firefox2501

If you cannot get the WinXP Remote Desktop working, consider using VNC. It has servers and clients for both Windows and Linux and it is GPL software. http://www.realvnc.com/ I think that RH9 has a client for it, but I am not sure if it is installed by default. Simply install VNC on the WinXP system and start the VNC service in the WinXP service manager. The first time you run it, VNC will prompt you for a password to use for the connection. Enter your desired password and it will run from there. You can then go to the VNC Client on your RH9 box, enter the hostname/IP Address of your WinXP system, enter the password you entered above and viola, complete control of your WinXP system from your RH box. Hope this Helps

The reason I have enjoyed using computers for as long as I have is because of curiousity. There is always that "Well how does it work" that floats around. Windows uses "wizards" to set up everything, but if you don't know how it works, you can't troubleshoot it. Sure, you can use frontends to configure things in Linux. But it is just as easy, if not easier, to edit config files to suit. And in doing so, you learn how the program works and how to troubleshoot it when it doesn't work. That is why I love Linux.

I second the notion of VSFTP.

When installing the network module, it is very important that you know which driver supports your NIC. What kind of NIC do you have? If you have a Linksys NIC, then you can use the tulip driver without any parameters. The D-Link NICs are listed. If you have a Realtek based NIC, look at the numbers on the main chip on the NIC. Most of them are either RT8129 or RT8139. Those are listed in the NIC module listing. Same story with the Intel, AMD, and 3Com based NICs. Look at your NIC to figure out which model number/chip number it uses and load the driver that most closely matches it. You very rarely will need to enter any additional parameters. Once the module is loaded, then you can move on to the Start Installation option. Hope this helps.

If you are worried about opening MS Office files on Linux, then you can use OpenOffice. OpenOffice runs on any distro of Linux or on Windows, and it can read or write MS Office files. If you are worried about file sharing with Windows systems, the best method to do this is with Samba. Which is available for any distro of linux. If you are worried about playing Windows Media Files, then your best bet is MPlayer, with the various codec add-ons. Once again, this is available for any distro of linux. The question of which distro is best boils down to personal preference, not the capabilities of linux. I run SuSE because I am used to it. One of my friends runs Red Hat, because she is used to it. Another friend compiled his linux from scratch. Hope this helps.

Using Suse with KDE, there is a shortcut to a "Superuser" Konqueror in the system menu of the Standard KDE Menu. To change from the default Suse Menu to the Standard KDE Menu, open the Control Center, go to Appearance, then Menu. Change the radio button from Suse Menu to Standard KDE Menu. If you do not want to go through all of that, you can make a shortcut on your desktop to Konqueror. When you create the shortcut, go to the Execute Tab on the Properties Windows. At the bottom of the Execute Tab, there is an option to run the program as another user. Specify "root" here and click "OK" on the properties window. Whenever you open that shortcut, it will prompt you for the root password. You will then be able to use Konqueror with root permissions. Hope this helps.