Mint16-64 install probs

[DavidMcCrossan]

First thanks to Neil for his good work. I did a clean install.

I was not given a choice of desktop so I have Mate, and I hate it. I have tried to delete it using Neil´s cunning script from an earlier post, but I got an error message saying ¨syntax error near unexpected token ´/´ ¨. Looking at it thro´ me rheumy eyes I see that although what is on the key is a ¨dit¨ I get an apostrophe ¨ ´ ¨ printed out. Can I change this somehow temporarily - my kbd is intl with some dead keys.

Install codecs gives a terminal with no chars and no response. So I get no music....

Thunderbird gives me ¨unable to locate mailspool file¨ so I get no inbound mail....

System upgrades give me a long list of files from Ubuntu/Canonical unable to find on 91.189.92.202 80,

VLC is unusable and I cannot either delete/uninstall it so my fav player does not work.

The only games available to me are KDE.

I have already done one re-install, and it takes forever.

There is a glimmer of light, in that there is an upgrade button at the rt bottom of the screen, which leads me to believe that I will never have to go through this again - or am I being a tad naive?

Any help you can give will be most welcome.

Best

David

[nelz]

You can change the desktop from the login screen, it's the button with the almost unreadable graphic between the language and power buttons, at the bottom left of the login window.

Instead of typing n the commands from that post, try copying and pasting, which should get round any keymap issues.

Does the file /usr/local/bin/installcodecs exist on your system? That's what the icon calls. It's only there as a convenience, you can achieve the same result by installing mint-meta-codecs from the package manager.

The system upgrades thing sounds odd, have you tried refreshing the lists?

You can change the default programs for most file types in Control Centre -> Preferred Applications.

[DavidMcCrossan]

Er...Mint15?

Thanks, Neil, I found cinnamon by poking about, and I´m a happy bunny.

I hand-typed the list of missing repos in Synaptic and found VLC. Shortly after, the install codecs ¨just worked¨. No sound on VLC as yet, but I will keep at it.

System Upgrade tells me that there about 400Mbs of downloads available and when I hit the Effect button it tells me there a further 3 files to download. I tell it to get on with it and it all greys out and shortly goes all sulky and shuts down. A few minutes later it tells me again and I tell it again and we get the rinse and repeat effect....

One more thing. In all my 11 years of using linux I have always had a tussle to config my monitor. Perfick first time on Mint!

Onwards and upwards, I will try to see if I can make any changes to Upgrade, taking notes as I go, and I will report back as soon as I have something.
Many thanks
David

[DavidMcCrossan]

Hi Neil!
I think have made progress, but in a disturbing way....
Upgrade Manager shewed me a log file with a report of todays upgrades - which clearly shewed all the proposed upgrades already done - and 3 Synaptic error messages of the type of Lib-GObject CRITICAL -failed followed by Warning invalid pointer, and the last as CRITICAL failed.
Natch it still shewed that 487 upgrades remained and the same 3 extra files as well. I agreed and it did just that......
Now I have the green tick in the box and all appears to be well.
I have visited Control Centre and made Thunderbird my preferred mail client and there is still no incoming mail.
My aged bonce is aching and I feel a G&T coming on.
I like the new Cinnamon and my is set to 1900*1200. Fantastic!
Good night.
David

[DavidMcCrossan]

Further progress, at last!
Following repeated hectoring Upgrade Man gave in as I reported last night, and there was a single upgrade notified this morn, which installed with no fuss. I have again the green tick so I expect all is now well.
I still have no email and the message remains ¨unable to locate the mail spool file¨.
I have noted all my settings and wonder if my best way forward would be to remove and re-install Thunderbird from the command line - or synaptic.
I would welcome advice please.
All that remains after this is to install my printer drivers (Samsung and Epson) and get my scanner working.
Best regards
David

[nelz]

Uninstalling Thunderbird won't touch your settings, package managers have no effect on the contents of your home directory. If you want to start afresh, delete/move your profile directory. It sounds like you have an account set up in Thunderbird to read mail from a local spool.

[DavidMcCrossan]

Thanks again, Neil.
I have moved the profile and still get the same error msg from Thunderbird.
Herewith the profile script - if it makes any sense to you?

Code: Select all

# ~/.profile: executed by the command interpreter for login shells.
# This file is not read by bash(1), if ~/.bash_profile or ~/.bash_login
# exists.
# see /usr/share/doc/bash/examples/startup-files for examples.
# the files are located in the bash-doc package.

# the default umask is set in /etc/profile; for setting the umask
# for ssh logins, install and configure the libpam-umask package.
#umask 022

# if running bash
if [ -n "$BASH_VERSION" ]; then
    # include .bashrc if it exists
    if [ -f "$HOME/.bashrc" ]; then
   . "$HOME/.bashrc"
    fi
fi

# set PATH so it includes user's private bin if it exists
if [ -d "$HOME/bin" ] ; then
    PATH="$HOME/bin:$PATH"
fi

Does this help?

Best David

[nelz]

Not your shell profile, the Thunderbird one in ~/.thunderbird.

[DavidMcCrossan]

Sorry, to be a pain, but is the one you mean?

Code: Select all

[General]
StartWithLastProfile=1

[Profile0]
Name=default
IsRelative=1
Path=mziony6s.default


Should I just move this and try again?
Many thanks
David

[DavidMcCrossan]

Hi Guys!

Thanks to Neil I finally got Thunderbird to work.

The answer was to insert

Code: Select all

/home/david/.thunderbird.profiles.ini

into the Account Settings in the Account setup, over-writing the

Code: Select all

/david/.thunderbird/mzion6s.default setting

.
Now I have a full inbox.

VLC still does not find Classic FM, and shows no codecs, altho´ Get Codecs command reports system codecs are up to date.
Banshee finds it so I have my music.

Upgrade Man shows up to date.

Yesterday at login Mint offered my the option of Repair Mode, which I ignored. Today at startup after the file checks the system offered me a black screen and Ubuntu-like green dots counting down the time to a normal login, except that it told me that the greeter screen was not right and proceeded to give me a normal login.
Should I be worried by this?

Best regards
David

[DavidMcCrossan]

Sadly the drama continues.

First the good news, with exception of VLC all is now working as expected and I am happy - but for a glitch at the beginning.

I should mention that, acting under advice from Neil, I enabled Smart things from my BIOS and the checks report that my HHD has but 1 faulty sector and passes all the tests.

At switch-on I get the black screen with the message Linux Mint 15, with the green dots below, as the countdown continues. It starts a filecheck, and offer me to scrub it by pressing C. heretofore I have allowed the checks to continue, but I am being plagued by messages as under:

Code: Select all

Greeter app crashing, will try to use a different one

So far it has recovered, but today it did not. This time I got a nCurses-like screen offering me login and password, but no GUI.

Code: Select all

startx

gave me a Ubuntu GUI and starts a session of repeated crashes as X is

already in use on another screen and would I to change the screen I am using

Code: Select all


Eventually the screen goes black and there is no response to REISUB and I am forced to use the BIG RED SWITCH...

Again I am presented with the Linux Mint 15 black screen with the green blobs under, but time I cancelled  the checks and was presented with the greeter screen. On an impulse I selected the blank icon next to the USA flag icon and was offered a selection of alternatives, of which the first was



Last session

Code: Select all

 

which I declined and selected Cinnamon, and got a lovely screen.

Would this be the time to consider deleting the Unity, KDE and Mate sessions from my system on the grounds that they may be causing the confusion?

Sorry to keep on.

Best regards

David



[sledgehammer]

I think the greeter crashing is a known Mint problem. If you can get a GUI started then changer your greeter theme to something that is not HTML5 and that should fix it.

[DavidMcCrossan]

Thanx Sledge!

Done that and now we (hopefully) get out of the wood....

Best regards

David

[DavidMcCrossan]

Many thanks to all who helped me.

Best regards

David