Welcome to the new "improved" Zopeless iMacLinux site. Things are a little rough around the edges right now, but we hope to get things back up to speed soon with the assistance of our web-design gurus. Stay tuned!

The new-look format for iMacLinux is being tested out here on our new iBookLinux site. The site is in a usable format, however please keep in mind that this is still beta!!

It seems to me the requirement of having to repartition your hard drive, and not being able to do this without buying 1 or more commercial MacOS tools, is a significant barrier to Mac users trying Linux. Obviously, those of you who hang out here are the more adventurous type. In my brief look last night, it looks like you would have to buy Norton, and possibly Hard disk Toolkit to be able to repartition a live system. Gnu parted does not handle HFS+, and I did not find anything else. If you don't ahve a network or backup media to save to, you're kind of stuck.

What do folks think? Is this a barrier, and what would a good solution be to make adopting Linux as easy as possible?

We are in a bit of a bind here at iMacLinux. I have not had access to an iMac (to make new content) for several months, Stew and other members of the staff have been keeping things going. Unfortunately, Stew may be unable to contribute shortly due to contractual obligations. We have three options that will decide whether or not imaclinux has a future. The reason we spend time on imaclinux is for the you (the users). If you have no interest in keeping imaclinux going, we will simply shut it down. Please read more to see how you can help decide our fate :)

Thanks to several generous donations and a group that generously matched the current donations we received, iMacLinux now has its very own iMac 350MHz for development and content creation. Read on for more details..

If you have been to over the past few months you may have noticed the SSL certificate had expired. While not threating to the security of the site, LinuxPPC Inc. has obtained an updated certificate so you will no longer recieve an error that could pontentially scare you or others away.

Note: This guide is obsolete. Please see instead.

If you have recently installed Debian, and can not figure out why apt-get refuses to get software for you, here are some lines that you may want to add to /etc/apt/sources.list.

This Guide has been obsoleted by a new guide in the iMacLinux Guides and Howto section.

It has been a while since I've put up one of my kernels, so here it is. On ftp.imaclinux.net there are two copies, one gzipped and the other not gzipped of the latest kernel-pmac 2.2.15pre20 kernel. This has working ethernet, sound, video and much more. Its been tested on the iMac 350, DV, DV SE, iBook, iMac Rev.A-D and G4. It should also work on Powerbooks, maybe even the latest one. It has built in PPP support. The source is also available in the same place.

I want to install linux on my imac and I'm wondering what's the currently best linux distribution for that. Any recommendations ??

I noticed that many of the old HOW-TOs from the old site are missing. Some of the ones here (like the kernel compiling instructions) do not provide all the information that was in the previous incarnations.

For example, after getting the latest stable tree, you can lose your mouse. It requires some simple XTerm work to fix. However it is not mentioned in the new HOW-TO. (I don't have a working mouse as a result)

So my question is, where have the HOW-TOs gone and why?

Jason Haas has returned to LinuxPPC, Inc. according to the website, after 2 months of absence after his accident. We all wish him the best of luck.

I know, there was a lot of thhreads about, a lot of postings in a lot of mailing lists; but I've read all them, have tried everything, but still I haven't succedeed to solve my problem. I've got an iMac rev. B with YellowDog CS 1.1 installed and kernel upgraded to version 2.2.15-2.9.0 to get Mol running. I've succeded in it, but I've lost mouse three buttons functionality. I have an Italian usb keyboard and an Apple usb one button mouse; with the previous kernel I have the central and right buttons mapped to "num lock" and "=". Now these buttons don't work; I tried to pass "adb_buttons=122,120" or "adb_buttons=x,y" with a lot of tries for x and y in BootX 1.1.3 but nothing happened. I've worked a lot to have a console and X italian properly working map for my keyboard so I would be very happy if somebody could give me some suggestions to solve this problem with the mouse. Bye. Rick

MacDiscussion.com has an of . According to the article, SuSE/PPC should be as stable and easy to use at the i386 and Alpha AXP versions.

While booting from the YDL CS v1.2 CD and into the installation dialogs I noticed something quite odd...the USB keyboard will not work as long as my USB Gravis joystick is plugged in...keyboard functionality immediately returns when the joystick is unplugged. I have not actually moved forward past this point since it's fairly useless to install Linux on this machine if the joystick will cause conflicts. Any ideas??

Hi, ma name is Michael Sauer. And after years of struggling to really enjoy my PC based laptops I dropped the coin and purcahsed and iBook S.E. It has been heaven on earth since. Have worked with Linux in and out of production environments for the last six years and I love everything about it: making, building, and compiling. Who could ask for more? Now I want to either boot Linux on my iBook or dual boot with Mac OS. The later being the prefered config. Have a 6 gig drive with one partition on it. Where do I start? In the PC world I would use PM to resize, Create A Swap and / partition in Linux. And finally use LILO to switch between the two. Is there a similiar process in the Mac world, are there partition tools on my iBook? Because I can't find them. And lastly, is there A FAQ or mini-quide that describes this process. Thanks in advance! MS

Is it possible to run linux on my bondi blue imac without the mac os?

While within MacOS 9, configuring my new ISP was easy using TCP/IP control panel. Now the challange is to get LinuxPPC 2000 on my iMac to use the cable modem. Anyone got a MINI-HOWTO in setting up LinuxPPC 2000 to use the @HOME service? Please post feedbacks so at least all the feedback could be compiled as a MINI-HOWTO here at iMacLinux.net

GNULinux.com has Jordan Hubbard of FreeBSD, Inc. Of greatest interest to PowerPC users is his perspective on the personal computer: "Finally, the notion of the PC is changing. One could even argue that the PC has widened to encompass the PowerPC, because there are all these iMacs on peoples' desks, and according to the original mandate we should be looking at those iMacs, too, which is what we're doing."

Although we like the activity, we'd really like to see folks post questions like the one below to the iMac/IBook FAQ department. They really belong there, rather than on the front page, and they are the most likely spot that the next person with the same issue is going to look for the answer. So please folks, take an extra moment to click on the FAQ department and post these types of questions there, and leave this area for more general news and announcements. While your at it, try visiting and contributing to the Files department too, if you've successfully built any RPM's for you iMac/iBook, or have come across any programs not part of your distribution that you thing other folks may be interested in.

Thanks,
Stew

is a new site on and

Has anybody had any luck compiling the 2.4.0-test1 kernel for the iMac? Since we're fairly (?) close to having a final 2.4, I figure now's the time to get the test kernels running so we can offer a good official iMac/iBook 2.4 kernel when the official one releases. I keep getting unresolved symbol errors whenever I do the make zImage and I'm guessing I've just got the config wrong (with some messed up dependencies). If someone has a good config file, I'd be willing to post constantly updated bleeding-edge kernels on my own web server. Anyone?

writes to :

" I have gotten good responses on all of the RFCs so far. I have one last RFC that we need to get out of the way before the list will be complete, this will be the list for all so far unclassified hardware that isn't already on the list. Send me your printers, scanners, modems, pcmcia cards, and a bag of chips too. Also, if you have updates for the existing sections, remember to send those to me also."

The supported hardware list (RFC) is . You can mail suggestions to Jeramy at .

now mirrors both Bitkeeper and Linux-PMac kernel trees on their server. It is updated nightly from 3:00-5:30 AM EST, and the trees are currently called: pmac-stable, pmac-devel, bk-stable, and bk-devel. Details can be found on the .

I've been informed that the iMacLinux site has been included in Top 100 Linux websites, in their . The issue won't be online until the end of summer, but there is plenty of other info there for you to look at.

John deserves a big pat on the back for coming up with original concept and keeping us all working towards a coherent site. Big thanks also to Shawn, Aarthur, Maurice and all of the rest of you folks that have contributed to making this site a great resource for running Linux on the iMac/iBook.

Let's keep up the momentum and liven things up here. General PPC news or information? Post it right here. Have a question? Head over to the FAQ dept. Found a great new program that runs on your iMac/iBook? Post if in the Files dept.

Thanks again - everyone

iKernel 0.1 was released today. What is iKernel?? It's a linux kernel tool that downloads the latest rsync source, lets you configure it over the web easily (but not yet, you have to use xconfig), compile it, and install it, all from one easy-to-use KDE/Qt GUI. It's cool! Go to to get it!

Many people have had problems with LinuxPPC and color depth, under the 1999 version, the configuration app had trouble detecting Rage Pro (aka Mach64) hardware and the full compliment of memory. This limited the color depth and resolutions availible to the user.

In LinuxPPC 2000, the config app is fully functional and has no problems detecting hardware. The only problem is, even if it knows it can support a combination, it can still crash the X Server.

Here is the fix for the 1999 version (older iMacs only) and the 2000 one as well (all iMacs).

If you don't want to partition your drive to install PPC Linux, and don't want to pay the full price for RedHat Linux 6.2 for VirtualPC, an alternative is purchasing VirtualPC with PC DOS and installing it your self. XLR8 Your Mac has posted a .

I am toying with the idea of setting up a web site where beginners and gurus alike can find a collection of the best tools, tips and tricks for using Linux on Macs (and clones). No more hunting around for that one handy script, or blockfile...I know that a lot can be found here (as I should ;) and my idea would be to add such a site to this one. Please let me know what you all think of this.

Suggestions are welcome as well, of course.

FileRogue is the next generation of distributed global file sharing. It is similar in concept to programs such as Napster and Gnutella in that there is a central server(s) which maintains a vast global catalog of user files, and enables direct peer-to-peer transfer of these files.

Hi all There's a thread on the linuxppc-user list where a bunch of people are trying to raise some $$ to buy Benjamin Herrenschmidt a G4 Cube so he can work on getting Linux to work on it. Since I'll be getting a Cube (and I think many others will as well) this sounded like a really good idea to me. So: anyone with a few $$ to spare and a wish to support Linux development around?

ZDNet Game spot has an . Terrasoft, along with Loki will port several popular games including Cilivization: A Call to Power, Myth II, RailRoad Tycoon II. Some of these games will be part of the Gone Home bundle.

After quite a bit of discussion in this article, I have written up a proposal on how the changes should be made. These include moving iMacLinux FAQ to Ask Dr. iPenguin, and creating a good new iMacLinux FAQ.

iMacLinux and Nope Developer , has an article in Linux Journal about . Link found on .

has an article distros. Slashdot has also picked up on this article, their running discussion is .

Maccentral has an article on . This article references to previous Linux Jornal articles, that were in the August issue of Linux Jornal. The August issue also had several other articles on PowerPC Linux, however they are not yet online.

Internet Relay Chat offers a variety of ways to talk about PowerPC Linux, get help, or just have fun. I've listed below some channels that you may enjoy, and how to get connected to Internet Relay Chat.

There are several iMac Linux mailing lists you may want to take a look at. They are an excellent source of documentation (if you search them), help, and a way to keep up to date with the latest iMac Linux news.

Just so we don't confuse folks too much. There's slight restructuring taking place to serve you better. What was known as iMac/Ibook FAQ, is now going to be Q&A. Still feel free to post there as you encounter problems working with Linux. A new department is going to be Guides & HowTos. The staff will be maintaining this area, updating and creating new Guides and HowTos as well as taking selected issues from Q&A, expanding on the solution, and "promoting" them to the Guides and HowTos area.

Just to reiterate how we'd like to see things land on the site:

General News and Information: This Area
Questions - Q&A Department
New PPC binaries, RPM's, or commercial products - Files Department
Guides and HowTos - If you feel you have a good grasp of a particular topic, and would like to share your expertice, feel free to contribute.
Thanks for your patience and support... ;^)

Applelinks has VirtualPC with Red Hat Linux. According to the review, VirtualPC makes installing Linux easy, as it comes preinstalled, but due to it's speed, it is not worthwhile using except for playing with. Reviewer Brent Hecht tested VirtualPC on a PowerMacintosh G4/350 with 128 MB of RAM.

Macweek has an on LinuxWorld in San Jose. It points out that few PowerPC Linux companies are represented here, mainly due to the lack of funds to go. SuSE, Debian and Montavista had some PowerPC related displays, however they were not extensive.

At LinuxWorld last week SuSE demostrated SuSE for the PowerPC. Macweek has written an article on there experience at . According to the article, SuSE contains many more apps then other PowerPC Linux distros, it's own setup tools to detect your hardware, and KDE as the default Desktop.

This past week, several new Guides and How-tos were added or updated (including 'Installing SuSE 6.4, 'Setting up KPPP', 'Sleep, Shutdown and Auto Power On/Off', updated 'Junkbuster Howto', and more). Make sure to check that area frequently for new guides and howtos. Did you miss the new software releases of the past week? Check them out. I've put up a PowerMacLinux list up. Send suggestions to .

says that you can make an $18,000 supercomputer out of 8 iMacs running Linux! It even has ! Slashdot story .

Would you buy Apple (again?) ? I know that Linux support on new Apple hardware, and Linux on the desktop is not always up to par with MacOS. For example, firewire support, digital video and things that work out of the box. What we want to know is having the ability to run Linux on Apple hardware and this site telling you how a factor that you take into account when considering the purchase of your existing Apple computer or future ones?

My comments on Linux on the iMac can be found at

I see LinuxPPC as being a precursor to OS X. My iMac (Lime, Series D) was a Father's Day gift and I promptly went out and bought the 1999 version of LinuxPPC, of which I just donated to our local Saturday.

Did iMacLinux.net help? Only in the sense of doing the install "How-Tos" and keeping up with the "How-do-I-make-this-work?" feedback. Indispensable!

There are going to be some major changes around iMacLinux and iBookLinux shortly. These include our very own dedicated SDSL (corporate) bandwidth. SDSL has the same upload/download speeds. We will of course still be running on SourceForge as a backup.

But we need your help, we need to purchase a new server, preferably an Apple product and we are hoping that the users that find this site useful might be able to donate to iMacLinux. Of course those who donate will receive a nice gift..

The PowerPC Open Platform has yet to create a bootable, usable machine, due to a lack of the special "North Bridge" chip required to use this machine, that was never produced. Also, Tom Geller notes that the Gerber chip never made it outside of IBM. Is there a future for the POP platform? It appears to have been scrapped at a stage just before as PreP and CHRP were scrapped. Below is Tom Geller's reply to POP Mailing List.

Emmett Plant, of Slashdot fame, has written an article about . Linux and NetBSD Open Source Software Source Code can be easily shared across platform, so somebody on a PC can write code, and a person on a PowerPC can recompile it and use it.

Today I was informed by my former employer (OneNet Communications) to remove my equipment from their Network Operations Center. It would appear that a recent change of management is going about removing the "loyalty" services provided to former employees and customers. As of 11pm EST on November 21st 2000, the server (wombat) that maintains our DNS, ftp, IRC and mail services was taken down. Please continue reading for further details..

iMacLinux is now being officially hosted in-house. We are running the site off 2MB/sec corporate access from Time Warner in Cincinnati. This means that effective immediately we will no longer host the site at sourceforge.

iMacLinux and associated sites were down this morning for a few hours. This outtage was caused due to a power failure. While our UPS systems maintained our servers during this power outtage our network provider was experience technical problems. These network problems were resolved by 9.30am EST this morning. We apologise for any problems this may have caused. We are currently working on making our network fully redundent.

The staff at iMacLinux.net would like to wish you a Merry Christmas. Have fun with your new stuff <grin>, and enjoy the Holiday.

Thanks again, for making iMacLinux.net part of your holiday season.

As of Monday (Feb 5th), our local network will be multihomed. This means that we will have two internet connections. Our second connection is provided by an ISP based in Louisville, KY and who offer DSL services here in Cincinnati. Iglou offer a feature-rich set of services for the power user.

It seems that getting X up and running in a reasonable manner on the various Apple machines is somewaht of a black art. I think it would be nice to build a database that everyone could use, where you could look up by machine type, kernel, video card, and X server and come up with suggestions or a full XF86Config file. This would be relatively easy to spin off of our existing database here, and would probably help everyone. So what I'd like from YOU, is the answers to the following:

• Apple Machine:
• Video Card (if you know):
• Linux Kernel Version:
• X server used (version, driver if applicable):
• Kernel boot append options passed:
• XF86Config file, or at least the modeline used:
• Are you happy with your current setup?

Now if someone has already done this, please point me to it, but if not, please contribute so we can help all the newcomers as Linux on PPC grows. Either respond in a reply here or me.

Thanks,
Stew

iMacLinux is pleased to announce the upcoming release of iMacLinux Live! It will be launched on Monday April 2nd. Please read on and give us your feedback, especially about the time.

Last week we made an announcement about iMacLinux LIVE. A trial weekly event where we would answer user questions (both live and previous emailed questions), provide useful tips, reveal new howtos and guides, review new hardware and software, interview guests and more. This week we are leaking out some more information. Thanks to the hundreds of requests that were emailed to , we have set the time for the first live event to 9pm EST (6pm PST). Read on for more information..

We would like to apologise for the 2 hour outtage from 5pm until 7pm EST today (Tuesday). Due to high winds a portion of the city where our primary facility is located was without power for a two hour period. Our backup DSL system failed to activate due to a hardware fault with a backup UPS. We have since moved the backup DSL system to a new UPS.

We apologise for making this announcement on April 1st. Please note, that this is a VALID system announcement rather than an April Fools. After careful debate it has been decided to postpone the launch of iMacLinux LIVE for a few weeks. Please read on for further details.

Don't be alarmed, we are postponing the launch of iMacLinux LIVE until we can get a better handle on the development of our other sites, and focus on our linuxpowerpc.org site. We are seriously understaffed, with many of our volunteer staff members pulled away for weeks at a time due to day jobs. We appriciate your patience and look forward to launching what promises to be one of the best Linux resources on the web.

Today at 6pm EST we will be taking down our primary web server for approximately 20 minutes. This maintenance is to check the temperature of the CPU and perform memory testing on the system.

Yesterday evening we took our primary web server down for maintenance for 10 minutes around 11.20pm. This was necessary maintenance to fix a heat related problem with the CPU. While making this change, we also modified some of the memory settings in the bios that we had "lowered" when we originally were debugging the problem. Turns out while we fixed the heat problem, the original memory settings we had were already the optimum, which caused the server to crash sometime in the early AM. System was restored with corrected memory settings at 8am EST. My apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused.

You may or may not have noticed problems with our site over the past week (mainly it being dead saturday, sunday and monday). The problem is with our primary server, its a heat related problem. With new parts on order, you may want to read on to learn more..

This is some REALLY advanced warning of a potential 3 or 4 day outtage of all services on iMacLinux with the exception of IRC. If you read my previous post, you'll know that with the summer weather creeping in that we are having heat related issues (its already 80 F in here and its night time). The outtage will be required for the move, expect the outtage to start on Thursday June 14th or Friday June 15th.

We have started the forth complete redesign of our maclinux sites. As per usual, iMacLinux will be the live test before we port the new site to the other platforms. I thought since the redesign was going well and its at an early enough stage to be pretty flexible, I thought I'd give the folks that really matter, the visitors, a chance to voice their opinion on what should be in the new site. Hopefully without giving too much away :)

This is the first of two reminders that I'm posting up between now and June 14th. At 7pm EST on Thursday June 14th, we will be taking the server down. It will remain off-line until Monday June 18th. Read on for details..

This is a quick reminder to notify everyone that this site and related sites will be down from 7pm EST Thursday June 14th and maybe down until 7am EST Tuesday June 19th. If the site comes up in between, it maybe unreliable. We apologise for any inconvenence this may cause.

We are upgrading out bandwidth tonight after 5pm EST. The new bandwidth is an upgrade of our existing pipe from our primary provider. The bandwidth will increase our upstream capacity more than 300%. We need to renumber all of our systems. Since the ISP has been unable to provide us with the IPs ahead of notice, please expect unreliable service for the next 24 to 48hrs. DNS should still resolve against our backup systems, but it may take up to 48 hours for whois databases to update properly.

We are pleased to announce that Indigo our Open Development Server is now ready for the public. Indigo is a 350MHz iMac with 128MB of ram. Indigo is a proof-of-concept, we plan on adding more development servers if there is demand. If you want access to the development server please read on..

This evening I am bringing online the new production servers, these new servers use Linux QoS features to rate bandwidth for a variety of services. This should prevent any activity on the local network or from individual users from using up all the bandwidth. We will also be bringing our DSL connection out of redundency into full production with rsync and ftp traffic being routed on it. Time permitting, we will bring the new FTP services on-line and reinstate our regular kernel builds (its only been a year or so since the last one) :) I had to learn QoS under Linux in the last hour, so I apologise in advance for any outtages that may occur.

Later this evening between 10pm (Thursday) and 2am EST (Friday), we will be upgrading all our servers with additional memory. There will be a short downtime of approximately 10 minutes while we upgrade the memory in our NFS server. This should not be a problem in the future as we are implementing database replication shortly. We are upgrading our NFS server with an additional 512MB of RAM. We had planned to do this yesterday but the memory did not arrive until late this afternoon.

As you have probably noticed, iMacLinux is now in the beta stage of a new site design. The old site is still available by going to /php/imaclinux.php3. Since this is a beta, we have not brought iBookLinux, PowerMacLinux or PowerBookLinux online with the new design. Please keep in mind that NOT all the functionality of this site works, but it gives about the same level as the old site and we want to get everyones opinions and suggestions before we take the whole thing live.

We are about to give you a good reason to upgrade your Netscape 4.0 browser. There is a bug in Netscape 4.0 that causes the display of the site to appear distorted. This is not a bug in the site design but a software defect in Netscape 4.0. The site actually conforms to HTML 4 Transitional. If you are currently using Netscape 4, we recommend you upgrade to either , or .

If you are using iMacLinux or you may have noticed some new features that we have introduced. Today we made it a lot easier for everyone to browse the entire article database. You can now use the recent articles/previous articles links at the bottom of the main page. These allow you to browse the entire news database. We have also provided the feature to browse by topic in the search box in the sidebar.

This article explains how to set up ReiserFS, a fast, journalling, efficient File System, on YellowDog or LinuxPPC systems. The previous How-To on ReiserFS assumed the user was using Suse linux.

We are pleased to announce that we have brought our high availability server farm into production. This site is now served from multiple servers. The existing server is still in the farm, however, the new servers are running a new version of apache with additional features enabled. If you encounter any problems please post them here as a reply or email . Reloading a few times should bring the page up on another server should you encounter a problem. Read on for details..

The beta period for TuxPPC is drawing to a close, we are putting the final touches on pending content and cleaning up the remaining bugs with the backend code. To handle problems as quickly as possible, we have implemented a bug tracking system. The system is mainly for internal use, however anyone can email bug reports or feature requests into the system. This is the quickest way to have a problem fixed, and allows us to put together a better site. Read on for details..

Yesterday I made a lot of modifications to the PHP engine that powers TuxPPC. Those modifications should correct the display of the site in less than compliant browsers. The changes can be tested at . I will port these changes to all of the other sites later this week. If you encounter a problem with LinuxPPC 64 please email with details of the problem.

We are pleased to announce that the backend code that powers TuxPPC is now complete. All of the features should now be available including searching multiple data sources (articles, guides, q&a), ability to browse the entire database for all data sources, code fixes for displaying in Internet Explorer 5, Netscape 4 etc. The new code has been migrated to all sites, please email if you encounter any problems. Read on for a list of known issues.

As a fitting end, I am pleased to announce that this Christmas we will be adding the original Revision B iMac that caused me to start iMacLinux back in 1999 to the web server pool. Olivier will make an announcement when the iMac is actually live in the pool. Traffic is shared amongst all the servers in the pool, so there is no concern with the iMac being unable to handle the load.

I've updated various pages around the site ( iMac Buyers Guide, Why iMac?) to reflect the new iMac G4 machines (and not just str_replace("iMac G3","iMac G3 and G4", $imaclinux);). If you find anymore pages that need to reflect these new machines, please drop an email to . Thanks.

Welcome to the new TuxPPC server. This is the temporary new home for TuxPPC for the next few weeks. It is only temporary while we upgrade our existing server hardware, rebuild the software installation and install the public beta of the new TuxPPC sites. We hope to have completed the upgrades and ship the server off to our new ISP within the next 6 weeks. If you experience any problems please let us know by emailing staff@tuxppc.org. Most of the site functionality should be uneffected by the transfer.