[ale] ubuntu install has no $PATH?

[Jim Kinney]

So call with my friend last night and his solution was to blow away the
install and install fedora 14 and all the updates. A few google checks on
how to install rpmfusion multi-media-everything and adobe flash with the yum
repo from both and he's all good to go.

The hardware is a 6 year old laptop with a dead battery and a totally flaky
keyboard and touchpad. Were this for him he would have thrown out the laptop
but it's for an elderly neighbor who wants to just use gmail to keep up with
the grandkids.

I suspect the bad keyboard was an issue but have no way of testing as he's
out of town relative to me.

Now if I can get him to STOP USING PHOTOSHOP (photographer) and use the gimp
(book: "the gimp for photographers" is at microcenter!) he'll cut all ties
and be fully in Linux land.

On Sun, Jul 24, 2011 at 10:50 PM, Jim Kinney <jim.kinney at gmail.com> wrote:

> A friend who is a very green Linux user installed Ubuntu (latest whatever
> version) and went to install adobe flash. It required some command line-fu
> (which he didn't have) so he called me.
>
> -> I'm not an ubuntu person <-
>
> So I was trying to find out what file type he was trying to install so I
> asked hi to open a terminal (he was in the normal X session) and run ls and
> tell me the name of the file he downloaded.
>
> It errored with "no command or file by than name". So I had him do a "pwd".
> Same error. Ditto on "echo $PATH"
>
> W   T   F    !!!!!
>
> the command he _needed_ to run was sudo apt-get flash.....   but he
> couldn't recall if it was saved in the Downloads directory or the home
> directory. So he tried to cd and it failed.
>
> Unfortunately, we were talking over the cell phones while I was in a busy
> and loud store so literally spelling out each letter of a working PATH
> "alpha bravo charlie" style was not going to happen.
>
> Now I have been pretty harsh on messed up distro stupids in the past but I
> can't fathom how an install could complete and leave no working path
> variables set.
>
> Any ideas how during an install (that appeared to conclude correctly)
> Ubuntu could have left off PATH? More importantly, ideas on how to NOT
> recreate this?
>
> --
> --
> James P. Kinney III
>
> As long as the general population is passive, apathetic, diverted to
> consumerism or hatred of the vulnerable, then the powerful can do as they
> please, and those who survive will be left to contemplate the outcome.
> - *2011 Noam Chomsky
>
> http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/
> *
>



-- 
-- 
James P. Kinney III

As long as the general population is passive, apathetic, diverted to
consumerism or hatred of the vulnerable, then the powerful can do as they
please, and those who survive will be left to contemplate the outcome.
- *2011 Noam Chomsky

http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/
*
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