<HTML><HTML>Many thanks to Carl for clarifying things re runlevel And thank you Cliff for telling me about the command "clear" ******************** Not asking for help on the following, but a couple of suggestions for K / Ubuntu This evening I loaded Kubuntu (5.04) on just the laptop in its standard state (i.e. no Advanced Port replicator) so with the main hard drive, and a DVD in the laptop's MultiBay. Also an external USB floppy drive plugged in. All seems to go well, I don't see anything worrying in the messages flashing up the screen and I don't get the long delay after "Initialising system services". I see that I have mis-typed the PC's name, so perhaps I will reload Kubuntu and get this right - so I can play about first... Try to open KUser, it won't - nothing appears DVD drive and floppy drive mount OK and can be read from. I set a root password Open KUser and I am invited to run as root Enter my root password, but am told this is incorrect. So enter the first user's password, and this works Delete the first user Add a couple of ordinary users Close KUser Alt + F2 and try for konsole: "KDEInit could not launch 'konsole' ditto for konqueror Use mouse on Kicker then Help. Get bouncing icon, after a time this stops, no Help (Coming from the Windows world... ) Perhaps a re-boot may help... Do this, and the Log on box shows the name of the first user, who was supposedly deleted First user's password doesn't get me anywhere So I try one of the ordinary users, and progress, but am shown a warning that includes "Informational - arlsmessage... ...Error while initialising the sound driver..." (Never had this message, or any sound problem, before) OK I've broken it and I'm to blame, I take responsibility, I knew I was pushing my luck, I planned to reload it, I wanted to see if I could have a "standard" setup with root, and ordinary users I am optimistic that the laptop will work (quite / ) well when I reload it. And when I do I will set a root password but leave the first user alone. But I mention all this in case it will assist the general development of K/Ubuntu, since it is aimed at a wide audience including the less experienced. (And please note that many of us who are new to Linux do read a lot of the stuff, but there is a lot of it to read and to some extent one needs to try things while studying) Perhaps consideration should be given to: 1. If deleting the first user will cause damage let alone kill the system perhaps KUser should warn us first 2. If KUser shows that a user has been deleted then as it is relevant re security, shouldn't that user have been well and truly deleted? (The first user's name was there after the re-start) 3. And, perhaps, a less ambiguous message in KUser than "run as root" though fair enough we are encouraged just to "sudo" (Any unix purists scoffing at the concept of making Linux idiot-proof please remember this was in a KDE application a graphical environment for us inadequates who can't yet use a command line for everything) Thanks again to all those who have done so much work to get to where we are Edward FW</HTML>