Re: [school-discuss] Linux distro multimedia education wishlist

[Aldous Everard <aldous@hypercubesystems.co.uk>]

On Wed, 2003-11-05 at 22:07, Marilyn Hagle wrote:

> Here is my linux application wish list . . . 
> 
> Linux software I currently use in class:
> 
> The Gimp
> OpenOffice.org Suite
> Konqueror
> Mozilla
> Mozilla Composer
> Gtypist
> LyX (I love LyX!)
> Gftp
> Gnome Terminal (ssh to a server)
> Konsole
> Ktouch
> TuxTyping
> Kwrite
> 
> Linux software I plan (hope) to start using next week:
> (computer animation class starting 3 dimensional work)
> 
> Blender3D
> Houdini Apprentice
> Povray Modeler
> Audacity
> MainActor
> Rosegarden
> 
> Other software I would like to learn:
> 
> Dialpak
> Kino
> Cinelerra
> Film Gimp
> Scribus
> Solfege
> ImageMagick
> Brahms
> Additional typing tutor programs
> 
> I am anxious to try other graphics/music programs.  
> 
> 
> Unfortunately none of the Linux distros I have tried have drivers for my
> particular set of usb toys (exception: RedHat saw my usb CD-RW).  If I
> go to USB View, it lists most of them with all kinds of detail, they
> still don't work.  What does that mean?

It means that the core usb software driver on your system is working,
and can notice that a usb device has been plugged in, and read the
identification information that is provided by that device, which is
what is displayed by usbview. However, as you say, they don't work.
That's because each device then needs the right kind of driver. If it's
a storage device, then there's a good chance you have the right driver
on your distro, but if it's a device that the manufacturer is supporting
only for Windows machines, then you may be out of luck, or you may be
forced to download a very up to date kernel which includes support. Why
do you have to get involved with kernels, when a Windows user only has
to get the driver installed? Well, because all the drivers that are
available for Linux come with the kernel sources; they actually make up
the majority of the code that you download in the kernel tarball. There
are exceptions. Some vendors provide binary only drivers for their
devices for Linux that work with a particular kernel version. These have
to be obtained separately to be used.

> I have a Visioneer StrobePro Scanner, a Microtek ScanMaker 4900, an
> Iomega Predator CD-RW, a Midiman 49 USB station (music keyboard
> controller), a Sony dsc-p51 Cybershot camera, a Sony MSAC-US1A Memory
> Stick Reader/Writer, and a Wacom graphire2 drawing tablet. 

Note on the graphics tablet - you want a driver for XFree86. I recently
got a graphics tablet working which actually already had the driver in
the XFree86 that I was using (4.3, I think). All I had to do was put the
right lines in the configuration file. It took at bit of googling and
some trial and error and now I can scribble on my screen! Excellent!

> It sure would be great to do one installation and have all of these
> programs with drivers to make my toys work!!!

Yes, it would! As time goes on things will improve. In the meantime,
your options are to check up if anyone has written a driver that is so
new that it hasn't got into the mainstream Linux kernel, and see if
there is a driver in a more recent kernel than the one you're using. You
can quite easily compile a kernel (there are howtos about and it's
really not a difficult process at all, even though it sounds
intimidating) that will run in place of whatever kernel comes with your
distro, giving you your distro, plus lots of other features.

hth

Aldous