Knoppix help for a lifetime Windows user

[HisHighness]

Hey all. I know you must get this question 10 billion times, but there wasn't any sticky and I didn't see a link, so please forgive me.

But I've been using Windows based applications for my entire life, and I'd like to learn about Linux. I'm on Knoppix right now and have gotten the basics down, but a lot of it still eludes me.

Is there a really good website that can show me the simularities and differences, and teach me to use Linux using windows as a reference. I've tried googling for one but the ones I've found use a lot of terms I don't understand.

And on a specific note how do I run programs/create desktop shortcuts under Knoppix. I downloaded firefox and managed to get it to run, but I really don't know how, it's weird cuz it seems to be a "whether it feels like working or not" type deal. I try double clicking (I set the mouse up to require a double click) the executable file called firefox-bin but that doesn't seem to work, I looked at another one which is a "shell script" file called simply firefox and double clicked on that and sometimes it'll open and sometimes it won't, it seems to work every time I right click on the shell script and click open in new window it'll open it up but that's a pain in the a** and it also opens up another winow Idon't want.

Thanks for your time,
HH

[UnderScore]

See this similar question where I gave info on good books http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=18386&.