[Roygus]

Hello,

I am new to Linux having successfully installed Fedora Core 4 as a dual boot on my Win XP system. I am having no problems booting Linux and running it but am utterly frustrated with my inability to install Firefox 1.5 tar on my Fedora Core 4 system. I bought a Sam's book on Fedora Core 4 and having read nearly through the book finally it discloses that Fedora Core 4 doesn't support tar only RPM! The Firefox download site only offers 1.5 as a tar and not as an RPM. I don't know what to do. I've extracted it over and over and cannot install.

Now please understand that I barely understand what tar and RPM are never mind the arcana of Linux command line interaction. I am not proud of my ignorance but I AM ignorant of Linux. I have been using DOS then Windows since 1987.

Is there someone in the Linux community who can speak to me without disdain and point me to Linux instruction that doesn't presume that I know all the unspoken assumptions that Linux veterans have? I've been shut down in other attempts to gain knowledge, disparaged really, by individuals who seem to be contemptuous of those not all-things-computer knowledgable. Gosh, has everyone forgotten that once s/he was ignorant, too?

Please understand that I want to learn and I am NOT criticizing every Linux user. I am sure I must have just met a few bad eggs. Surely someone in the community can help a sincere newbie. Please?

Sorry for the long-windedness; just kinda frustrated here...

Thank you.

Roygus

[lynch]

FC4 does support tar; all versions of Linux supports tar, afaik.
tar for fc4
Try here for the FC4 rpm of Firefox:firefox 1.0.7
HTH
lynch

[Roygus]

Lynch,

Thank you for replying to my request. The Fedora Core 4 installation included Firefox 1.0, which runs fine, but I am trying to upgrade to Firefox 1.5, which I am accustomed to using in Windows XP. I will visit the sites you suggested at my earliest opportunity and hope to discover some answers there.

Also, correcting what I wrote in my first post, the book Redhat Fedora 4 Linux All in One by Aron Hsiao reads in the middle of page 590 "Instructions for installing software from source code are beyond the scope of this book." I think I need a new book! So I misspoke about Fedora 4 not supporting tar only that the cited book won't tell me how. I followed the book's instructions to read the man pages for tar and gunzip and still came up empty.

Thank you, again.

Roygus

[Squashman]

I can probably bet that if you search one of the many RPM distribution websites that you can find an RPM for FireFox 1.5.
http://rpmfind.net/

[Roygus]

Thank you, Squashman. I have downloaded an RPM version and will try to install it later when I have more time. I wonder why the Mozilla site doesn't have an RPM version. Maybe because they don't want to single out any particular distribution? I have much to learn. Thanks again!

[lynch]

The Techguy Linux Software from source HOWTO

[ShooterM]

I've am in the same situation, tried the rpm didn't work said I have a newer version. Have no idea how to install tars. Would like to know if you found a solution

[NanoWzrd]

I am also a FC4 newbie.

What I did, after looking around was
(a) read some primer books - Linux for Dumies (me) and Red Hat (commercial Linux) primer
(b) use the man to find out what each command did
(3) read lots of posts here and in the Fedora forums.

The way I updated firefox was using the method outlined in the
FedoraForum.org site:

http://forums.fedoraforum.org/showth...ht=firefox+1.5

by poster jcliburn. The title of the post is
" Philosophical musings on Firefox and FC4 x86_64"

I am using an AMD64 chip but try to follow what he writes.

Where he lost me was with the plugins, I didn't have any in the basic firefox. I think I got the JAVA plugin by downloading the rpm

Best of luck.