As this section's name implies, this is where you can find most of the applications available with Red Hat Linux. We've split the applications into several different categories to make finding things a bit easier.
(If you noticed that we said ``most of the applications'' above, you can find more apps by looking at X11's application section towards the end of the appendix.)
This section contains packages that help you communicate -- either via fax, on-line chat, or simple terminal emulation.
This is a program to send and receive faxes over class 1 or class 2 fax modems. It has a nice interface to help facilitate faxing.
This is a popular Internet Relay Chat (IRC) client. It is a program used to connect to IRC servers around the globe so that the user can ``chat'' with others.
This package contains the help files and other documentation for the ircii client package.
This collection of commands can be used to download and upload files using the Z, X, and Y protocols. Many terminal programs (like minicom) make use of these programs to transfer files.
Minicom is a communications program that resembles the MSDOS Telix somewhat. It has a dialing directory, color, full ANSI and VT100 emulation, an (external) scripting language and more.
This section contains packages that provide basic database support for Red Hat Linux.
PostgreSQL Data Base Management System (formerly known as Postgres, then as Postgres95).
PostgreSQL is an enhancement of the POSTGRES database management system, a next-generation DBMS research prototype. While PostgreSQL retains the powerful data model and rich data types of POSTGRES, it replaces the PostQuel query language with an extended subset of SQL. PostgreSQL is free and the complete source is available.
PostgreSQL development is being performed by a team of Internet developers who
all subscribe to the PostgreSQL development mailing list. The current
coordinator is Marc G. Fournier
(scrappy@postgreSQL.org). This team is now
responsible for all current and future development of PostgreSQL.
The authors of PostgreSQL 1.01 were Andrew Yu and Jolly Chen. Many others have contributed to the porting, testing, debugging and enhancement of the code. The original Postgres code, from which PostgreSQL is derived, was the effort of many graduate students, undergraduate students, and staff programmers working under the direction of Professor Michael Stonebraker at the University of California, Berkeley.
The original name of the software at Berkeley was Postgres. When SQL functionality was added in 1995, its name was changed to Postgres95. The name was changed at the end of 1996 to PostgreSQL.
PostgreSQL runs on Solaris, SunOS, HPUX, AIX, Linux, Irix, FreeBSD, and most flavours of Unix.
This package includes only the clients and client libraries needed to access an PostgreSQL server. The server is included in the main package. If all you need is to connect to another PostgreSQL server, the this is the only package you need to install.
In this package there are client libraries available for C, C++ and PERL, as well as several command-line utilities you can use to manage your databases on a remote PostgreSQL server.
This packages includes an initial database structure directory for PostgreSQL. For a quick startup on PostegreSQL, it is recommended to install this package with your PostgreSQL backend server (altough it is not required).
If you choose to not install this package you will have to create the initial database yourself using 'initdb' command and possibly modify the postgresql startup script if you choose a directory other than /var/lib/pgsql for storing your databases.
In this section, we have an assortment of packages that provide basic (and in some cases not so basic) file editing capabilities.
This is the GNU line editor. It is an implementation of one of the first editors under *nix. Some programs rely on it, but in general you probably don't *need* it.
Emacs is the extensible, customizable, self-documenting real-time display editor. Emacs has special code editing modes, a scripting language (elisp), and comes with many packages for doing mail, news, and more, all in your editor.
This package includes the libraries necessary to run the emacs editor - the actual program can be found in either the emacs-nox or emacs-X11 packages, depending on whether you use X Windows or not.
This package contains an emacs binary built with support for X Windows. It will still work fine outside of X Windows (on the console, for instance) but supports the mouse and GUI elements when used inside of X Windows.
This package contains the emacs-lisp sources for many of the elisp programs included with the main emacs package. You do not need this package unless you want to modify these packages, or see some elisp examples.
This package contains an emacs binary built without support for X Windows. While the emacs binary in the main emacs package will work fine outside of X Windows (on the console, for instance), the one in this package has a smaller memory image.
Jed is a fast compact editor based on the slang screen library. It has special editing modes for C, C++, and other languages. It can emulate Emacs, Wordstar, and other editors, and can be customized with slang macros, colors, keybindings, etc.
Xjed is the same editor as jed, it just runs in its own X Window.
Joe is a friendly and easy to use editor. It has a nice interface and would be a good choice for a novice needing a text editor. It uses the same WordStar keybindings which are also used by Borland's development enbironment.
The VIsual editor iMproved is an updated and feature-added clone of the 'vi' editor that comes with almost all UN*X systems. It adds multiple windows, multi-level undo, block highliting, and many other features to the standard vi program.
This package is a version of VIM with the X-Windows libraries linked in, allowing you to run VIM as an X-Windows application with a full GUI interface and mouse support. You just run 'gvim'.
The VIsual editor iMproved is an updated and feature-added clone of the 'vi' editor that comes with almost all UN*X systems. It adds multiple windows, multi-level undo, block highliting, and many other features to the standard vi program.
The VIsual editor iMproved is an updated and feature-added clone of the 'vi' editor that comes with almost all UN*X systems. It adds multiple windows, multi-level undo, block highliting, and many other features to the standard vi program.
The vim-common package contains files (such as help) that are needed by any vim binary in order to run.
The VIsual editor iMproved is an updated and feature-added clone of the 'vi' editor that comes with almost all UN*X systems. It adds multiple windows, multi-level undo, block highliting, and many other features to the standard vi program.
This package contains a version of vim which has many of the extra features that have recently been introduced to vim such as perl and python interpreters.
The VIsual editor iMproved is an updated and feature-added clone of the 'vi' editor that comes with almost all UN*X systems. It adds multiple windows, multi-level undo, block highliting, and many other features to the standard vi program.
The vim-minimal package installs a version of vim into /bin/vi that is suitable for running when only the root partition is present.
In this section are packages that let your Red Hat Linux system run programs meant for other operating systems.
This package enables you to run a number of DOS programs under Linux. This package includes an image with DOS-C kernel (MS DOS 3.31 compatible) and FreeDos utilities. You should be able to start up the DOS emulator by logging in as root and typing 'dos' at the prompt.
This package includes a hdimage file that will be installed in /var/lib/dosemu directory if you need some version of DOS to start using dosemu.
Generally dosemu requires you to have some version of DOS available to bootstrap your hdimage files before first use, or to have partitions formatted and installed with DOS. If you have neither you can use this image that is already bootable with FreeDOS.
You will need to edit your /etc/dosemu.conf file to add this image to the list of "drives" used by dosemu.
This is a version of the DOS emulator that is designed to run in an X windows session. It provides VGA graphics support as well as mouse support.
This section contains packages for those of you that are into engineering.
SPICE is a general-purpose circuit simulation program for nonlinear dc, nonlinear transient, and linear ac analyses. Circuits may contain resistors, capacitors, inductors, mutual inductors, independent voltage and current sources, four types of dependent sources, transmission lines, and the four most common semiconductor devices: diodes, BJT's, JFET's, and MOSFET's.
The units program converts quantities expression in various scales to their equivalents in other scales. The units program can only handle multiplicative scale changes.
This section contains packages that help you work with graphics-related material.
Ghostscript is a PostScript interpretor. It can render both PostScript and PDF compliant files to devices which include an X window, many printer formats (including support for color printers), and popular graphics file formats.
These fonts can be used by the GhostScript interpreter during text rendering.
This program can convert and manipulate GIF images from the command line. It is most useful for making a color transparent for web sites.
This package includes various utility programs for manipulating JPEG files for use by libgr programs.
This package contains various programs for manipulating gif image files.
This program gives you all the features you need to create basic- to intermediate-level vector graphics, including bezier curves, lines, rulers, and more.
Zgv is a picture viewer capable of displaying GIF files as defined by CompuServe, with the exceptions listed in the RESTRICTIONS section. It is also capable of displaying JPEG/JFIF files using the Independant JPEG Group's JPEG software, PBM/PGM/PPM files as used by pbmplus and netpbm, Microsoft Windows and OS/2 BMP files, Targa (TGA) files, and the new PNG format.
This section contains several of the more popular e-mail-related programs.
ELM is one of the most popular terminal mode mail handling programs. It is powerful, easy to use, and easy to find help on. It has all the mail handling features you would expect, including MIME support (via metamail).
exmh is a graphical interface to the MH mail system. It includes MIME support, faces, glimpse indexing, color highlighting, PGP interface, and more. Requires sox (or play) for sound support.
Fetchmail is a program that is used to retrieve mail from a remote mail server. It can use the Post Office Protocol (POP) or IMAP (Internet Mail Access Protocol) for this, and delivers the mail through the local SMTP server (normally sendmail).
The /bin/mail program can be used to send quick mail messages, and is often used in shell scripts.
Metamail is an implementation of MIME, the Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions, a proposed standard for multimedia mail on the Internet. Metamail implements MIME, and also implements extensibility and configuration via the "mailcap" mechanism described in an informational RFC that is a companion to the MIME document.
Mutt is a small but very poweful full-screen Unix mail client. Features include MIME support, color, POP3 support, message threading, bindable keys, and threaded sorting mode.
nmh mail handling system (with POP support). nmh is a popular mail handling system but includes only a command line interface. It is an important base, however, for programs like xmh and exmh.
Pine is a very full featured text based mail and news client. It is aimed at both novice and expert users. It includes an easy to use editor, pico, for composing messages. Pico has gained popularity as a stand alone text editor in it's own right. It features MIME support, address books, and support for IMAP, mail, and MH style folders.
This section contains packages of interest to the mathematician in all of us.
bc is a text mode calculator of sorts. It has many extended features such as base translation. It can also accept input from stdin and return output. dc is the RPN version.
This is the GNU plotting package. It can be used to graph data in an X window or to a file.
This section contains network-related packages.
Arpwatch and arpsnmp are tools that monitors ethernet or fddi activity and maintain a database of ethernet/ip address pairings.
Libpcap is a system-independent interface for user-level packet capture. Libpcap provides a portable framework for low-level network monitoring. Applications include network statistics collection, security monitoring, network debugging, etc. Libpcap has system-independent API that is used by several applications, including tcpdump and arpwatch.
This a terminal based WWW browser. While it does not make any attempt at displaying graphics, it has good support for HTML text formatting, forms, and tables.
Ncftp is a ftp client with many advantageous over the standard one. It includes command line editing, command histories, support for recurisive gets, automatic logins, and much more.
rsync is a faster flexible replacement for rcp allowing rapid and network efficient synchronization of files or directories on different machines by transferring just the differences between those directories in a compressed form. It doesn't need either machine to have a copy of what is on the other.
A technical report describing the rsync algorithm is included in this package.
Tcpdump prints out the headers of packets on a network interface. It is very useful for debugging network problems and security operations.
GNU Wget is a freely available network utility to retrieve files from the World Wide Web using HTTP and FTP, the two most widely used Internet protocols. It works non-interactively, thus enabling work in the background, after having logged off.
The recursive retrieval of HTML pages, as well as FTP sites is supported -- you can use Wget to make mirrors of archives and home pages, or traverse the web like a WWW robot (Wget understands /robots.txt).
Wget works exceedingly well on slow or unstable connections, keeping getting the document until it is fully retrieved. Re-getting files from where it left off works on servers (both HTTP and FTP) that support it. Matching of wildcards and recursive mirroring of directories are available when retrieving via FTP. Both HTTP and FTP retrievals can be time-stamped, thus Wget can see if the remote file has changed since last retrieval and automatically retrieve the new version if it has.
By default, Wget supports proxy servers, which can lighten the network load, speed up retrieval and provide access behind firewalls. However, if you are behind a firewall that requires that you use a socks style gateway, you can get the socks library and compile wget with support for socks.
Most of the features are configurable, either through command-line options, or via initialization file .wgetrc. Wget allows you to install a global startup file (/etc/wgetrc on RedHat) for site settings.
This section contains packages that you can use to read on-line newsgroups.
Slrn is an easy to use but powerful full-screen NNTP based newsreader. It relies extensively on the S-Lang programmer's library for many of its features. Slrn works particularly well over slow network connections.
Tin is a full-screen easy to use Netnews reader. It can read news locally (i.e. /usr/spool/news) or remotely (rtin or tin -r option) via a NNTP (Network News Transport Protocol) server.
`trn' is one of the original threaded news readers. this version is configured to read news from an NNTP news server.
This section contains packages aimed at helping you keep track of time, and staying productive.
ical is a popular X-based calendar/scheduler application which can help you keep track of single events and recurring events (daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly), and sets off alarms to warn you of appointments.
This section contains packages that turn your Red Hat Linux system into a high-quality typesetting workstation. (In fact, the printed version of this document is produced using many of these tools!)
The groff text formatting system can be used to create professional looking documents on both paper and a computer screen. All the man pages are processed with groff, so you'll need this package to read man pages.
The package contains the gxditview program, which can be used to format and view groff documents in X Windows. For example, man pages can be read using gxditview.
The Lout system reads a high-level description of a document similar in style to LaTeX and produces a PostScript file which can be printed on many laser printers and graphic display devices. Plain text output is also available.
Lout offers an unprecedented range of advanced features, including optimal paragraph and page breaking, automatic hyphenation, PostScript EPS file inclusion and generation, equation formatting, tables, diagrams, rotation and scaling, sorted indexes, bibliographic databases, running headers and odd-even pages, automatic cross referencing, multilingual documents including hyphenation (most European languages are supported, including Russian), formatting of C/C++ programs, and much more, all ready to use. Furthermore, Lout is easily extended with definitions which are very much easier to write than troff of TeX macros because Lout is a high-level language, the outcome of an eight-year research project that went back to the beginning.
This package includes the complete Lout documentation, including the "user" and "expert" manuals, written in Lout and with PostScript output. Good examples of writing large docs with Lout.
SGML-Tools is a SGML-based text formatter which allows you to produce a variety of output formats. You can create PostScript and dvi (with LaTeX), plain text (with groff), HTML, and texinfo files from a single SGML source file.
TeX formats a file of interspersed text and commands and outputs a typesetter independent file (called DVI, which is short for DeVice Independent). TeX capabilities and language are described in The TeXbook, by Knuth.
PostScript fonts are (or should be) accompanied by font metric files such as Times-Roman.afm, which describes the characteristics of the font called Times-Roman. To use such fonts with TeX, we need TFM files that contain similar information. afm2tfm does that conversion.
This package contains the documentation files from the teTeX system. Because of their big size, the documentation is now separated in its own subpackage.
Dvilj and siblings convert TeX-output .dvi files into HP PCL (i.e. HP Printer Control Language) commands suitable for printing on a HP LaserJet+, HP LaserJet IIP (using dvilj2p), HP LaserJet 4 (using dvilj4), and fully compatible printers.
The program dvips takes a DVI file file[.dvi] produced by TeX (or by some other processor such as GFtoDVI) and converts it to PostScript, normally sending the result directly to the laserprinter.
LaTeX is a TeX macro package. The LaTeX macros encourage writers to think about the content of their documents, rather than the form. The ideal, very difficult to realize, is to have no formatting commands (like ``switch to italic'' or ``skip 2 picas'') in the document at all; instead, everything is done by specific markup instructions: ``emphasize'', ``start a section''.
xdvi is a program which runs under the X window system. It is used to preview dvi files, such as are produced by tex and latex.
The GNU project uses the texinfo file format for much of its documentation. This package includes the tools necessary to create .info files from .texinfo source files, as well as an emacs interface to all these tools.
This section contains packages that let you use your Red Hat Linux system's sound capabilities.
This program provides a tty based, interactive method of controlling a sound cards mixer. It lets you adjust the input levels from the CD, microphone, and on board synthesizers as well as the output volume.
This program allows you to play audio CD's on your computers CDROM drive. It provides a version with a full screen interface as well as a command line version.
This program plays MPEG 2 format audio files through your PC's sound card. MPEG audio files are popular for sending high fidelity music over the Internet, and http://www.iuma.com contains a large archive of MPEG 2 sound files.
One of the best and most well known MOD players around (for unix). Play MOD (and their brethren) songs.
MikMod is a portable modules player originally written by Jean-Paul Mikkers (MikMak) for DOS. It has subsequently been hacked by many hands and now runs on many platforms, this particular distribution intended to compile fairly painlessly in a Unix (Linux) environment. It uses the OSS /dev/dsp driver including in all recent kernels for output, and will also write wav files. Supported file formats include mod, stm, s3m, mtm, xm, and it. The player uses ncurses for console output and supports transparent loading from gzip/pkzip/zoo archives and the loading/saving of playlists.
Plays MIDI sound files through a sound card synthesizer. It includes basic drum samples for use with simple FM synthesizers.
X program for playing MIDI sound files through a sound card synthesizer. It includes basic drum samples for use with simple FM synthesizers.
The self described "swiss army knife of sound tools", sox can convert between many different digitized sound formats and perform simple sound manipulation functions.