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Technical

This is the Onebase technical FAQ. It is updated frequently and is based on the Community forum discussions.

Installation Configuration Hardware Administration

List the types of Onebase HD-installers

Onebase has two types of installers contrast to each other.

  • Net-installer - Provided with Onebase Linux 2005 editions. Flexibile, updated but slow and requires Internet.
  • HD-Installer - Provided with OnebaseGo editions. Fast, Pre-configured and recommended for newbies

Can you explain on what is Net-Installer?

The Net-Installer is an Internet based installation program. It is console based and user-friendly. The following lists its pros and cons.

Pros

  • It is highly flexible, as you can install the packages you need
  • Updated - It always installs the latest packages available during install
  • Type of Install - You can choose between a source or binary type of installation


Cons
  • Requires Broadband Internet for downloading packages
  • Not recommended for users with no or little Linux experiance
  • The main tradeoff is that it takes lot of time to get a final OS setup.

Which installer should I choose?

Net-Installer is Free but it is recommended by the Onebase Project if you are a

  • Good Internet connection
  • Highly customized and optimized OS but sacrificing time
Whereas the HD-Installer provided by OnebaseGo products are good for
  • Linux Newbies
  • Want to have Onebase running immediatly
  • Everything pre-installed and pre-setup like Windows
  • Besides this all the Onebase features are present.

How to resume interrupted process with Net-Installer?

The installation process can be resumed if it was abrupted when downloading or installing packages.

Boot the CD, type installos command and select "resume" option. Then enter the partition details which you have previously entered for installing Onebase.

After entering your "Onebase evironment", retype the command: to install packages.

Problem with Reiser4 filesystem?

When Onebase is installed with the new "Reiser4" filesystem. It does not boot perfectly.

Inorder to solve this:

  • 1) Boot the Onebase first (despite the errors).
  • 2) Then do a normal restart of Onebase (Either using Ctrl+Alt-Del Keys or from the GUI. Ignore all the errors.
  • 3) Restarting once like this would solve this problem permanantly.
The cause of the problem seems to be due to a bug in the reiser4 version included with the system.

However other than this, everything else appeared to be very stable.

My video settings does not work, what to do?

Onebase Linux provides automatic detection and setup of Video Configuration. However in certain peculiar cases, this may go wrong and booting to your Onebase Desktop causes a "flickering black screen".

After some time, it would exit to the console screen. Immediatly login and type: ol-desk and select "console". Then restart your Onebase to avoid X.

Now you can manually edit your Video Settings using Vi editor. Command: vi /etc/X11/xorg.conf and test the setting using command: startx

If it still causes problem, determine the "error resulting from the command startx" and report your problem to the Community Forums.

About bootloader installation?

Onebase bootloader is of two types - GRUB and LILO. While LILO is the official bootloader, GRUB is advanced.

The bootloader can be installed "Master Boot Record" (MBR) or to the "root" partition.

If you dont have any other operating systems installed in your system or you want Onebase to manage other OS bootloaders then choose to install in MBR. This is recommended and is a must if you have only Windows(TM) in your PC

If there is already an existing bootloader which you can configure to add Onebase as an option then install the Onebase Bootloader in the root partition.

How to add Windows partition to bootloader?

Onebase Installer automatically detects Windows partition and adds it to the Onebase Bootloader. However if this fails then do this.

For GRUB users: (Enter the following in /boot/grub/menu.lst file)

# Windows
title Windows
chainloader (hd0,0)+1

Where (hd0,0) + 1 represents partition hda1. Similary increment the (hd0,0) second number based on your partition. Example (hd0,2) for hda3.

For LILO users: (Enter the following in /etc/lilo.conf)

#Windows
other=/dev/hda1
label=Windows
Where hda1 should be replaced by your Windows Partition.

How to use AutoSetup to automate Net-Installer?

Automation of Onebase installation (Net-Installer) is possible using AutoSetup. when you want to deploy Onebase in many computers with the same software and configuration. The first step is to create a AutoSetup file using Onebase Portal (an existing Onebase OS is required). Then copy this file to a USB or Floppy disk.

Boot the Net-Installer CD and perform the pre-liminary operations by using command "installos" and selecting "Autosetup" option.

Then copy the Autosetup file from the disk to /usr/src and issue command: "autosetupos" to automate installation. (Note: You need to configure and activate Internet before proceeding).

Repeat this with all the computers

List of todos to be performed after OnebaseGo HD-install?

This lists the regular tasks that you need to perform after installing Onebase using OnebaseGo (or its variants) HD-Install

  • Update Software Gallery (ol-apps -update or using Portal)
  • Update OLM (olm -s olm)
  • Perform system update (using Onebase Portal)
  • Perform security updates (using Onebase Portal)

What are the configuration tools available with Onebase?

Onebase Provides a common system management center called Onebase Portal which is browser based

A collection of console based configuration tools for performing basic operations: command list: olm -l

And a number of other third-party GUI and console based configuration tools that are available in the software gallery

Please read User documentation in this website on how to configure Onebase.

How to setup my Internet connection with Onebase?

Read this documentation on how to setup and activate various types of Internet Connections.

How to change bootsplash screen?

The BootSplash screen of your Onebase loading can be changed using Onebase Portal->System Module.

It shows the current list of available themes and you can download, setup and reinstall bootloader automatically to change the splash screen using this program.

Can I reconfigure the Linux Kernel?

Onebase Linux by default comes with the full kernel source. The Kernel provides drivers and various kinds of Hardware support, which you can change to suit your own needs.

Inorder to reconfigure the kernel, use command: ol-ki -config

Then a menu based console window will open giving all the options present for this kernel. After configuration, the entire kernel or the changes will be recompiled and installed.

Now reboot your Onebase OS for the newly reconfigured kernel come into effect.

Since the kernel is recompiled, certain third-party kernel modules already present in your system need to be reinstalled. To know the software that needs to be reinstalled. Use command: ol-ki -modinstall

How to install and manage software in Onebase?

Like RPM in RedHat, DEB in Debian, Onebase has its own package management program called OLM.

OLM or Onebase Linux Manager is a verstaile and robust utility for downloading, installing or uninstalling software packages for Onebase.

The software management can be performed using Onebase Portal or entirely using command line with olm.

Which should I prefer source or binary installation?

OLM supports both source or binary package installs. And they are integrated in a seemless manner. For Source based installs. Net-Installer is the recommended method.

Pros of source installation

  • Can be optimized to your system
  • Normally packages compiled on your system run faster
  • Highly flexible, you can add extra features using xflags
  • Use source masking to prevent unwanted updates
Con of souce installation
  • Takes a lot of time for compilation
  • A low-end system may suffer resouce-loss during compilation
Pros of binary installation
  • Quick installation, takes less time
  • Size of binary packages are usually small compared to source packs
  • Takes very less resouces or memory during installation
Con of binary installation
  • May not run as fast and optimized as compiled packs
  • Not flexible which means you cannot alter the software install
With Onebase you are not forced to follow 1 type of install as you can switch between source and binary installations any time without trouble.

Gnome Menus does not appear?

You may see that the GNOME menu does not appear when the GNOME desktop is installed.

This is because, from version 2.10 Gnome has changed its Menu organization but unfortunatly this has led to clashing with the KDE menu entries, resulting in disarrangement of the menu structure in KDE.

So if you are a GNOME user. Then do the following (otherwise avoid this for now)

1) Enter the following in /etc/profile file

export XDG_CONFIG_DIRS="/etc/gnome/xdg"

Where can I find system requirements?

The system requirements of Onebase Linux (Net-installer) and OnebaseGo slightly differ. You can learn the basic hardware requirements for Onebase from this page.

Can Onebase run on my machine ?

At present, Onebase does not maintain a hardware database. However Onebase is expected to run all hardware supported by the Linux Kernel, Xorg X11 and various third party drivers for various devices.

Besides this, Windows(TM) wireless card drivers are supported using Ndiswrapper.

Onebase is meant for the 32-bit PC architecture and does not support 64-bit processors as of now.

How to find Onebase drivers for my hardware?

Onebase provides automatic hardware detection which means it automatically loads the associated drivers or modules for your hardware during bootup.

In other situations you can search for extra drivers from the Software database that isnt officially supported in the Kernel.

Example for Printers, CamCord, Webcam... or you can recompile the kernel (as mentioned in the "configuration" faq) and install specific drivers meant for your hardware.

How to setup my Printer, give some tips?

Install the following printer drivers based on your printer model.

  • cups - Printer drivers and software
  • gimp-print - Extra printer drivers
  • hpijs - Drivers for HP Printers
Also additional drivers are present in the software gallery. After updating the above software. Use "kprinter" program (requires kdebase installation). to setup and configure your printer. Otherwise use URL: http://localhost:631 for configuring printer.


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This is an opensource project licensed under GPL and Onebase Agreement