Because there isn't any Ubuntu for powerpc afaik.

Yeah, I see - but I believe that ppc is only supported by Dapper and perhaps Edgy- ppc support appears to have been dropped for Buntu 7.04. I don't know whether anyone is interested in an older release even though it may still be supported in the case of Dapper.

PPC support stopped after Edgy, If I understand the OP correctly, they aren't going to install Ubuntu, just use the Live CD....

http://ftp.wwc.edu/pub/mirrors/ubuntu-releases/6.10/

IGF

I managed to burn Debian to cd and then i typed "expert" but installer cannot set network settings.

Next problem is when it starts to ask partitioning questions. I dont want to install it to hard drive, just run it from cd or usb flash drive. So what i answer to partitioning questions?

Do i really need network connection? What if i download GPSbabel to hard drive and install it from there. Is this possible?

I'm afraid that there isn't any Debian liveCD yet; on top of that, I don't think that GPSbabel is on the first cd anyway - and you can hardly add software to it unless you don't mind a lot of work (You cd would need to be remastered).

This leaves only the option of installing to USb - but that isn't exactly cake walk either, to say the least. Here is an outline:

http://www.saout.de/tikiwiki/tiki-in...=USBFlashMedia


And internet connection is not strictly necessary - but as I mentioned in a previous post, you would almost certainly have to fetch one or more extra cds.

So i should burn this and it work as liveCD (does it work in flash usb drive)?

http://ftp.wwc.edu/pub/mirrors/ubuntu-releases/6.10/

Yes, that one can be used as a liveCD (but make sure you get the Desktop cd - the other two do not offer that kind of functionality).

It should work fine from USB flash. Here's a tutorial:

http://www.pendrivelinux.com/2007/02...r-linux-users/

Thanks all, i have now Ubuntu livecd.

Ubuntu dont see internal hard drive at all and it saw external firewire after i unblugged it but even then "you do not have permissions to write to this folder".

I would like to save Linux preferences and logs to internal hard drive or usb flash drive, so i dont have to set them every time.

Is it possible to install Ubuntu to usb flash drive size of only 512 MB? That pendrivelinux page says it requires 1GB.

Clock time was not same as Macs time even after i changed time zone.

Is it possible to download linux software using Mac, then transfer it to Linux and then install it?

When shutting down, Ubuntu stopped to "please remove the disk, close the tray (if any) and press enter to continue". When i pressed enter, it didnt do a thing.

While it is possible to have a Linux LiveCD or HDD installation what does automatically exactly what you want I doubt it is readily available. Debian installed to your pendrive without GUI + a little scripting would be a way to go. A customized Ubuntu LiveCD is another way to accomplish it. But it all may require more tinkering than you are willing to do.
I'd recommend you stick with that standard Ubuntu LiveCD and learn how to use it. Unfortunately I do not have any experience with Linux for Mac nor Ubuntu. So I cannot give you detailed instructions how exactly to mount your hard drive. This is certainly possible, Linux has support for Mac filesystem. Things like this should be covered in documentation which come with your Ubuntu, there is also documentation on Ubuntu website.

Accessing a mac drive from Ubuntu:
http://jclark.org/weblog/2005/05/24/ubuntumount/


As for installing to USB, that is certainly possible but I seriously doubt whether it will fit on only 512MB. If you install to hard drive, you will find it takes up just over 2 GB - and that is not counting the additional and indispensible free space for temporary files. Even 1GB is too small then but it should be sufficient to run Ubuntu without a graphical user interface.

Downloading Ubuntu packages on mac and transferring them to Ubuntu shouldn't be a problem - but there is a hidden catch. Many packages have "dependencies", i.e. they depend on other software packages. If you download from Ubuntu, the system will be able to check what is already installed and what is not - if a specific packages you request needs other packages that are not installed yet, the system will fetch those at well without any further intervention on your part. But if you download on mac, you get only what you ask for - no dependency checks as only Ubuntu can carry those out. As a consequence, you will often end up with packages that simply fail to install because you need to fetch some other packages first (and collecting all of those - many of which have their own dependencies - can get extremely frustrating).

Have you considered running Ubuntu in a virtual pc? This would emulate another pc on your mac that could then run Ubuntu. You wouldn't then be perfectly able to set preferences etc. in a permanent way + you would be able to use internet on Ubuntu.

Thanks.

This virtual pc thing. Is there any freeware solutions? I would like to use some simple system which minimally messes my hard drive.

Yes, VMware is a big name and their VMwareplayer is free. They didn't have anything for Mac but I hear they finally did release VM for Mac a few months ago. You should visit their site to find out more.

VMware obviously does not mess with your hardware. It is just like any other application running on your Mac - only it is special to the extent that it can run a complete operating system. It does this by emulating a real pc - it also emulates a NIC, which is why you should be able to have internet on Ubuntu even though this may be impossible with your real NIC.

The only downside to it is that Ubuntu (or any other OS) will run somewhat slower under VMware: your host (Mac) needs sufficient resources to keep running so only part of your CPU cycles and your RAM are available to the guest OS. The CPU doesn't usually pose a problem; more often people find they need more RAM. But if you have enough installed to devote 256MB to Ubuntu without crippling your Mac (check the RAM requirements for Mac), then you are all set to go (although you may get by with only 128 for Ubuntu - but in that case you would have give it a light-weight desktop such as XFCE, Fluxbox, ...).

What difficulties are you having with Mac version? I went to http://www.gpsbabel.org/osnotes.html#osx and it seems it should function under Mac OSX. Installing a ton of software just to run one application ... maybe there is a better solution?

I have PPC Mac and gpsbabel dont work with it.

I use now Linux to get data from it and best part is that in Linux i dont even need to instal gpsbabel to get data from device, just drag&drop to desktop.

Maybe there is some unix software which can (force) mount usb-devices. Sony GPS-CS1 shows in desktop as memory stick.

The problem is:
http://macgpscs1.blogspot.com/2007/03/march-update.html

"Although Sony do not advertise it as being Mac compatible, it should mount as a removable disk on a Mac. However unless you have a Core 2 Duo Macbook, then your version of Mac OS X 10.4.9 has a bug that stops the GPS-CS1 from mounting."

"A workaround (other than using a PC to download the files and then transfer them to your Mac) is to boot your Mac in Ubuntu - you can do this from CD. The GPS-CS1 mounts without problems in Ubuntu."