Installed to HD. Still freezing. Application problems too. Help?

[topaz-2012]

Hello again all,

I was so excited that I had finally installed Vector properly to HD last night. All seemed to be fine late last night. Though I had trouble installing from the Live CD, I was successful installing from the regular installer for Vector 7.0 / XFCE.

Last night I installed Focuswriter using Gslapt. It was working fine afterwards.

This morning, I noticed that Gslapt checks if things need upgrading, so I allowed it to upgrade whatever it could.

Then I installed a few other writing programs to compare which I liked best. I also installed Blue Griffon and some other browsers. Oh, and I activated a battery manager on the dock.

This afternoon, I found one of the applications wasn't able to launch, so I went back to Gslapt and had it removed. Then I tried Blue Griffon, and while trying to change some preferences, I couldn't click on anything within the Blue Griffon screens, but could click on the rest of the computer screen. Shortly after that, my battery manager keeps announcing to me that my battery is fully charged - over and over. Then I found I could not launch Focus Writer at all.

As I was typing this message requesting help the first time, my system did a freeze and I had to hard reboot via the power key. It freezes and the mouse/cursor won't move at all. It did this while using the Live CD too (and Live CD of PCLinuxOS also).

I did run MemTest prior to installing on the HD. It passed fine.

What could be wrong?

I really like this new little laptop (Thinkpad R51) very much - and like Vector a whole lot. I dread the idea that I might have a lemon.

Can this be fixed?

[nightflier]

so I went back to Gslapt and had it removed

I'm guessing here, but some times, gslapt goes nuts and removes a string of programs listed as dependencies of installed programs. You may have been a victim of this aberrant behavior.   If so, a re-install is probably your easiest choice.

[nightflier]

One more thing.. is the cooling fan running on your machine?

[topaz-2012]

Thanks for helping, Nightflier.

Since this is such a new install, it won't pain me at all to re-install from scratch and be more judicious on my gslapt-ing.  I'll do that right after I finish this post.

Re: the fan. Yes, it does run. It kicks in every once in a while and all sorts of very warm air gets pushed out of the vent on the side. I also keep a small laptop cooling fan running underneath it all the time just in case. It would be ironic if it was a heat issue - because my old Pismo (mac g3 powerbook) that I dearly love despite it being so ancient has a huge heat problem. Now that I have the Thinkpad as a viable replacement for the Pismo, I was planning to disassemble the pismo and put some arctic cooling mx-2 where it belongs under the processor since that appears to be the likely culprit. (I didn't want to work on the Pismo until I was sure the Thinkpad was straightened out, just in case I kill the Pismo during surgery. They have the world's best laptop keyboards ever.)

[topaz-2012]

One more thing before I re-install Vector.  (I tried just re-installing Focuswriter to no avail by the way.)

When I partitioned the drive, I set it up this way:

Partition size 12 gb
type ext3
mount point  /

partition size 15 gb
type ext3
mount point  /home

partition size 2097 MB
format as swap space


I was sort of winging it on that - were those the right options to choose?

[nightflier]

Those are reasonable partition choices. 

If your fan turns on and off, that is a sign of proper operation, so overheating should not be an issue here.

[topaz-2012]

Okay, I've sorted out a few things, but still have some problems.

On the plus side, I've become quite an expert at re-installing Vector. 

Some things I've discovered:

There is a small word processor / text editor named Marave in the repository. Each time I try to get it, the install seems to work ok. However, trying to launch it results in an error message - something about "child" and missing? (Sorry I didn't write it down)

So I no longer try to install that one.

I have tested out downloading FocusWriter prior to running all the system updates - and when I do it that way, Focuswriter installs and runs like a dream. However, once I run all the system updates then Focuswriter refuses to do anything when I click it to open. Nothing at all happens. I have tried to re-install, uninstall then install again, but to no avail. How can I get FocusWriter working again? 

I *think* I remember the updater saying something about not being able to get all the dependencies for all the updates. I *think* it might have named one like gegl. WHen I looked at the list - it says I have the oldest one installed, not the newest. When I try to install the newest, it says this: Can not install Gegl due to dependency failure. gegl: Depends: ffmpeg >= 0.10  Could this be the reason for Focuswriter not launching? Or, do you know of any way I can resolve this problem?

Thanks in advance.

[sledgehammer]

I have focuswriter installed from the VL7 repository, though I haven't had time to mess with it much.  It seems to work fine.  I have similar problems with gegl...gives all sorts of errors when I try to update it. It won't let me update from gegl 1.6 to 1.8 and won't let me reinstall gegl 1.6.  So I just leave it alone.  Doesn't seem to matter. Though I have used VL 7 for months, quite satisfactorily, I have not done an update system.  For the most part, I just update when I see a problem and then only update the problem files. 

[topaz-2012]

So maybe gegl isn't responsible for Focuswriter failing then? I did read that gegl is used for the latest version of Gimp - and I noticed the system tells me I can't update Gimp either.

That brings me back to Focuswriter failing to open. I sure do need to fix this. Any ideas how anyone?

[topaz-2012]

Is there some sort of diagnosis tool, or repair tool, that automatically detects problems and fixes them? Is there something I can use that will help me get focuswriter working?

[nightflier]

I tested focuswriter on an install of VL7 Light, and it looks like focuswriter is expecting "hunspell" version 1.2.x. I used gslapt and downgraded from 1.3.2 to 1.2.14, and then it ran without problems.

[topaz-2012]

I tested focuswriter on an install of VL7 Light, and it looks like focuswriter is expecting "hunspell" version 1.2.x. I used gslapt and downgraded from 1.3.2 to 1.2.14, and then it ran without problems.

Bingo! That did it. *huge sigh of relief*

THANK YOU!