Telinit and text mode
I have tried to install the proprietary Nvidia driver for my GE Force 6150 card. The problem is that in order to install the driver, one must have the system in text mode.
Normally, this would be no sweat. Just run 'sudo telinit 3' and when the Gnome window is replaced by a text screen, run 'sudo sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-173.14.31-pkg2.run'. But apparently, something as basic to X-windows for more than twenty years as telinit WILL NOT WORK! In all past distributions (since Yggdrasil Linux in 1994, and up to Ubuntu 9.x) this command sequence would have worked perfectly. But not now.
So I had a look at Grub, figuring that I could find a way to produce a boot instruction which would be the equivalent of "boot 1" in order to get into single user text mode. Can't figure it out because trying to learn how to edit grub, the grubbiest boot manager since DOS 1.0, is harder than reading the space shutle flight manual.
NowI am a retired Unix sysop since 1988 (HP-UX, QNX,IRIX,Ultrix and HP's RTE-A before that) and I have been using Linux since '94, I'm neither easily frustrated nor frightened by most problems. But this one has me mad enough to go back to Lilo and forget about Gnome, which in any case has become bloatware par excellence.
How do I get my system into either single user or multiuser text mode (telinit 1 or 3) so I can install the driver?
The nVidia driver you are referring to is proprietary. If you respect your own freedom, you should not install it.
Anyway, I guess it does not hurt to teach you that you can log into a "real" terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+F1 (or F2 or ... or F6 for six terminals in parallel). Ctrl+Alt+F7 brings you back to the graphical session. To kill it:
sudo killall gdm-binary
В 16:07 +0200 на 10.10.2011 (пн), magicbanana[@nospam] написа:
> The nVidia driver you are referring to is proprietary. If you respect your
> own freedom, you should not install it.
+1
> Ctrl+Alt+F7 brings you back to the graphical session. To kill it:
> sudo killall gdm-binary
Why kill it?
sudo service gdm stop
sudo invoke-rc.d stop
sudo /etc/init.d/gdm stop
Well, he looks quite angry at GNOME. I thought killing GDM would be a good catharsis... :-p
В 00:45 +0200 на 11.10.2011 (вт), magicbanana[@spam] написа:
> Well, he looks quite angry at GNOME. I thought killing GDM would be a good
> catharsis... :-p
Good one! :D
I am a translator!
Wow, I'm learning GNU/Linux since Ubuntu 6.04 and one of the first things I learned was how to log into the textmode by pressing Ctrl-Alt-F1.
Sorry commiecam, no offence to you or your knowledge about Unix in general and GNU/Linux in particular, but that was just funny :D
Debian and its derivatives (this includes Trisquel) are a bit unique in that they don't use runlevel to determine whether or not to start X. You can check out http://www.debianadmin.com/debian-and-ubuntu-linux-run-levels.html for more information.
We can't help you specifically with installing the proprietary nVidia driver, however, because helping people install proprietary software is against our guidelines.
While I agree with the desirability of using only freeware and open source, Ihave found the Nvidia drivers to be rock solid. But my AMD powered Compaq desktop refuses to do 16x9 format with thew Trisquel-supplied driver. So I thought I'd just use what I knew would work flawlessly. But it didn't, though only because I ran into the run-level problem. I run almost all open source software and have since loading Linux 0.93 in January 1994. But if a hardware manufacturer is decent enough to supply GOOD Linux support, I am hardly going to turn up my nose at it. In fact it encourages me to buy from them!
And yes, I think that both Gnome and KDE are absolutely appalling bloatware, full of decorative stuff that is totally non-essential to the writing and photo editing that are what I mostly I do. wasting countless zillions of CPU cycles and ram and disk megabytes. Mostly, I dislike software with mind-boggling unnecessary features, preferring lean programs that are not loaded with arcane options in imitation of Windoze software. In countless commercial software shops, the mantra is, "Let's generate some new revenue! We'll add some more snake-oil features and tell the IQ-80 crowd they can't live without 'em."
A bit crusty or curmudgeonly? Perhaps, but I wrote my college term papers on a 12MHz 286 system with 1MB of RAM running QNX2.x, long before Linus got fed up with Coherent and began writing his own. I thought, when it appeared, that Wordstar was a gift from the gods! There is simply too much unnecessary complication clogging the arteries of all -IX systems.
Sorry to go on so, and thank you all for your assistance.
I am a member!
Intel has free GPU drivers. Only avoid Intel Wireless Adapters
В 12:46 +0000 на 12.10.2011 (ср), lukacsem[@nospam] написа:
> While I agree with the desirability of using only freeware and open source,
Freeware is still proprietary software. It isn't free software or open
source.
> Ihave found the Nvidia drivers to be rock solid.
Yeah, right! (ironically) I remember when I depended on them years ago
and the kernel version changed. I was unable to build/install and use
them, because of the incompatible binary-blob-object file. If the the
source was available they could have been patched by me or someone else.
> But if a hardware manufacturer is decent enough to supply GOOD Linux support, I am
> hardly going to turn up my nose at it. In fact it encourages me to buy from
> them!
I will agree on that, but the definition of "good support" have to be
documentation and/or free software drivers. Proprietary drivers are not
helping. When they stop supporting an old model we'll be doomed.
I've been there, thanks, but no thanks. I want free software.
> There is simply too much unnecessary
> complication clogging the arteries of all -IX systems.
Pure text mode, then. :)
Just reciprocating the "+1" that ivaylo sent me a few messages earlier in this thread. :-)
I would add that it is funny to defend productivity and rant against bloatware while, at the same time, trying to install a proprietary driver whose only purpose (versus what Trisquel ships by default) is to enable 3D acceleration!
By the way, we have not pointed out that an experimental support of this rendering acceleration is available via the package libgl1-mesa-dri-experimental which is in Trisquel's repositories. Nevertheless, these features come at the cost of less stability (hence the "experimental" in the name).