User's guide for Debian Eee PC Live

What is this?

The Debian Eee PC Live image is a small, bootable debian-live-based disk image made for use on a USB stick or SD card that will demo Debian running on your Eee PC without installing anything on it. See our ?live project page to download it and copy it to your chosen flash device. Then boot it and follow this guide.

Because our project makes Debian itself run on your Eee PC, not a customized derivative, this demo only shows you one way Debian might look and feel on your Eee. It reflects the developers' preference for a lightweight desktop environment. It should not be taken to represent what your system will look like. It's up to you to install whatever software you want and set it up to look and feel however you please, just like any other Debian system you might own.

Booting the image

A brief tour

To

Instructions

View this document

Click the web browser icon on the panel at the bottom of the screen to view a local copy of this brief tour.

Enable wifi

Connect to a wireless network by clicking the Wicd network icon in the bottom right corner of your screen. If the wifi card is turned off, press Fn-F2 to toggle it back on again first. Click the arrow by the network name and press Advanced Settings to adjust network settings such as WEP/WPA passphrase or key. Select the Automatically connect to this network checkbox for your network so that wifi will come back up again for the next step.

Suspend/resume

Press Fn-F1 to suspend the system to RAM. Press the power button to resume. Wicd should bring the network up a short while after resuming. (Still working on this: if it doesn't come up, toggle Fn-F2 and/or manually reconnect in Wicd.)

Get chat help

At any time, if you want help via irc, open a terminal (you'll find a terminal icon on the panel at the lower left of your screen) and enter "irssi" to start an irc chat client. You will be auto-connected to the #debian-eeepc support channel on irc.debian.org. Use "/nick YourName" to change your nickname to "YourName".

Use the web

After opening this document in the web browser as indicated above, press Ctrl-T to open a new tab and enter any web address. Click on the ?UsersGuide tab to continue reading the demo.

View an image

Double-click the image on the Desktop to open it with GPicView.

View a video

Double-click the movie on the Desktop to open it with MPlayer.

Adjust volume

Use the Fn keys on your system to (un)mute and adjust volume up and down. Note: we assume channels other than "Master", which the Fn keys control are already turned up and unmuted. Open a terminal and use alsamixer to adjust these (e.g. Front, Speaker, PCM, etc.) if they aren't.

Adjust brightness

Use the Fn keys on your system to adjust brightness.

Browse files

Click the folder icon on your panel at the lower left to browse your filesystems with the PCMan File Manager.

Use the webcam

Click the webcam icon on the panel to demo the webcam. You can use the same icon afterwards to turn it off again after the demo. Press 's' to take a snapshot. Press 'q' to quit. Double-click the "My Documents" icon on the desktop to browse to the shot####.png file.

Take a screenshot

Click the camera icon to take a screenshot. As with the webcam demo, find the Screenshot-#.png file in "My Documents" and open it.

Explore the apps

Locate the start menu in the panel at the lower left. Examine the selection of applications and tools installed for this demo.

Play a game

Start briquolo from the "Game" menu. It is a 3D brickout game.

Install more apps

Install more applications with Synaptic. These are installed in the live system in RAM and will only be there until you reboot. In the Start menu, select System Tools and then Synaptic Package Manager. When it has opened, read the Quick Introduction in the Help menu, Reload the package list and then search for what you want to install. Our users have listed some of their favourites on our ../../Software page.

Attach a monitor

If you have a monitor, attach it and use the Fn key on your system to toggle between LCD and VGA.