[plug] Some random Linux questions

[Cameron Patrick]

G'day all,

I have a couple (±20) of miscellaneous problems with Linux which
hopefully someone here will be able to help me with.

(1) Most of the time when I start an xterm, it turns up with a black
background and white text.  However, after being logged in for a while,
starting an xterm results in a white xterm with black text and screwed
up key bindings (arrow keys, home, end, F1=>F12 all don't work).

The machine is running Debian sid (up-to-date as of a couple
of weeks ago), and a NVIDIA RIVA TNT2 PCI graphics card with the XFree86
server. Does anyone know what could be causing this?

(2) Does anyone know how to set up network boot EPROMs?  I have a
Cyrix 6x86 with a cheapo network card (according to lspci, it's an
RTL-8139) which has a 28-pin ROM socket.  Currently it's booting using
GRUB to load an Etherboot ROM image off a 1gb hard drive and continuing
discless from there.

Where do I get a blank EPROM from?  Dick Smiths sell a 32kb EPROM with
an appropriate number of pins.  Will it work in the NIC?  How do I burn
the 16kb ROM image onto the EPROM?

What magic incantations are necessary to tell the BIOS to boot from the
network card?  Will this happen automatically in a system with no HDD?

Thanks in advance,

Cameron.