable; e.g., export PATH=".:"$PATH using bash, although this

is discouraged for the reasons mentioned above.

Q: How Do I Find Out If a Notebook Runs Linux?

A: There's no fixed answer to this question, because notebook hardware is constantly updated, and getting theX display, sound, PCMCIA, modem, and so forth, working, can take a good deal of effort.Most notebooks currently on the market, for example, use "Winmodems," which often do not work withLinux because of their proprietary hardware interfaces. Even notebooks which are certified as "Linuxcompatible," may not be completely compatible.

Information about installing Winmodems in general is contained in the Winmodems-and-Linux-HOWTO.

Refer to Where Is the Documentation?.

You can find the most current information, or ask other users about their notebook experiences, on the

linux-laptop mailing list, which is hosted by the vger.redhat.com server. Refer to What Mailing Lists

Are There?.

A mailing list for Linux on IBM Thinkpads has its home page at http://www.topica.com/lists/linux-thinkpad/ .

Another Thinkpad mailing list is hosted by http://www.bm-soft.com/ . Send email with the word help in the

body of the message to majordomo@www.bm-soft.com .

There is a Web page about Linux on IBM Thinkpads at http://peipa.essex.ac.uk/tp-linux/ .

 

For information about interfacing peripherals like Zip and CD-ROM drives through parallel ports, refer to theLinux Parallel Port Home Page, at http://www.torque.net/linux-pp.html .

If you need the latest version of the PCMCIA Card Services package, it is (or was) located at

ftp://cb-iris.stanford.edu/pub/pcmcia/ , but that host no longer seems to be available. Recent distributions are

on ftp://metalab.unc.edu/pub/Linux/kernel/pcmcia/ . You will also need to have the kernel source code

installed as well. Be sure to read the PCMCIA-HOWTO, which is included in the distribution.

Q: Can Can I Resume an Interrupted Download?

A: You can use the reget command of the standard ftp client program after reconnecting to pick up whereyou left off.

Clients like ncftp support resumed FTP downloads, and wget supports resumed FTP and HTTP downloads.

The Linux FAQ page 14 Solutions to Common Problems

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