Thinking of using Tiny Core; advice please?

[JunkYard]

Then is there a file manager program that I can download and install onto it, as you can see from above trying to open the drives, I can not work with the Terminal command line

You can use the extension browser to search by keywords. Searching for "file manager" finds many. If you install a graphical one (pcmanfm, emelfm, nautilus...) , it'll appear as an icon you can launch like the extension browser. Repeat as desired to install all the programs you want.

Where Tiny Core might not be for you is you need to know what programs you want, and some might need a little setting up. Other distros pick ones for you that come installed by default, hence they're often very big (including many things you might never use).

So you are saying I have to donwload it onto the machine from the terminal right?

[JunkYard]

The OP is looking to install on a Pentium 4 with 512 Meg of RAM.

Hi Rich. All the more reason the OP should learn to love the TCL way of doing things
Opening up a terminal and running tce-load -wi xfe (or pcmanfm or rox-filer or spacefm) is not that hard.

As we say from my earlier post about trying to read the drives. The terminal is rubish and dose not work!

[Rich]

Hi JunkYard
First of all, I deleted your last post. All you did was quote a bunch
of other posts without saying anything else.

There is nothing wrong with the terminal. I works just fine.

Did you plug a network cable into your machine?
You can't download any extensions without a network connection.

There is an icon for a GUI based extension downloader/installer:

It won't work without a network connection either.

A few more items:
1. You will need to manage your expectations. If you expect to
   point and click your way to a fully equipped system, then you
   picked the wrong Linux distro.

2. You are confusing:
      "this is rubbish and nothing works"
   with:
      "I don't know or understand how things work"
   Your current issue is the latter.

3. Stop quoting entire posts. If you need to address an issue from
   a post, just quote the sentence that mentions that issue.

[CNK]

You can use the extension browser to search by keywords. Searching for "file manager" finds many. If you install a graphical one (pcmanfm, emelfm, nautilus...) , it'll appear as an icon you can launch like the extension browser. Repeat as desired to install all the programs you want.

So you are saying I have to donwload it onto the machine from the terminal right?

No, as Rich already said.

You said you read the Tiny Core Linux book. Re-read chapter 3 "Basic Package Management via GUI", it's only a few pages.

[JunkYard]

Hi JunkYard
First of all, I deleted your last post. All you did was quote a bunch
of other posts without saying anything else.

That is because the first quoted poster said that I did not post any information regarding the issue I have had with not being able to open the drives. Then I quoted myself showing the terminal error codes that I had

There is nothing wrong with the terminal. I works just fine.

Did you plug a network cable into your machine?
You can't download any extensions without a network connection.

I dont have a network cable or internet connect for said motherboard/ machine. However I am weight for a delivery in the post of a USB dongle that you insert a sim card into it to get internet from. Do you know if Tiny core O.S would understand this or not. It is to my knowlage that driver hunting is a windonws thing

[Rich]

Hi JunkYard
I've never dealt with that type of USB device, so I don't
know how Tinycore would deal with it.

[CNK]

I think most/all current USB mobile broadband modems just identify as a USB Ethernet adapter and you use a web browser to configure them. So it may need to be configured first on a different PC that already has a web browser installed.

Older USB mobile broadband modems using "AT commands" need pppd or ModemManager configured to get them working on every use. pppd can also be configured with wvdial though I haven't tried that. I did try hard with ModemManager but it just didn't like me so I now use pppd configured manually. The extensions and dependencies for that would have to be downloaded using another PC, and it's not that simple to set up.

Hopefully this is one of the newer type of USB mobile broadband modems.

[Rich]

Hi JunkYard

... Hopefully this is one of the newer type of USB mobile broadband modems.

And hopefully the device you ordered says it's Linux compatible
in its description.

[JunkYard]

Hi JunkYard

... Hopefully this is one of the newer type of USB mobile broadband modems.

And hopefully the device you ordered says it's Linux compatible
in its description.

its one of these
https://www.vodafone.co.uk/mobile-broadband/dongles/vodafone/k5161-dongle
But I bough it from the flee site so its completly unlocked! All it says on the description is win xp and above. no mention of linux

[gadget42]

visited OP provided link (https://www.vodafone.co.uk/mobile-broadband/dongles/vodafone/k5161-dongle)
...clip/snip/quote...

Specifications
Model: K5161z
Form: Standard USB-A Stick
LTE Bands: B1/B3/B7/B8/B20
UMTS Bands: B1/B8
GSM/EDGE Bands: B3/B8
Dimensions: 93.8mm x 28.6mm x 13.5mm
Weight: 28.2g
Upload Speed: LTE 50 Mbps, HSPA+ UL 5.76Mbps, EDGE/GPRS Class 12
Download Speed: LTE CAT4 150 Mbps, HSPA+ Rel. 9 DL 42Mbps, EDGE/GPRS Class 12
SIM Card: 3FF SIM, 3V Sim card and 1.8V SIM card
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chipset: ZX297520V3 Wise Fone
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Compatibility: Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8/8.1/10, MAC 10.6-10.11.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Box content: Device, Quick Start Guide, Product Safety Information leaflet.

ddg-lite search for "Chipset: ZX297520V3 Wise Fone"(no quotation-marks used for search) gave numerous links but a brief glance didn't show anything concrete.

***added "linux" before the earlier search terms (Chipset: ZX297520V3 Wise Fone) and there were less(and some different) results/links but again nothing concrete.

is OP trying to use this dongle with "ASUS PTGD1-LA (OEM) R1.06 PTGD1-LA Motherboard"?

or have we moved on to more recent/current hardware?

[Rich]

Hi gadget42

... is OP trying to use this dongle with "ASUS PTGD1-LA (OEM) R1.06 PTGD1-LA Motherboard"? ...

Yes.

Modifying the search to this:

Code: [Select]

Vodafone K5161z "linux"
returned this:

The Vodafone K5161z (a rebranded ZTE MF833U1) operates in Linux as a
plug-and-play Ethernet device rather than a traditional modem.

and also led to this:
https://nickcharlton.net/posts/vodafone-mobile-broadband-zte-k5161z-lte-dongle-linux

[JunkYard]

the dongle arrived yesterday. but sadly it is faulty and will have to be returned
never buy any thing from ebay again!

[JunkYard]

I got my USB dongle working in the end!
Plugged it into the Tiny Core O.S and the blue light flashes which means there is a signal and working; But that is it! no message on the screen nor nothing!

Dont know how to.....
1. Bring up the area network and internet connections programs to view what is going on
2. Dont know how to read a drive and seeing what my USB dongle is telling the computer/ OS (see unansered eirlier posts)
3. open up a web page browser, or let me guess, like other fundermmental user programs; it was never installed to save on space. so instead we have to rely on the dreded ^#%&$&&%hjjlkhjlkhjkw terminals which make so so much sence for a Marshon from the planet Mars

[JunkYard]

Hi JunkYard
First of all, I deleted your last post. All you did was quote a bunch
of other posts without saying anything else.

There is nothing wrong with the terminal. I works just fine.

Did you plug a network cable into your machine?
You can't download any extensions without a network connection.

There is an icon for a GUI based extension downloader/installer:

It won't work without a network connection either.

So after I click that magic button then what do I do next please?

[Juanito]

First you need to check if you have a network connection.

Open a terminal window and enter the following:

Code: [Select]

ping -c2 google.com
[you should see something like the following]
PING google.com (172.217.20.46): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 172.217.20.46: seq=0 ttl=115 time=17.079 ms
64 bytes from 172.217.20.46: seq=1 ttl=115 time=17.941 ms

--- google.com ping statistics ---
2 packets transmitted, 2 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 17.079/17.510/17.941 ms

If you don't get this, enter the following to see if your dongle is seen as a network device:

Code: [Select]

ifconfig
[you should see something like the following]
eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 2C:CF:67:ED:A2:31 
          inet addr:192.168.1.17  Bcast:192.168.1.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:2491540 errors:0 dropped:1768544 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:96498 errors:0 dropped:1 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:262445147 (250.2 MiB)  TX bytes:18785590 (17.9 MiB)
          Interrupt:106

lo        Link encap:Local Loopback 
          inet addr:127.0.0.1  Mask:255.0.0.0
          UP LOOPBACK RUNNING  MTU:65536  Metric:1
          RX packets:4 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:4 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:200 (200.0 B)  TX bytes:200 (200.0 B)
If you don't get something similar to this unplug your device, plug it in again and enter the following:

Code: [Select]

dmesg | tail -20..and paste the result in this thread.

If on the other hand you do have a working network/internet connection, you can, for example, use the apps gui to download and load these extensions:

emelfm (simple file manager)
firefox-ESR (web browser)