Questions on Kubuntu

[Chaar]

Hello all. I hopefully will be switching to Kubuntu here soon, but I have a few questions, and was hoping I may get some answers.

1) What are the differences from Kubuntu and Ubuntu?
2) I am running Vista right now, and I plan to install Kubuntu on another HDD. Will this cause any trouble between the two OSs, or will I be okay?
3) How easy is it to customize KDE? And how easy is it to change desktop icons?
4) Would it be wise to wait for 7.10, or should I just go with Feisty Fawn right now?

I thank you for your questions and time,
Chaar

[mivo]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Kubuntu and Ubuntu are basically the same thing, just that one uses KDE for the desktop environment, and the other Gnome. The selection of applications differes, but the underlying core is the same. You can download the KDE desktop package to basically turn Ubuntu into Kubuntu, and vice versa. (But you get a leaner system if you want KDE and go with Kubuntu).

KDE is as easy or as complex to configure as you want. There are plenty of choices and options, and it is not difficult. Changing an icon on the desktop works like in Windows: right click, "Properties", click on the icon, and you can choose from the selection or import one of your own choice.

Not dual-booting, so can't help with the XP question. I would just get 7.04 now while you are interested.

[mivo]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Oh, and try the Live CD first, if you haven't already, just to make sure your hardware is properly supported out of the box.

[integr8e]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

I agree with the previous posts; you can wait for 7.10 to release, or you can just go ahead and give 7.04 a try and upgrade to 7.10 when it comes out. As for the differences between Kubunut and Ubuntu, Psychocats.net provides the following differentiation:

http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/kdegnome

They are both very similar, I just prefer Kubuntu; it's more friendly to my orientation.

I don't dual boot, but as far as I know and from what I've read, as long as you are installing to another hdd, you shouldn't have any problems dual booting. Windows has the tendency to partition your entire hdd, making it difficult to install another OS on the same drive.

[Snowhog]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

You can install Kubuntu to the HD that Vista is on, but you need to utilize the Vista Disk utilities to shrink the volume first. If you don't, you can't install another OS to the same drive. I have Vista and Kubuntu in a dual boot environment on the single HD (laptop). Works great.

[Qqmike]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Vista *** The definitive dual-booting guide: Linux, Vista and XP step-by-step
http://apcmag.com/dualboot

Excellent guide. Very readable. That'll give you a sense for it -- and maybe the encouragement to jump in. (And heed the advice in the above posts.)

[Chaar]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Thank you all for the great answers! However, a question out of paranoia has come up. I figured I really don't have a need for Windows Vista. I have a computer running XP I have access to if I really need Windows, and the only program I have on the computer I planned to duel boot with that needs Windows is Irfan View. So, I figured I would just get rid of Vista all together.

However, I have installed OSs before, but I have never attempted to delete everything on a partition and then install an OS. What may I have to do? Is it any different? I use a SCSI HDD if that is of any importance.

And finally, I read that Linux requires me to have 2 partitions to work. I already have my main partition (about 140gb), and a 10gb partition. Will I be able to use this partition for Linux? And what should I install on each of these partitions?

Thank you all for your time once again.

[Qqmike]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

If you are going to dedicate that hard drive to Kubuntu, best thing is to wipe the drive clean – delete all partitions and then make new partitions.


For partition editing – GParted, a free download. A favorite (and EASY to use) partition editor in Linux is GParted, and it’s a good idea to have a Live GParted CD on hand.
GParted: http://gparted.sourceforge.net/
GParted how-to: http://www.howtoforge.com/partitioning_with_gparted

The issues are:

Your Linux should have 3 partitions:
/ (the root files of the operating system)
/swap (swap files for memory management—used by the OS)
/home (a place for all your stuff—data, photos, music, etc.)
You do not need to put /home on a separate partition. The advantage of doing so is that if you update the kernel through Adept Manager, the update will not overwrite your personal /home files (where your personal data, settings, and programs are kept).

Others here will give you recommendations for the sizes of these partitions.
- - Usually, /swap is 1 ½ times the size of your PC’s RAM (but many will say that’s a bit too much). So if your RAM is 1 GB, /swap would be set at 1.5 GB. Many will say that 500 MB – 1 GB is plenty.
- - /, root files – a minimum of 3-5 GB, many will recommend 6-10 GB.
- - /home – Gosh, anything from 1 GB on up, depending on your needs. 10-50 GB would be a typical number you’d see for average users.

Then you need formatting. Linux uses FAT 16 and FAT32, and its own ext2, ext3, and reiserfs. You are safe with ext2 and ext3, for sure, and ext3 is much better now for recent versions of Kubuntu (ie, use ext3).

One other topic you may want to be aware of in making partitions:

You can have only four primary partitions on a hard drive (HD).
So, to get around this, or accommodate it, people create 3 primary partitions on the HD, then they create a so-called Extended partition (which qualifies as a primary partition, thus making four).
After you create partition 4, the Extended partition, you may create within it other partitions and these are called Logical partitions (to indicate they are contained within the Extended and not part of the group of the first three primary partitions).

Example: You put K/Ubuntu on a fresh hard drive.
Your Kubuntu will take up 3 primary partitions, root /, /swap, and /home (assuming you wish to put /home on its own, separate partition). After that, if you need another primary partition for something (eg, data or another distro or whatever), you would first create the Extended partition as primary partition #4. Then within the Extended partition, you would create another new partition, partition #5, called a Logical partition. That would be the partition you would use (#5) for whatever it is you need it for. And you can create another Logical partition #6, and so on, within the Extended partition.

Give the others a chance to pipe in here, as this is a popular topic and there's many views on it.

[Chaar]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Dang. Exactly what I needed. Thanks so much.

If you are going to dedicate that hard drive to Kubuntu, best thing is to wipe the drive clean – delete all partitions and then make new partitions.

How might I do this? I really don't know anything when nit comes to partitioning.

[Snowhog]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Partition planning.

[Chaar]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Partition planning.

Thanks. I am a little afraid to partition and dual boot, as I have read a lot of people have trouble with it, and I am really new when it comes to partitioning. I may consider this though. Thank you.

[Qqmike]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

You first download and burn your GParted Live CD. This is easy to do in Linux (it almost “does itself” with a few clicks); in Windows, you'll have to look into it – In XP, I used Nero burning tools once or twice before I started using Linux You just want to burn a standard CD-R from that file you downloaded (and extracted).

Turn on your PC, say in Windows, and at the log-on screen (or anywhere), put the GParted CD in the tray, close out all open windows, re-start the PC, and the PC will start back up into GParted Live CD (if your BIOS is set to boot first from CD, which I'm sure yours is set to do).

Then just follow the directions on the CD, making choices the best you can or accepting Defaults as it asks you questions about language, keyboard, etc. If you do have an issue with your video driver, select the Vesa with 1024 x 768 settings (a safe choice that usually works).

By “wipe” the drive, I mean to simply delete the existing partitions on your hard drive:

At the GParted screen, in the upper right area are your drives in a drop-down list, make sure your drive is selected there.
In the table at the lower half screen is the list of your partitions on that drive (that you just selected).
Highlight each partitions shown there (one at a time, like sda1, sda2, etc.), and delete it (at the top, I think under Partition > Delete, and there may also be a Delete icon). Now, that does not delete it! You'll see that request you made listed at the bottom somewhere. To Apply your requested operation, click the Apply icon at the top of this screen. Do this for each partition of the drive.
It is unforgiving, so if you have two hard drives, make sure you selected the correct one (at the upper right part of the screen).

That's it – your partitions on that drive are deleted and you have a clean, fresh drive to partition from scratch right there, now, in GParted.

If GParted ever gets “stuck” (or seems that way), at the top, selected GParted > Refresh Devices, to get a refresh.

To get started, you will simply highlight the unallocated space (in the table), select Partition > New, the Apply (as you did before), and set it up in the dialogue box, using ext3 format. Note the size is in MB or MiB (that's a technical thing you needn't worry about here, powers of 2 vs ten etc gibberish). So 1 GB = 1000 MB, 10 GB = 10000 MB etc.

Read the How-To stuff at GParted. If you mess up, you can always go back in and do it again.

After doing this the way you want it, the Kubuntu Live CD installer will see your partitions, you will specify /, /home, swap, and off you go – but the installer MAY want to reformat the partitions even thouigh you already did it as ext3. If so, that's OK – let the installer do it, no harm done.

[mivo]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

In the Kubuntu Live CD installer, you will need to select "manual" in the partitioning screen if you used GParted as explained by Qqmike (follow his excellent instructions ). The mount points can be selected in a drop down menu for each partition. It will only format if you check the "format" box next to each partition. If you do not choose "manual", Kubuntu will make one large partition for / plus a 3 GB swap partition (which most people feel is not the best option).

I went with 10 GB for /, some 230 GB for /home (well, the rest of the disk), and around 1 GB for swap. When I had to reinstall Kubuntu, the installer did not touch my /home partition beyond mounting it to home. All data was kept. After installing all the applications that come with Kubuntu, the entire KOffice, OpenOffice, Kontact (plus Basket and Knode), all KDE Games,Wine, Java, and various other programs plus everything that is needed to play commercial DVDs, watch MP4 videos and play audio files, only 35% of my 10 GB / partition are used, and that includes the entire OS as well. I was really skeptical about the seemingly small size, seeing how my Program Files folder in XP was almost 40 GB alone, but 10 GB for / turned out to be plenty of room. /home uses 45% of the 230 GB, it's songs, documents, photos, videos, etc. This really depends on what you use your computer for, though.

Think of / as what "Windows" and "Program Files" are in Windows, and of /home as "everything else" (including your settings).

[Qqmike]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Hey mivo -- that's really good, specific & helpful information you posted there! --Mike

[Qqmike]

Re: Questions on Kubuntu

Note: Chaar, I said that you just want to burn a standard CD-R. Just to clarify, that is correct, but you’ll be burning the CD as “burn CD image” or some such description – NOT a “data” CD, but an “image” CD.
The file you download will be an “.iso” file (for the Live CD version). That’s the file you want to burn as an “image” to a standard CD-R (not a DVD or anything). When you are done, you'll have a bootable CD that your PC can boot from and that will run the GParted program as a Live CD. -- just to clarify what I meant by a standard CD!