New to Linux

[amardilo]

Hi.

I have never used Linux before (or UNIX for that matter) and seeing as everyone keeps talking about it I thought I might give it a go. Plus a lot of the jobs I am going after require people who can use Linux without any problem.

I liked the idea of Knoppix as it boots and runs off a CD.

I have heard Linux has a very big learning curve and is not as "simple" as Windows. Are there any books or sites to help me get started? As I have no idea what a shell is or how to execute/install files in Linux (been told its not just click and run and you have to mess around with something called a shell).

My background is in computing I have a degree in Computer Science but all I learnt over there was programming in Java, VB, C#, ASP and .NET (wish I had taken those Linux modules now ).

[Harry Kuhman]

http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15179

[amardilo]

Thanks

[mr_ed]

See also Knoppix Hacks by Kyle Rankin (with a forward by the creator of Knoppix, Klaus Knopper). Rankin posts on this forum from time to time.

I have some negative views about O'Reilly's "Hacks" series in general, but I think you're a good candidate for this book in particular. It's a series of 100 cookbook-type sections starting from the very beginning, like how to freakin' download and burn a CD!

By the end of the book you'll be using your handy-dandy Knoppix CD to repair Windows machines, set up emergency replacement routers and web servers, and create your own, customized live CD.

(For the use of the CD as a weapon, see the original movie about throwing round, sharp objects: Dr. No. Of course Sean Connery is the original, the one and only, Bond.)

For books about Linux in general, most of O'Reilly's are great and some from other publishers are too. I can heartily recommend against the few yellow and black Wiley books I've bought. Even if they hired someone to copyedit the incredible number of typos that get into print, Debian Bible in particular is badly written.

Be aware that many Linux books tend to be about either Red-Hat/Fedora-type systems or Debian-type systems (like Knoppix).

In the long run there isn't a lot of difference, but as a beginner I was sure as heck confused about the location of binary files and shell scripts. There are some occasionally weird variations, but generally most Linux distros go essentially one way or the other.

Another difference that can be confusing if you're a beginner and annoying if you're not is the two main ways Linux systems manage packages of binaries. Once again, Red Hat originated one system (RPM) and Debian the other (apt, essentially), though both have spread throughout the Linux world. And now you can usually use both on one system, if you want. (apt is superior to rpm - there are other systems, and they have their fans too)

It's easy to buy books (from O'Reilly, especially) that are way over your head - or over my head, anyhow! The information is packed into them very densely.

So look for titles like Running Linux, Linux in a Nutshell, and Linux Cookbook (from either O'Reilly or No Starch Press) - and save Linux Device Drivers and Understanding the Linux Kernel for later. Unless that's your bag, baby.

(Hmmm ... Linux Desktop Hacks ... I haven't seen that one before!)

I have heard Linux has a very big learning curve and is not as "simple" as Windows.

Heh. I have a 722-page book just on scripting in XP. Really, the only argument left is over the desktop.

Linux now dominates the compute-heavy supercomputer market by a wide margin. Linux together with Apache webserver, MySQL database, and any of the Perl, Python, or PHP languages (LAMP) is a major webserver force. Linux rendering farms are common with those artsy folk in the animation industry. Foreign governments - from developing to developed - are increasingly replacing networks of Windows workstations with Linux.

For the desktop, Linux is nearly there. Not quite, I'd argue, but nearly. And I'll go out on a limb and say that Knoppix is the most important development in personal operating systems in the last five years or maybe more. Knoppix gives most users an easy-to-get and feature-rich desktop environment.

Note that neither Harry nor I recommend Knoppix as the best Linux to install to your hard drive to get this experience - Knoppix is really, truly intended to only run from CD. My enthusiasm for Knoppix is that it sets standards for automatic detection and configuration that other Linux distros must now measure themselves against.

I have no idea what a shell is

A shell is the software interface between the operating system and the user. DOS is a shell; Windows is a shell. They take your commands and either act on them themselves (using internal functions) or farm them out for you (to external functions, where "functions" means "software thingies").

When people talk about "shells" in the world of U/ULOs (Unix and Unix-Like Operating systems - a term I invented ) what they mean is the command-line interface. But the GUIs in Linux (etc.) are shells, too. Just like Uncle Windows.

By the way, do not under any circumstances be intimidated by people who claim they've been using nothing but a CLI on their hand-built-from-source-code Linux that has an uptime of 7 years, 3 months.... And they edit configuration files not as text, like mere mortals, but with hex editors. Often they enjoy sneering at people who are most comfortable in a GUI.

Truthfully, the command line puts more power under your fingertips than a GUI can for nearly every job a system administrator has to do. But it does come at a heavy cost. The Unix Way is to have lots of small tools and string them together to achieve complex tasks.

This by itself increases complexity when you're not used to it. But these small tools aren't as simple as lots of people claim - they have lots of little parameter switches. And the twisted Unix culture has given most of them really strange and often non-intuitive names. More and more complexity.

And there's a big, big difference between having the power to tinker around with configurations and just plain having to tinker with them. Should you be assailed by one of these fun-spoilers, refer them to this conference of operating-systems researchers who decided that the need to futz around with systems is "the most important problem facing the community." www.eecs.harvard.edu/~syrah/nofutz/

Then there's this paper, where no less than the creator of Unix joins in to say that it no longer met the needs of Bell Laboratories more than 10 years ago: www.cs.bell-labs.com/sys/doc/9.html

Oh, wait - I'm trying to convince you to look forward to Knoppix, aren't I? Well, Knoppix clears the deck of most of this futzing with its top-of-the-line detection and configuration of your system for you. And you can still tweak it however you want. Plus, the 700-MB CD actually contains 2 GB of software, including nice, fat, full-featured desktops.

... or how to execute/install files in Linux (been told its not just click and run....)

Lies, sir. Damnable Yankee lies!

With apt in particular there are three powerful point-and-click interfaces that handle the retrieval, installation, and default configuration of new software. One monstrous problem that RPM doesn't yet solve as well as apt is that much software depends on the presence of other software that may not be installed on your system already - dynamically-linked libraries, for example.

The ideal is for the computer to take over such idiotic worries for the user, and the apt system does that very well. Unfortunately, Knoppix can trip up that process a bit, which is one reason why something like the Debian sarge release is a better candidate for installing to hard drive.

Executing program files from the desktop is just a matter of putting a shortcut on the screen and deciding whether all of your shortcuts should activate with a single click or a double click. That's reasonable, isn't it?

Well, hey - have fun, and be sure to write whenever you want to hear more than you're ready for!

-- Ed

[amardilo]

dude.......

Was not expecting anyone to help me as much as you did....... thanks mate

I am not looking to do anything major, I don’t intend to mess with settings or anything. My main problem was I started my full time job a few months ago and was hired as a .NET and J2EE developer. What they didn't tell me was they were in a lot of debt (it's so bad that when I started I was in a team of 6 now it’s a team of 1 - me). Anyway things have got so bad and the financial controller wants to lower costs and thinks software licences are too expensive so the majority of the licences are to expire and I need to find a way around it. Thought of Linux but the Laptop my work issued me is from a hire company and the hire agreement says that I can’t change or alter the OS or boot. So after further searching the net I came across Knoppix.

Anyway I guess you didn’t want or need to know that. Thanks for your help mate will get those books and try to get an understanding of all this stuff quickly.