How do I "install" it?

I downloaded what looks to be a directory that doesn't need installed. I clicked on what looks like an executable (SecondLife_1_8_4_7/secondlife` and `SecondLife_1_8_4_7/bin/secondlife-bin`) and nothing happened. Nothing at all. No errors no nothing.

What should I do now? (Please don't tell me to go back to windows. I'm trying. Honest I am.)

You're right on one thing: no need to "install" it anywhere. It's designed to run "in place". So, let's see what's going on:

Open a terminal and cd into the directory. Type ./secondlife to run the program. This approach might work a little better than using your file manager to run the program; at the very least it should give you some output that tells you why SL isn't running correctly!

(You sound fairly new to Linux... if that's the case, my Linux command line tutorials might help: My website)

Actually, not so new to Linux. I've even had the RHCT class but didn't pass the exam. No real drive to use Linux since I program in VB and game at home. So my fledgling Linux skills wax and wane. I figured running SL on Linux would be another nail in the coffin for me using Windows. Incidentally, for no apparent reason, my XP partition just crashed today. That's tonight's motivation.

Anywho, here's what I'm getting.

[root@navi SecondLife_1_8_4_7]# ./secondlife
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z WARNING: LLDir_Linux not fully implemented!
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: QUEUED THREAD STARTING
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: QUEUED THREAD STARTING
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: QUEUED THREAD STARTING
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Checking marker file for lock...
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Marker file isn't locked.
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Checking marker file for lock...
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Marker file created.
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Removing message.log
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Exiting init_marker_file().
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Opening debug file /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/SecondL ife/logs/debug_info.log
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Second Life version 1.8.4
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Local time: 2006-03-09T23:12:01 EST
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: CPU info:
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z processor : 0 vendor_id : AuthenticAMD cpu family : 6 model : 8 model name : AMD Athlon(tm) XP 1700+ stepping : 1 cpu MHz : 1467.420 cache size : 256 KB fdiv_bug : no hlt _bug : no f00f_bug : no coma_bug : no fpu : yes fp u_exception : yes cpuid level : 1 wp : yes flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx fxsr ss e syscall mmxext 3dnowext 3dnow bogomips : 2875.39
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Memory info:
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z MemTotal: 515736 kB MemFree: 1444 kB Buffers : 18512 kB Cached: 267192 kB SwapCached: 0 kB Active: 332996 kB Inactive: 141748 kB HighTotal: 0 kB HighFree: 0 kB LowTotal: 515736 kB LowFree: 1444 kB SwapTotal: 522072 kB SwapFree: 521896 kB Dirty: 144 kB Writeback: 4 kB Mapped: 262256 kB Slab: 32112 kB Committed_AS: 4 51036 kB PageTables: 2732 kB VmallocTotal: 499704 kB VmallocUsed: 2 756 kB VmallocChunk: 496872 kB HugePages_Total: 0 HugePages_Free: 0 H ugepagesize: 4096 kB
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: OS info: Linux 2.6.9-5.0.3.EL #1 Sat Feb 19 18:26:49 CST 2005 i686
2006-03-10T04:12:01Z INFO: Loading feature tables.
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Using configuration file /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/S econdLife/user_settings/settings.ini
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: LLControlGroup::loadFromFile unable to open.
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: LLControlGroup::loadFromFile unable to open.
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Loading art table from viewerart.ini
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Loading base colors from colors_base.ini
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Loading user colors from colors.ini
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Default vfs data file not present, found /bin/SL/Seco ndLife_1_8_4_7/SecondLife/cache/.
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Old salt: 1
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z WARNING: Bad or missing vfx index file /bin/SL/SecondLife_1 _8_4_7/SecondLife/cache/index.db2.x.1
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z WARNING: Removing old vfs data file /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_ 4_7/SecondLife/cache/.
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Renaming /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/SecondLife/cache/ . to /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/SecondLife/cache/data.db2.x.2062521015
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Renaming /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/SecondLife/cache/ index.db2.x.1 to /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/SecondLife/cache/index.db2.x.2062521 015
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Pre-sized VFS data file to 524288000 bytes
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: VFS: Using index file /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/Seco ndLife/cache/index.db2.x.2062521015 and data file /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/Sec ondLife/cache/data.db2.x.2062521015
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: VFS: Using index file /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/app_ settings/static_index.db2 and data file /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/app_settings/ static_data.db2
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Initializing window...
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: createContext: creating window 800x600x32
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: createContext: window creation failure. SDL: Couldn't find matching GLX visual
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Unloading all GL symbols...
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z WARNING: OSMessageBox: Window creation error
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: Unloading all GL symbols...
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z WARNING: LLWindowManager::create() : Error creating window.
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z WARNING: Unable to create window, be sure screen is set at 32-bit color in Control Panels->Display->Settings
2006-03-10T04:12:02Z INFO: remove_marker_file()

Here's the log file...

[root@navi logs]# cat debug_info.log
SL Log: /bin/SL/SecondLife_1_8_4_7/SecondLife/logs/SecondLife.log
Second Life version 1.8.4 build 7
Can't get terse CPU information
RAM: 0
OS: Linux 2.6.9-5.0.3.EL #1 Sat Feb 19 18:26:49 CST 2005 i686

... Yes, I know it's bad to be logged in as root all the time. (it's been a rough night)

I'm running an AMD Atholon running at 1.4 GHz. I'm running 512 MB until I find out if the additional 1 Gig of Ram contributed to the XP partition failing. (I got the RAM last weekend. only thing that changed)

My video card is an ATI All in wonder Radeon 8500 DV 64 MB AGP

I think I've got an MSI mommy board and an el cheap'o SB16 sound card to round it all out.

I'm running Cent OS which is a free RedHat compile. I think it's REL 3.

Thank you for your help.

Hi!

A few points to watch:

a) do not install as root, or run as root. Install as a normal user, run as a normal user. I copy the contents of the download directly under my home directory; I then set a link "SecondLife" to point to this tree. This needs to be updated every time a new SL Client version comes, but is an optional step. If you run as root, and the window manager is started as a normal user, you may not have a valid DISPLAY variable, and you may not have rights to display on the X server anyway. Try typing "xterm" in the window where you start the second life program. If THAT does not work, nor will SL, and its a DISPLAY / permision problem.

b) No valid CPU information is not a bug It is the Current State of the Nation, in the Alpha version. SL Linux still runs fine, with limitations. See the Known Bugs thread.

--- edit ---

b prime) So are almost all your highlighted messages.

Some people have been having trouble with empty directories which leads to similar errors to the ones you are getting. Just uncompress the file with tar xzf at command line. Also, make sure you have the correct (proprietary) ATI drivers, and that the correct colour depth is set in /etc/X11/XF86Config or /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 or /etc/X11/xorg.conf depending on which xserver you are using.

It looks like you may just have extracted one or two files from the archive. You need to extract the complete archive using the instructions in the post above me.

To me it looks like you extracted it as root and are trying to use it as a user.
Either chown it to that user or give that user write permissions there.

But as mentioned earlier, it's best to just run it off your home directory.

Hi, I was wondering if this issue has been resolved yet? I am getting the same error, on my gentoo box,

Thanks,
James

Nah. Not yet. I'll post when I get it working and I'll post how. It might be Tuesday or later. Not sure yet. Exam on Monday and I may have to reinstall my entire PC if some Linux tricks don't work for me tomorrow.

Stay tuned.

Me and my girlfriend are both using the same OS (Ubuntu, Breezy) and I have mine all jacked up seven ways from sunday with all sorts of configuration... well, you get the idea. Any way, I am getting the exact same errors that you are... and it runs flawlessly for her.

The only differnece in our machines is that I am running a PCI geforce 6600 and she is running a AGP geforce 660GT. I have a 64bit proc (but am running 32 bit ubuntu) and she is using a similar amd 32 bit. I am, however, using SCSI drives.... but I dont think that would matter.

ok... so I dug around on here a little more and saw that this is due to the way its extracted. you should just delete the folder and then use tar -xf to extract it, and not as root.

/263/bb/90858/1.html

If you wish, you could try my hacked-together 'alpha installer'. It doesn't do much more than you'd do by hand with a couple of steps manually, but hey, it might still be worth a try

/263/fa/92836/1.html

Another thing to make sure of is to check if your Window manager is set to 32bit... by default its set to 16bit I believe.

On ubuntu 5.10 I believe the config file is somewhere in \etc\Xorg.conf but I can't remember

I found it and changed to 24bit (which is kind of 32bit) and it worked

Hehe, 24bit is not "kind of" 32bit, but rather the contrary, 32bit is "kind of" 24bit:
In fact 32bit is not exact when referred to video resolution, because bits are assigned to RGB colours only:

Red = 8 bits
Green = 8 bits
Blue = 8 bits

for total of 24bits. In fact, Microsoft's 32bits is NOT referred to colour resolution, but more a mix-up of colour resolution and alpha-channeling (trasparency), thus:

RGB=24bits + Alpha=8bits = 32bits

which strictly under colour resolution is incorrect, since 24bits(colour) and 32bits("Microsoft" provide the exact same number of colours, which is 16,777,216 colours per pixel.
Trasparency in linux is handled by the xserver separately (and that gives me a hint that windows functions in the same way, though I don't understand why 32bits is more "cool" than 24bits) and for home use is more than adequate, since human eye can discern up to almost 10M colours.
So no difference between 24bits linux and 32bits windows is visible, because there isn't any.

Take a look at Wikipedia's Truecolor article for more info.