How can one say Linux is $-free . . . ?

[Craig Hagerman]

On 10/26/06, YAGNESH N DESAI <ynd at hzw.ltindia.com> wrote:

> I just shifted to Linux and have tried on laptop read a lot about the
> meaning of Free. But just was wondering is it really $-free . . . ?
>
> I have invested 40hrs and still counting on getting and installing Linux and
> trying to make it work. (Though it was fun but its not yet working to my
> full
> satisfaction and I am at it).
>
> While above time does not includes my time participating in such discussions
> and preparing pages on my experience.
>

I don't understand your point about questioning if Linux is free. Did
you pay for Ubuntu? Or are you just talking about the time you spent
to set it up? If it is the latter I think it is a moot point. I
recently did a fresh install of both Windows XP and Ubuntu. The former
took 40+ minutes. Ubuntu didn't take any longer. What did take time
was installing and setting things up afterwards. But setting up apache
would take a similar length of time on any platform.

> Also after all this efforts I am not able to compile
> many of the softwares in ubuntu I tried to compile Mplayer from its official
> site. . .
> Many of the downloads compilations are in .rpm package which means do I need
> an RedHat based Linux too on my laptop?
>
> I know I am putting a cat among the pigeons.
>
> Replies awaited . . .
>

Replies about what exactly? How to set up mplayer? How to install
Ubuntu painlessly? How to get software in general? As another poster
said, check out http://www.ubuntuguide.org. (Probably the Dapper link
is better for you.) That probably has most instructions you need.

I can't believe that in 10 replies no one gave help with mplayer. You
do not need to compile it yourself. Also RPMs are used for Redhat and
Redhat-based distributions. Yes, there are technologies to convert an
.rpm to a .deb but don't worry about that. Most everything that is in
rpm format is also in deb format. To get mplayer you need to add extra
repositories (again, read through the Ubuntu guide!!) and then apt-get
it.

>From the terminal:

sudo apt-get install mplayer

>From Synaptic, search for mplayer and install

That is the  way you get pretty much any software and is generally
painless (and FREE!!).

By the way, searching for "mplayer ubuntu" in google gives a lot of hits!