I use Linux Ubuntu 11.10 edition and I've managed to download LimeWire Pirate Edition version 5.6.2 and i cannot get it to connect at all. Each time i start the program, all it says on the main screen is "You are offline. Please check your internet connection." I'm connected to the internet wirelessly to a router using DSL. First in order to install it i had to install the regular Oracle Sun Java 6 JRE, (was using OpenJDK 6), i also installed OpenJDK (Linux's open source Java) version 7, but it didn't solve the problem. Anyone have any ideas?

My guess is you need a fresh connection file. I do not have a Linux installer for this but you can download the file and place it in the right location yourself.
See half way down this post where it says * Note: http://www.gnutellaforums.com/other/...tml#post359417. An alternative gnut file can be found here.

Just a note, all LW 5 versions including LPE will delete the connection file if LW has not been used for 30 days or longer.

If still connection problems after that, then it might be related to any firewall you have, or your router's NAT in which case port forwarding might be needed.

By the way, does the Linux LPE open ok in Java 7?

Thanks! The the gnut file fixed it. Though the "You are offline. Please check your internet connection." still shows up on the start page when you first start the program, i get all the way to a "turbo-charged connection", but when searching, it is pretty slow, it takes a while and not very many of the artist's songs show up, sometimes i have to search for the same artist twice to get results, and the results are often times different than the previous same search. And no, i haven't tried to use Oracle Java 7 with it yet, though i'm pretty sure that won't change anything much in terms of connection speeds and search results.

Sometimes connection can be a bit slow - so you might show as not connected until your LW finds good hosts to connect to.

The network isn't what it used to be. These days, there just aren't as many users/sharers as there once were. And, unfortunately, there are still scum who are paid to sabotage the network: http://www.gnutellaforums.com/downlo...h-results.html

You'll find that results are different sometimes because the network is dynamic... as users in various time zones log on & off, files available change. So, searching at different times of day can help if you're looking for rarer files.

There are some tips for searching here: How to find music
There's a section there about using the keyword filter, with lots of info about which words & file extensions to filter for best results (ie weed out the fakes, spam & porn)

You can find a file extension filter within tools > options > search > filter file extensions.
And keyword filter within tools > options > search > keyword filter. After adding words/extensions to the filter(s), click ok on the filter page & then ok again on the main options page.

And if you still can't find what you're looking for, try changing ultrapeers (hosts that you connect to in order to search).
In LW tools > advanced tools. In the Host column, you'll see UPs that you're connected to. Check in the Time column & see which ultrapeer has been connected for the longest time.
Right click on that host > Remove. That ultrapeer will be replaced by another. Now start a new search for your file.
If you don't see any improvement in results, remove the next ultrapeer. And so on...

This is because the program tries to contact the original LW site but that link has since been closed down (this affects both LW 4 and 5 versions.) The link would originally notify if there were updates, but that was replaced with a legal notice after LW closed down. But now the link is dead. So it's nothing to be concerned about. What is important is your connection bar bottom left of screen. It should be green or blue. If red, then connection problems.

As for spammers on the network, if you ban those I listed here http://www.gnutellaforums.com/open-d...imewire-7.html it will help to reduce a certain number. Though as Birdy pointed out, some spam companies use dynamic ip's or use proxies so their ip's change constantly. The TechNutopia Fullsize Hostiles List itself does not work with LW 5, but you can add the ones I posted to either your router, firewall or LW's ban list. These are static addresses. If your firewall allows, also ban port 27016 for both TCP and UDP.

I used LPE last night for first time in a few weeks, and I agree the search was not that good. It was fine a few weeks ago. The general rule is, the longer you are connected, the better your search results will eventually be.