Kiara is a recursive acronym

[blackbelt_jones]

I finally released my own live CD distro, and it's actually pretty awesome. That has more to do with Slax, Slackware, and KDE3.5 than with me, but awesome is awesome, right?

If Kiara GNU/Linux ever matters-- and I intend that it does, it will be because of the documentation I plan to write, and because I think it's about time that someone came out with a distro that is expressly dedicated to keeping KDE3 as alive as possible for as long as necessary. When KDE3 users finally have a distro that they can depend on, I think that the KDE team will have a lot less whining to listen to. And that is part of the point.

http://thekiarablog.blogspot.com/

http://linuxtracker.org/index.php?pa...ff79212331402a

[je_fro]

Dude, I am SO giving that a try!

[blackbelt_jones]

Originally Posted by je_fro

Dude, I am SO giving that a try!

Well, thanks so much. It's a little buggy, but, based soley on my own experience, not as buggy as Karmic Koala.

Most of the packages are ported from Slackware 12.2, but the architecture is essentially Slax. That means you can hack it from just about every direction. I spent about three months getting to know slax, and I'm by no means convinced that it has stopped surprising me with its versatility. There may be as many ways of running Slax as there are ways of making love.

There are three reasons for Kiara.

1) To keep KDE3 out there. KDE4, is here to stay, and I think that's good. It's a good direction for mainstream KDE development, and more importantly, it's what's happening, but I think KDE3 has a life as an alternative for small distros. Anybody who wants KDE3 to be available should consider cooking up a live CD.

If there's no further KDE development, Live CDs will allow us to bundle the older Desktop with older software. In other words, I won't have to worry about putting KDE3 onto Slackware 13 14 and 15. If necessary, I can stick with Slackware 12, adding new items like firefox releases on a case by case basis, whatever works. There are definite security advantages to live CDs. You reboot, and everything in the root directory is refreshed.

2)To explore the Flux/Konqueror desktop paradigm. I used to call it "Kickbox". A text-based menu and keybinding system used to deploy a powerful graphic interface. Konqueror can do just about anything, and fluxbox can put anything Konqueror can do into a click or a keystroke. How far can I take that concept?

3) The Blog Kiara may turn out to be as much a blog as a live CD. Updates every Friday.

[JohnT]

Good Work!! A live CD is needed! Being an adherent of Slackware and KDE 3, I pre-supposed I was stuck with KDE 4 when upgrading Slackware to 13. Wrong! I installed Slackware 13 without KDE 4 and then installed KDE 3 from my Slackware 12 .iso. Works like a charm.

[blackbelt_jones]

I should mention that fluxbox is the default desktop. You can get KDE3.5.10 by editing or deleting ~/.xinitrc. There's a button for opening this file with kwrite in the fluxbox menu. By editing that file, you can also get icewm, xfce, fvwm, or twm

You can still get KDE3 with Slax, but you can't get ALL of it. Kiara has all or nearly all of the standard KDE 3.5.10 packages, plus a few extras like yakuake ktorrent and krusader. Here's the complete list of packages:


Packages Included

Slax Base:

006-devel.lzm
005-koffice.lzm
004-kdeapps.lzm
003-desktop.lzm
002-xorg.lzm
001-core.lzm


Ported from Slackware 12.2

amarok-1.4.10-i486-3.lzm
knemo-0.4.8-i486-2.lzm
kdewebdev-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdevelop-3.5.3-i486-3.lzm
kdeutils-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdetoys-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdesdk-3.5.10-i486-3.lzm
kdepim-3.5.10-i486-4.lzm
kdenetwork-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdemultimedia-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdegraphics-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdegames-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdeedu-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdebindings-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdeartwork-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdeadmin-3.5.10-i486-4.lzmEdit/Delete Message
kdeaddons-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
kdeaccessibility-3.5.10-i486-2.lzm
xv-3.10a-i486-5.lzm
xscreensaver-5.07-i486-2.lzm
xmms-1.2.11-i486-2.lzm
xine-ui-0.99.5-i686-1.lzm
xine-lib-1.1.15-i686-1.lzm
xgames-0.3-i486-1.lzm
xfce-4.4.3-i486-1.lzmEdit/Delete Message
xclock-1.0.3-i486-1.lzm
xchat-2.8.6-i486-2.lzm
vim-7.2.018-i486-1.lzm
twm-1.0.4-i486-1.lzm
sudo-1.6.8p12-i486-1.lzm
seamonkey-1.1.13-i486-1.lzm
screen-4.0.3-i486-1.lzm
sane-1.0.19-i486-3.lzm
ruby-1.8.7_p72-i486-2.lzm
perl-5.10.0-i486-1.lzm
mozilla-thunderbird-2.0.0.18-i686-1.lzm
mc-4.6.1_20070623p14-i486-2.lzm
man-pages-3.15-noarch-1.lzm
lynx-2.8.6rel.5-i486-1.lzm
linux-howtos-20080411-noarch-1.lzm
linux-faqs-20060228-noarch-1.lzm
links-2.2-i486-1.lzm
irssi-0.8.12-i486-2.lzm
icewm-1-2-35.lzm
gxine-0.5.903-i486-1.lzm
gnuplot-4.2.3-i486-1.lzm
gimp-help-2-0.8-noarch-1.lzm
gimp-2.4.7-i486-1.lzm
epic4-2.8-i486-1.lzm
emacs-cvs-23.lzm
bsd-games-2.13-i486-8.lzm
attr-2.4.41_1-i486-1.lzm
at-3.1.10-i486-1.lzm

Modules from slax.org

yakuake.lzm
slax2hd-1.3-fx.lzm
opera10.10.4609.flash.10.lzm
libdvdread-4.1.3-i486-1pst.lzm
libdvdcss-1.2.10-i486-1mfb.lzm
icewm-1-2-35.lzm
krusader-1.90.0.lzm
firefox-3.5.3-flash-10-jre-6u16.lzm
elinks-0.11.lzm
codecs-essential-20071007.lzm/download.php?gtml2kmw1uo
mplayer-1.0.lzm

I just burned a new disk with some nice changes. It goes up on Friday. Solving the problems involved in getting started was fairly exhausting, like I was playing chess in my head all day and all night. but now I can blog about Linux and use the CD to learn and help others to learn and have fun. It's an educational tool, first and foremost. And it's a pretty good live CD. For me, there's something special about Slackware because whenever I get involved with Slackware I stop dicking around and I get productive. It's good to have some Debian around so I can have access to all the free software in the world, but everything that I need is almost always available for slackware, or for Slax.

[trilarian]

I have to admit, I've never been a fan of KDE... any version ever. I've been back and forth between gnome, enlightenment, and blackbox/fluxbox over the years. For now, I'm sold on E17. I do use live cds all the time to recover problems both on linux and windows pcs, and since you made flux the default I'll have to grab it. Just since I can say I 'know' the developer - well as much as you can know anyone on a forum.

[blackbelt_jones]

Originally Posted by trilarian

I have to admit, I've never been a fan of KDE... any version ever. I've been back and forth between gnome, enlightenment, and blackbox/fluxbox over the years. For now, I'm sold on E17. I do use live cds all the time to recover problems both on linux and windows pcs, and since you made flux the default I'll have to grab it. Just since I can say I 'know' the developer - well as much as you can know anyone on a forum.

And you STILL want to try it?

You might want to wait till Friday. Just added to the files,

*something I've long thought live CDs needed... mount points! Empty directories, so that when I want to manually mount my hard drive to the CD, I can save a step. The great thing about manually mounting is that, in the path, "/media/dev/sda1" becomes "/files ", or even "/1" easier to type, but also easier to remember and keep track of, and easier to use scripts that refer to the same files on Slackware, where my usb drive is /dev/sda1 and Ubuntu, where the same drive is /dev/sdb1.

*Scripts for mounting /home to the hard drive, so you can run the live CD and still retain configuration and ~ data files for a future session. I call this "live rooting". You can do this with any ext3 or reiserfs partition, even one that is used by another linux system.

*Konqueror Desktop. Instead of just opening Konqueror from the menu, fluxbox now opens Konqueror to ~/Desktop by default... so, what you get when you first open Konqueror is a less fancy version, but fully functional, of the KDE3 desktop, minus the panels. This sort of drives home the point of the Flux/Konqueror paradigm, bringing clickable icons to fluxbox.

[alderon]

Loaded Kiara in VirtualBox 3.0.8...

Booted to default text mode, which worked fine. Startx opened (600x800) to the desktop with "Root Desktop Environment" background (nice graphics). Took about three minutes until the terminal opened and, while I was writing this sentence, it quit. "Run" was the only other app which opened from the menu. I entered 'konqueror' and it opened after a few minutes. Took 30 seconds to change from icon view to list view, then it, too, just quit.

PXE opened to the default desktop (1024x768) with the Clearlook style checked, but the screen was black; menu had black bg and white text. Other styles and backgrounds were normal. Started clicking to open stuff...

xterm opened after a few seconds
Konsole opened after about two minutes.
Konqueror would not start from the menu. I entered 'konqueror' in the terminal and it opened for a minute, then quit:

Warning: Can't open /.kde/share/apps/konqueror/bookmarks.xml
kio (KIOConnection): ERROR: Could not write data
kio (KIOConnection): ERROR: Could not write data
kio (KIOConnection): ERROR: Could not write data
kio (KIOConnection): ERROR: Could not write data
Killed

I much prefer KDE 3.5x to the new version and I support "keeping it out there." I also like Fluxbox, and because Slax is a fun distro, I definitely wanted to give Kiara a try. Please let me know if you want any other info.

Good luck!

[blackbelt_jones]

Originally Posted by alderon

Loaded Kiara in VirtualBox 3.0.8...

Booted to default text mode, which worked fine. Startx opened (600x800) to the desktop with "Root Desktop Environment" background (nice graphics). Took about three minutes until the terminal opened and, while I was writing this sentence, it quit. "Run" was the only other app which opened from the menu. I entered 'konqueror' and it opened after a few minutes. Took 30 seconds to change from icon view to list view, then it, too, just quit.

PXE opened to the default desktop (1024x768) with the Clearlook style checked, but the screen was black; menu had black bg and white text. Other styles and backgrounds were normal. Started clicking to open stuff...

xterm opened after a few seconds
Konsole opened after about two minutes.
Konqueror would not start from the menu. I entered 'konqueror' in the terminal and it opened for a minute, then quit:

Warning: Can't open /.kde/share/apps/konqueror/bookmarks.xml
kio (KIOConnection): ERROR: Could not write data
kio (KIOConnection): ERROR: Could not write data?
kio (KIOConnection): ERROR: Could not write data
kio (KIOConnection): ERROR: Could not write data
Killed

I much prefer KDE 3.5x to the new version and I support "keeping it out there." I also like Fluxbox, and because Slax is a fun distro, I definitely wanted to give Kiara a try. Please let me know if you want any other info.

Good luck!

YIKES! Now what?

What happens with me, and I mentioned it in the the blog, is that the first time I try to open something in X it takes a long long time, and then everything is fine.

Okay, here's my first question: Before you ran startx, did you run xconf? If I don't run it, I don't get any x at all with Slax.

If that's not the problem, what you could do that would be very helpful to me is to go to slax.org, download the default 200 mbs version of slax, and find out if it works for you?

And FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, DOES ANYBODY ELSE HAVE ANY IDEAS?

Hmmm you mentioned that Slax is a fun distro, so that does not bode well. Let me know.

Try booting again, watch the output during the boot for errors.

EDIT:

What's frustrating is that this is the first I've heard back from about 30 downloads. Does it work for anybody?

[alderon]

Okay, here's my first question: Before you ran startx, did you run xconf? If I don't run it, I don't get any x at all with Slax.

Logged in and, before startx, did xconf (musta missed that one). After about 5 minutes with a black screen, I entered Ctrl+c and got no response, so I rebooted with VBox's reset. Logged in again and did xconf again; same result. When I do startx before xconf, I get a normal-looking desktop.

If that's not the problem, what you could do that would be very helpful to me is to go to slax.org, download the default 200 mbs version of slax, and find out if it works for you?

Got the 200MB Slax, version 6.1.2, and used the same VBox settings as with Kiara. It booted to a 1024x768 desktop (no CL, no startx). Everything seems to work... online access, flash videos, apps, KControl, etc.

Try booting again, watch the output during the boot for errors.

Bootup recognized the USB hub, 8 ports, the unpartitioned VBOX HARDDISK, mouse, keyboard, etc... didn't see any errors.

One warning on boot:
EXT4-fs warning (device ram0): ext4_fill_super: extents feature not enabled on this filesystem, use tune2fs

Under "When finished, use "poweroff" or "reboot" command..."

slax login: /sbin/ldconfig: /usr/lib/libaudio.so.2 is not a symbolic link

After login, searched /var/log/... messages had no errors but dmesg had this:

(Line 341) end_request: I/O error, dev fd0, sector 0

The floppy error: I disabled the floppy drive in VBox.

Faillog and maillog had nothing in them. Syslog had the same fd0 error as dmesg.

Rebooted again, did startx then exited to get a Xorg.0.log, but this is where I'm gonna need some help. The log has some warnings/errors but I can't get online. I edited in the correct address for my router in /etc/hosts, but ifconfig shows "Device not found" (pinging google shows 100% loss). Which means I cannot post the xorg log directly from Kiara. Can't copy/paste to host (nice feature in VBox v3) because the kernel needs to be at least 2.6.27 to use the guest addition. Any suggestions?

[blackbelt_jones]

Here's something you can try:

1. Copy your slax cd directly to the hard drive.

2. Copy your kiara Cd directly to the hard drive, or use isomaster to extract the "slax" directory

3. Each directory is made up of two main subdirectories "boot" and "slax"

4.From the "slax" directory, copy the subdirectories "modules" and "rootcopy" from the kiara files to the slax files, overwriting the original slax directories, which are empty.

5. If you want the splash screen copy slax.png from the kiara boot directory to the slax boot directory

6 cd to the "slax" directory for the slax files, and from the console type

./make_iso.sh /tmp/new-slax.iso

That should make you a new cd which will appear under /tmp. This won't contain the modifications I made to the lilo boot menu, in case that was the problem.

I suspect the problem is your kiara CD, because you were having trouble with Konqueror, and Konqueror is exactly the same on Kiara and Slax, but that's little more than a guess. If this doesn't work, I suggest you try downloading a later version. I don't know debugging, I just plug away when I have a problem, and I can't do that when it's your system. If you want to keep plugging away, I'll give you as many ideas as much support as I can.

Thank you for crashing with Kiara.

[alderon]

Thank you for crashing with Kiara.

Well, learning how to edit an iso is a new experience, and I thank you. Didn't burn a CD for VBox; the iso is all that's needed. I mounted the isos in separate temp directories and copied the "modules" and "rootcopy" subdirectories from Kiara to Slax, then made the new iso. Went fine, except I forgot to copy the slax.png file to the new iso's boot directory.

Loaded it with same VBox settings. Got the Slax screen and went with the default KDE. It booted directly to a black background desktop with Fluxbox; no terminal login. The desktop was 1024x768, not 600x800, with the same problems described in my first post. Booted to VESA-Mode, which went directly to a black desktop at 600x800. Booted to text-mode, logged in, entered xconf but had to reboot. Did text-mode again, entered startx and got Kiara's Root Desktop background at 600x800.

Other than the initial Slax screen, the new iso has the same issues. Dunno where to go from here but I'm open to any suggestions you have.

[blackbelt_jones]

Intuitively, this doesn't make any sense. The Slax Base is the Slax base. So my intuition is clearly faulty.

I can't see how anything in rootcopy could be doing this. And I don't see how anything in modules should be doing this. I think something is corrupted somewhere. I'm going to upload the the new release candidate and post a link as soon as it's ready.

[blackbelt_jones]

By the way, I appreciate you helping me with my CD, but if this doesn't work out, you now know most of what you need to make your own slax-based live CD

Here's a little more

In addition to downloading modules from slax.org, you can make modules out of slackware 12.2 packages with the tgz2lzm command, which works like this

tgz2lzm emacs-22.3-i486-2.tgz emacs-22.3-i486-2.lzm

there are also scripts for making modules out of *.deb packages and the newer slackware package format, which I want to say is ...*.tgx? Something like that. Needless to say, adding modules from these formats to slax is a bit more problematic.

More information here.

[alderon]

I reloaded Kiara in VBox with the default settings, which means the booted OS doesn't 'see' the host's hardware. No change. Like you, I'm wondering if anyone else has had any issues with the iso.

Forgot to mention one other thing about the Fluxbox menu. The Root Desktop background is shades of red but the menu is a light grey with white text. The submenu 'Applications' opens to show 'general,' 'system,' and the others, but none of those other sub-categories open to show the apps. Any apps I've been able to run were opened from the terminal. I looked at the menu file and the parts which open are in the normal fluxbox format; the sub-categories under applications are in a different format.

Thanks for the links. Ya got me curious so I think I'll do s'more tinkering. I'll check for the posted link, and give the new RC a try too.