Welcome to LinuxCNC.org

LinuxCNCer's

what is the best DVD to get?

i don't want to buy a box of writeable DVD's and

just have them sit around forever.

i saw ones on Amazon that were Version 8.x ,10.x and 11.x.

i'm considering the Canonical ones.

Have A Nice Day!

The best DVD is not a DVD at all but a CDRW with the live CD image written to it
(or a USB drive with the same)
If you intend to run an actual machine (not just simulation)
you will need the real time kernel included with the LiveCD

Linux CNCer's

i want to get a CD/DVD from Amazon.

which one is like this version of Ubuntu?

i want the 'add-on' of EMC2 to go as smoothly as possible.

Have A Nice Day!

Linuxcnc will not work from any distribution of ubuntu or any other flavour of linux , without some linux knowledge behind you
the cd is freely available from this site as a live cd , see the lefthand panel for the download link .

installing linuxcnc to any previously installed version of linux will not work , it needs the kernel to be patched which is not an easy task for any beginner to linux .

download and install the live cd as discribed , and it will work

I think the instructions for patching the kernel for RTAI are pretty good. The sketchiest thing I ran into was actually invoking emc on a custom build. The exact location where that script is wasn't too clear to me. Chris on IRC (cradek) helped me there though.

I've run the CD image and it is Ubuntu. Not exactly my cup of chai.

I don't know why Ubuntu was chosen as the base distribution that LinuxCNC is built on. Ubuntu seems more a consumer desktop than anything else to me. It also looks like moving forward Ubuntu may become less and less easy to work with. All I know is Ubuntu sure wouldn't have been on my short list of potential candidates, ever.

I would think a better distribution choice for something like LinuxCNC might be a much lighter and less involved offering. I haven't tried this yet but it looks promising:

www.slitaz.org/en/

If I find another hard drive kicking around I just might give it a whirl here.

pfred1 : i'd certianly be interested if it will run on that distribution , i'll have a go , but if you find success let me know

LinuxCNCer's

i don't understand why Linux CNC is 'packaged' with Ubuntu.

where is the Linux CNC 'program'?

seems kind of strange to be forced to change OS's to use a program.

that's a unique situation, for sure.

Have A Nice Day!

it has nothing to do with linuxcnc as a package , and is clearly available as a download , however it uses a modified Kernel with RTAI built in , and thats is a major programming task , if you do not know the finer points of Kernel rebuildinig and real time
linuxcnc is much more than just a normal packaged program , it is inherent to and intertwined with the RTAI interface . which is why it is supported as a live cd amongst others .

You can just get the software here:
sourceforge.net/projects/emc/files/

But like cncbasher says LinuxCNC won't completely work unless it has the RTAI kernel extensions. What LinuxCNC does when it is fully enabled is unique enough to justify the complexity.

It slices, it dices, why it can even make julienne fries! But that's not all folks ...

In order for LinuxCNC to work like how you want you're going to have to get this guy on board the project:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Popeil

But then it'll cost everyone who wants to use it $19.95 I'm afraid. Which might be a bargain considering the time involved setting it up now. Just set it, and forget it! At least we have that base covered already.

LinuxCNCer's

Plan A is to use source code with PC-BSD.

will EMC2 start up without doing work on RTAI extensions?

Have A Nice Day!