[Techtalk] Help, I'm confused

[Mary Gardiner]

On Thu, Oct 04, 2001 at 05:56:44AM -0500, pmurphre at indiana.edu wrote:

I've never had anything to do with WordPerfect for linux, but here are
some thoughts on the specific things you have mentioned.

> "Note: In order for the GUI interface to work, your display
> environment must be set correctly."

A linux system is capable of having several different displays, possibly
even on different computers (you are probably just using your Linux
machine as a simple desktop, but they are capable of acting as servers,
letting other users run X sessions over a network and so on). The
display environment variable is the thing which tells your prompt which
display to use.

Type

echo $DISPLAY

at the prompt, you will see something like

:0.0

in response.
If the Runme script gets to the point of installation where it pops up
dialog boxes or any separate windows (I'm assuming it is meant to), then
assume your DISPLAY variable is set correctly.

> 
> Then, the ever so helpful document states
> 
> "The Runme script must operate within the /bin/sh environment"
> 
> Am I correct in assuming that these two items are related?  If so,
> what does this indicate that I should do on the command line? 

I don't quite understand it either, it probably menas you should
activate the script by running the command:

/bin/sh Runme

in the directory where the Runme script is located.

> I ask
> because I have probably spent at least 8 hours trying various
> solutions, only to inevitably end up with a situation where the Runme
> script will activate and then be unable to locate any of the files
> necessary to perform the installation.  As I have untarred and
> unzipped the files and placed them in a directory (as instructed by
> the ever-so-helpful (heavy sarcasm) installation guide), I can't
> understand why the Runme script cannot seem to locate them.  

If my suggestions haven't been helpful, as is probably the case, since
the installation guide does sound rather dodgy, can you post more
details of your installation attempt?

Things that might be useful:
* The value of your DISPLAY environment variable (I demonstrated how to
  get it above)
* The location of the unzipped files (you type 'pwd' to get the current
  directory if you need to).
* The location of the Runme script
* A quick summary of each stage of the Runme script, up until the point
  where it dies.
* The exact text of the error messages you are receiving.

It may also help you to seach for those error messages on www.google.com
to see if they have been discussed on any other mailing lists.

-Mary.

-- 
Mary Gardiner
<mary at puzzling.org>