Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

On Sun, May 1, 2011 at 10:54 PM, Marc Shapiro  wrote:
> On 04/21/11 09:21, Patrick Bartek wrote:
>>
>> --- On Sat, 4/16/11, Andrei Popescu  wrote:
>>
>>> On Vi, 15 apr 11, 22:26:54, Patrick
>>> Bartek wrote:

 So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not
>>>
>>> suitable for

 the Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it
>>>
>>> to a noobie.  With

 Debian, you need to know, at least somewhat, what
>>>
>>> you're doing.
>>>
>>> For mere users (no administration) Debian stable is
>>> wonderful IMVHO.
>>>
>>> It should also work if someone knowledgeable does the
>>> initial install
>>> and major upgrades and let the user do only security
>>> updates
>>> (update-manager or even completely automated).
>>
>> I wasn't referring to Linux users, those knowledgeable, either a little
>
>> or a lot, in Linux.  My statement was about those who know nothing
>>
>> about  Linux, not just nothing about Debian, almost all of whom are
>> Windows users, who unfortunately expect Linux to work like Windows,
>
> I came from Win 3.1 directly to Debian (Bo, I believe) back when dpkg was
> the package manager.  No Apt, no Aptitude, nothing GUI, just a command line
> and no automatic dependency resolution.  It told you what was needed, but it
> wasn't going to get it for you.
>
> I survived, and I am still here.
>

sense we are getting back to the old stuff, i figured i'd mention -
slackware 13.37 was released last week. it doesn't get more elite than
that (though it won't be too many years before 'leet' is considered
proper).

maybe i should celebrate their new version by installing it oh the
other hand, maybe i'll just wait another 20 years until debian gets to
version 13 and decides to do something like that (yes, according to
wikipedia, debian was first released in '93 ~1 month after slackware).

ps - this was all ~5 years before google and in the days when it would
have taken me a few months to download an iso (if i would have had the
hdd for it)

pps - we survived but some of us lost a bit of sanity working in the
(almost) internet.


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Re: New to Linux

[Marc Shapiro]

On 04/21/11 09:21, Patrick Bartek wrote:

--- On Sat, 4/16/11, Andrei Popescu  wrote:


On Vi, 15 apr 11, 22:26:54, Patrick
Bartek wrote:


So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not

suitable for

the Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it

to a noobie.  With

Debian, you need to know, at least somewhat, what

you're doing.

For mere users (no administration) Debian stable is
wonderful IMVHO.

It should also work if someone knowledgeable does the
initial install
and major upgrades and let the user do only security
updates
(update-manager or even completely automated).


I wasn't referring to Linux users, those knowledgeable, either a little

> or a lot, in Linux.  My statement was about those who know nothing

about  Linux, not just nothing about Debian, almost all of whom are
Windows users, who unfortunately expect Linux to work like Windows,


I came from Win 3.1 directly to Debian (Bo, I believe) back when dpkg 
was the package manager.  No Apt, no Aptitude, nothing GUI, just a 
command line and no automatic dependency resolution.  It told you what 
was needed, but it wasn't going to get it for you.


I survived, and I am still here.

Marc Shapiro


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Re: New to Linux

[Christopher Judd]

On Thursday 21 April 2011 21:15:11 Heddle Weaver wrote:

> ...

> Yes, I've found this to be exactly the case. I've developed a strong
> interest in quantum, chaos and game theory so I decided to up my math
> ability. Applied to the local tech. colleges and discovered that they could
> teach me household budgeting and a bit about statistics.
>  ...

There are many online resources now for people of all ability and ambition 
levels.   MIT Opencourseware, for example, has a lot of fairly advanced math 
and science course content online:

 http://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm

There are many other college level resources available, also.  Teaching 
yourself is more difficult than attending classes, of course.

-Chris


|   Christopher Judd, Ph. D.   |
|   Research Scientist III |
|   NYS Dept. of Health   j...@wadsworth.org   | 
|   Wadsworth Center - ESP |
|   P. O. Box 509518 486-7829  |
|   Albany, NY 12201-0509  |



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Re: New to Linux

[Miles Fidelman]

Heddle Weaver wrote:
The logs, algebra, geometry, etc., that I was learning in my first 
year of high school, isn't taught here in Australia until after the 
third year of high school, now. To get anything better I have to drop 
work/career and go to university at a phenomenal cost.


The 'conspiracy theory' that we are educated to meet the standards of 
a 'product' that the corporate entities require, isn't a far-flung one.


The corporate entities around here like people to know math (Boston, 
high tech and all) - they scream about poor math preparation; so does 
the military (you know, balistics and such).  My theory is that we're 
educating political sheep - who can't read budgets or statistics.



--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
In  practice, there is.    Yogi Berra



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Re: New to Linux

[Heddle Weaver]

On 22 April 2011 10:39, Patrick Bartek  wrote:

> --- On Thu, 4/21/11, Alan McConnell  wrote:
>
> > A couple of comments.
> >
> > On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 01:15:08PM -0400, Miles Fidelman
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > >It's been my experience that most users never read
> > the manual.
> > > Too much trouble.  When something breaks, they
> > find someone to
> > > fix it or tell them how to.  No learning
> > required.
> >   If someone tells you how to, you've
> > certainly learned something.
>
> Only if they retain it.
>
> >   Haven't we all been to school?
>
> Yes, but a lot has changed--for the worse--since I attended.  A few years
> ago, tutored my niece, who is now a college junior, with her high school
> geometry and algebra.  The texts reminded me of the ones I had used in 8th
> grade--large print, simple language, few or no proofs of theorems, etc.
>  They weren't even required to prove or even shown the proof of The
> Pythagorean Theorem.  Amazing!  Her history and English text books were
> equally retrograded.  I also discovered that the grading system had been
> significantly downgraded since I attended.  Most of the honor roll students
> in her school would have only been C students, average, in mine.  In mine,
> you had to have an overall average of 90%, B minus, or higher to make the
> honor roll.  Something not all that easy to do.  In her's, 80% was a B
> minus; in mine, C minus.  Lower standards begets lower achievement.  No
> wonder the median high school graduate (in the US, anyway) only reads at an
> 8th grade level.
>

Yes, I've found this to be exactly the case. I've developed a strong
interest in quantum, chaos and game theory so I decided to up my math
ability. Applied to the local tech. colleges and discovered that they could
teach me household budgeting and a bit about statistics.

The logs, algebra, geometry, etc., that I was learning in my first year of
high school, isn't taught here in Australia until after the third year of
high school, now. To get anything better I have to drop work/career and go
to university at a phenomenal cost.

The 'conspiracy theory' that we are educated to meet the standards of a
'product' that the corporate entities require, isn't a far-flung one.
Regards,

Weaver.
-- 

Religion is regarded by the common people as true,
by the wise as false,
and by the rulers as useful.

— Lucius Annæus Seneca.

Terrorism, the new religion.

Re: New to Linux

[Patrick Bartek]

--- On Thu, 4/21/11, Alan McConnell  wrote:

> A couple of comments.
> 
> On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 01:15:08PM -0400, Miles Fidelman
> wrote:
> >
> > >It's been my experience that most users never read
> the manual.
> > Too much trouble.  When something breaks, they
> find someone to
> > fix it or tell them how to.  No learning
> required.
>       If someone tells you how to, you've
> certainly learned something.

Only if they retain it.

>       Haven't we all been to school?

Yes, but a lot has changed--for the worse--since I attended.  A few years ago, 
tutored my niece, who is now a college junior, with her high school geometry 
and algebra.  The texts reminded me of the ones I had used in 8th grade--large 
print, simple language, few or no proofs of theorems, etc.  They weren't even 
required to prove or even shown the proof of The Pythagorean Theorem.  Amazing! 
 Her history and English text books were equally retrograded.  I also 
discovered that the grading system had been significantly downgraded since I 
attended.  Most of the honor roll students in her school would have only been C 
students, average, in mine.  In mine, you had to have an overall average of 
90%, B minus, or higher to make the honor roll.  Something not all that easy to 
do.  In her's, 80% was a B minus; in mine, C minus.  Lower standards begets 
lower achievement.  No wonder the median high school graduate (in the US, 
anyway) only reads at an 8th grade level.  

B



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Re: New to Linux

[Miles Fidelman]

Alan McConnell wrote:

OK, a little survey here.  How many of you use mutt, or
   elm, or Evolution(?), and do your E-mail right from your
   home computer?  I do, and since my ISP -- not PatriotNet,
   incidentally -- gives me a dynamic IP
   address I have to use a "smart host"/'relay host' for
   my E-mail to get anywhere.  It has been my experience
   that setting this up is very difficult, requiring a good knowledge
   of what one's ISP requires, and what the proprietor of
   one's relay host requires.  My Postfix setting up took
   quite a bit of work, and I bothered lots of people on the
   Postfix E-list before I got it right.
   


Alpine on the server, SeaMonkey on the desktop.  And I run my own mail 
server and list server (sympa) on a server sitting in a datacenter 
(legacy of once having owned a small hosting company).  Yup, not easy.


It's a little easier for my father-in-law - he uses Comcast's mail 
servers, but reads on home computer.  Took a bit of work transitioning 
from Verizon's mailserver - what with different ISPs blocking different 
SMTP ports these days.

(apt still rules).  I've watched one of my sons - the English major
- ditch Windows for Arch Linux  on his ancient Compaq laptop,  learn
the ins and outs of finding/installing drivers for various things,
and teach himself some C and Python along the way - so you never
know.
 

Great!  I congratulate him; and you!
   

Thanks!

In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
In   practice, there is.    Yogi Berra
 

   P.S. Compare my .sig of today, just below.
   
--

Alan McConnell :http://patriot.net/users/alan
Know thyself.  If you need help, call the C.I.A.
Whenever anyone says, "theoretically", they really mean, "not really".
   

Isn't that "theoretically" = "not if I can help it?" :-)


--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
In  practice, there is.    Yogi Berra



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Re: New to Linux

[Alan McConnell]

A couple of comments.

On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 01:15:08PM -0400, Miles Fidelman wrote:
>
> >It's been my experience that most users never read the manual.
> Too much trouble.  When something breaks, they find someone to
> fix it or tell them how to.  No learning required.
  If someone tells you how to, you've certainly learned something.
  Haven't we all been to school?

> I'm really floored every once in a while by someone who can't get
> their email set up - but when you come right down to it, there is
> some trickiness to things like getting all the server names, port
> numbers, protocol selection, and passwords set up.
   OK, a little survey here.  How many of you use mutt, or
   elm, or Evolution(?), and do your E-mail right from your
   home computer?  I do, and since my ISP -- not PatriotNet,
   incidentally -- gives me a dynamic IP
   address I have to use a "smart host"/'relay host' for
   my E-mail to get anywhere.  It has been my experience 
   that setting this up is very difficult, requiring a good knowledge
   of what one's ISP requires, and what the proprietor of
   one's relay host requires.  My Postfix setting up took
   quite a bit of work, and I bothered lots of people on the
   Postfix E-list before I got it right.

> I'm not sure I'd recommend any flavor of Unix to someone without
> some general understanding of computers, except maybe a Mac.  I'm
   Those of us who are familiar with other countries know
   that we are uniquely dominated by M$.  Others get
   familiar with IT much earlier, and I have the impression
   that they are much better at it.  I bet there are tons
   of non-native-English speakers here; I wonder if they
   will agree with this assertion.

> (apt still rules).  I've watched one of my sons - the English major
> - ditch Windows for Arch Linux  on his ancient Compaq laptop,  learn
> the ins and outs of finding/installing drivers for various things,
> and teach himself some C and Python along the way - so you never
> know.
Great!  I congratulate him; and you!

Best wishes,

Alan McConnell, in Silver Spring MD

> In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
> In  practice, there is.    Yogi Berra
  P.S. Compare my .sig of today, just below.
-- 
Alan McConnell :  http://patriot.net/users/alan
   Know thyself.  If you need help, call the C.I.A.
   Whenever anyone says, "theoretically", they really mean, "not really".


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Re: New to Linux

[Lisi]

On Thursday 21 April 2011 20:03:00 Klistvud wrote:
> Dne, 21. 04. 2011 18:21:09 je Patrick Bartek napisal(a):
> > Windows users are accustomed to being lead around by the hand
>
> I thought that "lead around by the nose" was the correct (Queen's
> English) phrase. But then again, I'm not a native speaker.
>
> --
> Cheerio,
>
> Klistvud
> http://bufferoverflow.tiddlyspot.com
> Certifiable Loonix User #481801  Please reply to the list, not to
> me.

I would say both, but with slightly different meanings.  "Lead around by the 
nose" implies to me that the person being led is being unduly submissive to 
someone who is successfully dominating.   (E.g. a hen-pecked husband.)

The other implies infantilising or being infantile.  (Taken litterally, 
toddlers need their hands holding, some animals (e.g. pigs and bulls) are, or 
anyhow were, led by the nose.) 

The phraseology of "lead by the hand" is less fixed, and would often be more 
like:  Windows users are used to having their hands held.

Lisi


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Re: New to Linux

[Klistvud]

Dne, 21. 04. 2011 18:21:09 je Patrick Bartek napisal(a):


Windows users are accustomed to being lead around by the hand


I thought that "lead around by the nose" was the correct (Queen's  
English) phrase. But then again, I'm not a native speaker.


--
Cheerio,

Klistvud  
http://bufferoverflow.tiddlyspot.com
Certifiable Loonix User #481801  Please reply to the list, not to  
me.



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Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

On Apr 21, 2011 1:58 PM, "Heddle Weaver"  wrote:
>
>
>
> On 22 April 2011 02:31, Patrick Bartek  wrote:
>>
>> It's been my experience that most users never read the manual.  Too much
trouble.  When something breaks, they find someone to fix it or tell them
how to.  No learning required.
>
>
>  Most users don't read the manual, because they come from windows and
windows doesn't have one. I can remember being totally frustrated at the
lack of one when the occasion arose and one was required, but you become
conditioned to an environment to the degree that even when there is a manual
available, you don't read it because you assume that it doesn't exist.
>

Nah, there's technet. Though, Microsoft started making books they sent with
their software crappy starting at dos 6 (6.22 book sucked) and then they
made the windows help damn near useless. If you talk to a normal mac user,
they'll tell you how useful spotlight is for finding help.

So the point is, the info is there, Microsoft just started breeding
incompetence into their culture 15+ years ago.

Re: New to Linux

[Heddle Weaver]

On 22 April 2011 02:31, Patrick Bartek  wrote:

> --- On Sat, 4/16/11, foldingst...@theowned.org 
> wrote:
>
> > > Like I said, "A Lot has changed
> > in 12 years".  Debian is more friendly
> > > today than yesterday as are most distros, but there
> > are others that are
> > > friendlier, a lot friendlier.
> > >
> > > So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not
> > suitable for the
> > > Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to
> > a noobie.  With Debian,
> > > you need to know, at least somewhat, what you're
> > doing.
> > >
> > > B
> > >
> >
> > I think if someone is capable of reading and comprehending
> > the excellent
> > documentation available, there should be no problem using
> > Debian. This is
> > how many people have learned.
>
> It's been my experience that most users never read the manual.  Too much
> trouble.  When something breaks, they find someone to fix it or tell them
> how to.  No learning required.
>

 Most users don't read the manual, because they come from windows and
windows doesn't have one. I can remember being totally frustrated at the
lack of one when the occasion arose and one was required, but you become
conditioned to an environment to the degree that even when there is a manual
available, you don't read it because you assume that it doesn't exist.
Regards,

Weaver.
-- 

Religion is regarded by the common people as true,
by the wise as false,
and by the rulers as useful.

— Lucius Annæus Seneca.

Terrorism, the new religion.

Re: New to Linux

[Miles Fidelman]

Patrick Bartek wrote:

--- On Sat, 4/16/11, foldingst...@theowned.org  
wrote:

   

Like I said, "A Lot has changed in 12 years".  Debian is more friendly today 
than yesterday as are most distros, but there are others that are friendlier, a lot 
friendlier. So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is notsuitable for the Linux 
firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to a noobie.  With Debian, you need to know, at 
least somewhat, what you're doing.
   

I think if someone is capable of reading and comprehending
the excellent documentation available, there should be no problem using
Debian. This is how many people have learned.
 

It's been my experience that most users never read the manual.  Too much 
trouble.  When something breaks, they find someone to fix it or tell them how 
to.  No learning required.
   


I'll certainly agree with that - applies to everything.  I expect few 
people read the manuals for their cars, or their cell phones, until 
they're trying to figure something out (like how to set the clock).   
Those of us who are engineers need to remember that most people are not, 
and engineers get paid to make technology simple to use (well, generally 
not paid to work on Debian).


I'm really floored every once in a while by someone who can't get their 
email set up - but when you come right down to it, there is some 
trickiness to things like getting all the server names, port numbers, 
protocol selection, and passwords set up.


I'm not sure I'd recommend any flavor of Unix to someone without some 
general understanding of computers, except maybe a Mac.  I'm beginning 
to come around to the idea that appliance computers (web browser, 
nothing else) + software as a service is not that bad an idea for the 
average person -- I'd certainly spend a lot less time helping friends 
and family out of jams.


As to Debian: Easier than BSD, OpenSolaris, Gentoo, Slackware, Redhat, 
SUSE; probably not as easy as Ubuntu, maybe Mint.  Definitely not as 
easy as a Mac.


On a more general note: You probably want to take some time to learn 
things, if you're going to use Linux, and Debian is easier than most 
(apt still rules).  I've watched one of my sons - the English major - 
ditch Windows for Arch Linux  on his ancient Compaq laptop,  learn the 
ins and outs of finding/installing drivers for various things, and teach 
himself some C and Python along the way - so you never know.




--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
In  practice, there is.    Yogi Berra



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Re: New to Linux

[Patrick Bartek]

--- On Sat, 4/16/11, foldingst...@theowned.org  
wrote:

> > Like I said, "A Lot has changed
> in 12 years".  Debian is more friendly
> > today than yesterday as are most distros, but there
> are others that are
> > friendlier, a lot friendlier.
> >
> > So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not
> suitable for the
> > Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to
> a noobie.  With Debian,
> > you need to know, at least somewhat, what you're
> doing.
> >
> > B
> >
> 
> I think if someone is capable of reading and comprehending
> the excellent
> documentation available, there should be no problem using
> Debian. This is
> how many people have learned.

It's been my experience that most users never read the manual.  Too much 
trouble.  When something breaks, they find someone to fix it or tell them how 
to.  No learning required.

B


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Re: New to Linux

[Patrick Bartek]

--- On Sat, 4/16/11, Andrei Popescu  wrote:

> On Vi, 15 apr 11, 22:26:54, Patrick
> Bartek wrote:
> > 
> > So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not
> suitable for 
> > the Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it
> to a noobie.  With 
> > Debian, you need to know, at least somewhat, what
> you're doing.  
> 
> For mere users (no administration) Debian stable is
> wonderful IMVHO.
>
> It should also work if someone knowledgeable does the
> initial install 
> and major upgrades and let the user do only security
> updates 
> (update-manager or even completely automated).

I wasn't referring to Linux users, those knowledgeable, either a little or a 
lot, in Linux.  My statement was about those who know nothing about Linux, not 
just nothing about Debian, almost all of whom are Windows users, who 
unfortunately expect Linux to work like Windows, since Windows is the only OS 
they have experience with.  Of course, they soon discover that Linux is not 
Windows.  It's a death spiral for most from there on, and they quickly are back 
with Windows, never to try Linux again because "it doesn't work."  Here's a 
typical example:

I did a default install of Debian 6 for testing purposes totally unrelated to 
what is being discussed here.  One of the first things that didn't work, sort 
of, was Flash.  I, of course, expected this.  A Windows user would not.  Gnash 
had been installed by default.  I purged it and installed the proprietary 
Flash.  A Windows user would not have known what to do, since, because of 
Gnash, there was no pop-up notifying the user that a plugin was needed, "Click 
here to install," etc.

Of course, this isn't specifically a Debian issue.  This type of "problem" 
applies to almost all Linux distros.  However, there are a few that "work out 
of the box" and come configured with most everything needed (proprietory and 
open source, both) by the typical noobie to start using Linux immediately after 
installing, just like Windows.  Two that come to mind are PCLinuxOS, which is 
the one I recommend for noobs, and Mint Linux, which I only have cursory 
experience with.

Windows users are accustomed to being lead around by the hand, not having to 
think or RTFM.  And until Linux contends with those issues, Linux, generally, 
will never be noob-friendly.


B



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Re: New to Linux

[Stan Hoeppner]

Steven Rosenberg put forth on 4/18/2011 6:58 PM:
> On 04/15/2011 12:49 PM, Krzysztof Bieniasz wrote:
>>> FWIW: O'Reilly published a Special Edition book LEARNING DEBIAN
>>> GNU/LINUX (c. 1999).  It was a very good introduction and step-by-step
>>> guide to installing and using Debian.  I got it for free from the Debian
>>> booth at Las Vegas COMDEX 1999.  This was the first year Linux had a
>>> major presence at COMDEX.  Having the Linux people all in one exhibit
>>> hall greatly simplified my investigations of making the switch from the
>>> Amiga. I still have the book.  However, ultimately, I chose Mandrake 7
>>> as my first distro.  Debian was not a distro for the noobie, either then
>>> or now.

This really truly depends on the traits of the 'noobie'.  Warning, car
analogy:  A successful Debian noobie is the guy who changes his own oil
and replaces his own water pump and alternator when needed, without ever
having done so before.  I.e. a person not timid about popping the hood
and digging into the problem, knowing full well that no matter how bad
he may break things along the way, he can fix it.

Noobies who pick many other distros take their car to the shop for all
repairs and even oil changes.  They may read about how to do these
these, but in the end they don't trust themselves to do it, knowing they
don't have the mental aptitude and personality type to put the engine
back together, and know the car will run, after tearing it apart.

>> today though... Nowadays just about any distro is noob-friendly enough,
>> perhaps excluding Gentoo and Slackware.

This depends on a few things, the most distinctive being whether you
install a GUI or not and thus have graphical administration tools.  My
baptism into Linux consisted of making a Debian network install boot
diskette via a downloaded Win32 floppy imaging util and disk image file,
booting that diskette and performing a network install of Potato over my
first ADSL line back in 2000.  I did a compact install, added all
packages I needed via apt-get, edited any config files I needed to with
vi, etc, etc.  It was a *steep* learning curve.  But that's what I wanted.

I did this because it was a trusted colleague's answer to my question:
"What's the best way to learn Linux from the ground up?"  He was right.

-- 
Stan


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Re: New to Linux

[Heddle Weaver]

On 19 April 2011 10:06, Steven Rosenberg  wrote:

>
>
> "Practicing" installing the system and doing it a bunch of times also helps
> a lot.


Massive 

A bunch? I've done it a million times more than necessary and everytime I've
learnt something. I've fallen asleep over the keyboard installing for the
fifth time at about 3 am.

I've often thought that the path to a particular package or doc or whatever
could be included in the 'About' section of the help tab and at the head of
the docs themselves, just to help noobs find their way around the system.
That would do a lot to help with initial orientation.
Regards,

Weaver
-- 

Religion is regarded by the common people as true,
by the wise as false,
and by the rulers as useful.

— Lucius Annæus Seneca.

Terrorism, the new religion.

Re: New to Linux

[Steven Rosenberg]

On 04/16/2011 11:05 AM, Jude DaShiell wrote:

Actually, if a new user reads the contents of debian-reference before
doing much else with Debian they'll solve that problem.  The problem
behind that is that debian-reference doesn't install by default on
systems.  A question like "Are you new to Linux (y/n)? in the install
script might not only install that package by default but also configure
boot up sequence such that once all was finished booting the user would
land inside the debian-reference application.  I can't really predict
what amount of pain would be reduced by such steps so am not
recommending them unless testing gets done with a significant sample
size of users new to Linux first.  If follow up study shows these users
progress faster on their learning curves, then I'd recommend making
these modifications.  The bsd system has a learn utility that teaches
several topics once set up correctly using computer-assisted instruction
and if that were ever successfully ported to Linux (maybe some on this
list remember using it), that might also be a good utility to use to get
more knowledge in areas where debian-reference is missing or goes
lightly through.  I know I certainly got lots from it back in late '80's
and it's command line too.

On Sat, 16 Apr 2011, shawn wilson wrote:


On Apr 16, 2011 11:18 AM,  wrote:



Like I said, "A Lot has changed in 12 years".  Debian is more friendly
today than yesterday as are most distros, but there are others that are
friendlier, a lot friendlier.

So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not suitable for the
Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to a noobie.  With Debian,
you need to know, at least somewhat, what you're doing.

B



I think if someone is capable of reading and comprehending the excellent
documentation available, there should be no problem using Debian. This is
how many people have learned.



The debian documentation is among the best (along with gentoo and FreeBSD).
That said, when I want to get something done this isn't the first place I
look - I google and what I find there. I don't suppose I could consider
myself 'new' anymore and it did take me a year to figure out how to find
things on the net.

I think that any distro that doesn't do quirky things is good for beginners
(ie, sles having aliases and definitions for everything is just stupid). If
a distro keeps its etc pretty standard, puts things in the right place in
the directory tree, and has a good user base, it should be good to learn on.
(the first and second reason are why I hate mandrake)

There is also the issue of how you use linux. If you want a free OS that
just works, you can install debian or ubuntu (or maybe fedora - idk) and
most things should pretty much work. You can use this environment and that's
great. However I don't think you really learn linux like this.

Otoh, you can run mac or windows and just access linux through putty or
terminal.app and get tons of experience.

In the end, I suppose it just depends what you want to get out of it.







Users in general, and unfortunately new users as well don't want to read 
the documentation before they jump right in. The installation of just 
about any Unix/Linux system goes better if you read the documentation 
first, and that is true of Debian.


I've botched my share of upgrades when I didn't read the docs, and my 
last Lenny-to-Squeeze upgrade went very well only because I read the 
release notes and followed the instructions in them.


"Practicing" installing the system and doing it a bunch of times also 
helps a lot.


--
Steven Rosenberg
Life, the Universe and Debian
http://debian.stevenrosenberg.net
Click
http://blogs.dailynews.com/click


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Re: New to Linux

[Steven Rosenberg]

On 04/15/2011 12:49 PM, Krzysztof Bieniasz wrote:

FWIW: O'Reilly published a Special Edition book LEARNING DEBIAN
GNU/LINUX (c. 1999).  It was a very good introduction and step-by-step
guide to installing and using Debian.  I got it for free from the Debian
booth at Las Vegas COMDEX 1999.  This was the first year Linux had a
major presence at COMDEX.  Having the Linux people all in one exhibit
hall greatly simplified my investigations of making the switch from the
Amiga. I still have the book.  However, ultimately, I chose Mandrake 7
as my first distro.  Debian was not a distro for the noobie, either then
or now.


I wouldn't agree. I started with Debian being a complete noob and I
manage somehow. Actually some of my first experiences were with compiling
the kernel because the one bundled with stable (Lenny) didn't have the
module for my wireless interface :). And I managed to get it to work then
although I suppose the process must've looked funny. I wouldn't try that
today though... Nowadays just about any distro is noob-friendly enough,
perhaps excluding Gentoo and Slackware.

KTB





I did my first installation of Debian right when Etch came out in April 
2007, and I had only been playing around with Knoppix, Puppy and Ubuntu 
for a couple of months before that.


Debian isn't any harder for a noob than Ubuntu, and the more welcoming 
we are as current users of Debian to newer users, the better.


--
Steven Rosenberg
Life, the Universe and Debian
http://debian.stevenrosenberg.net
Click
http://blogs.dailynews.com/click


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Re: New to Linux

[Lisi]

On Saturday 16 April 2011 19:05:09 Jude DaShiell wrote:
> Actually, if a new user reads the contents of debian-reference before
> doing much else with Debian they'll solve that problem.  The problem
> behind that is that debian-reference doesn't install by default on
> systems.  A question like "Are you new to Linux (y/n)? in the install
> script might not only install that package by default but also configure
> boot up sequence such that once all was finished booting the user would
> land inside the debian-reference application.  I can't really predict
> what amount of pain would be reduced by such steps so am not
> recommending them unless testing gets done with a significant sample
> size of users new to Linux first.  If follow up study shows these users
> progress faster on their learning curves, then I'd recommend making
> these modifications.  The bsd system has a learn utility that teaches
> several topics once set up correctly using computer-assisted instruction
> and if that were ever successfully ported to Linux (maybe some on this
> list remember using it), that might also be a good utility to use to get
> more knowledge in areas where debian-reference is missing or goes
> lightly through.  I know I certainly got lots from it back in late '80's
> and it's command line too.
>
> On Sat, 16 Apr 2011, shawn wilson wrote:
> > On Apr 16, 2011 11:18 AM,  wrote:
> > > > Like I said, "A Lot has changed in 12 years".  Debian is more
> > > > friendly today than yesterday as are most distros, but there are
> > > > others that are friendlier, a lot friendlier.
> > > >
> > > > So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not suitable for
> > > > the Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to a noobie.  With
> > > > Debian, you need to know, at least somewhat, what you're doing.
> > > >
> > > > B
> > >
> > > I think if someone is capable of reading and comprehending the
> > > excellent documentation available, there should be no problem using
> > > Debian. This is how many people have learned.
> >
> > The debian documentation is among the best (along with gentoo and
> > FreeBSD). That said, when I want to get something done this isn't the
> > first place I look - I google and what I find there. I don't suppose I
> > could consider myself 'new' anymore and it did take me a year to figure
> > out how to find things on the net.
> >
> > I think that any distro that doesn't do quirky things is good for
> > beginners (ie, sles having aliases and definitions for everything is just
> > stupid). If a distro keeps its etc pretty standard, puts things in the
> > right place in the directory tree, and has a good user base, it should be
> > good to learn on. (the first and second reason are why I hate mandrake)
> >
> > There is also the issue of how you use linux. If you want a free OS that
> > just works, you can install debian or ubuntu (or maybe fedora - idk) and
> > most things should pretty much work. You can use this environment and
> > that's great. However I don't think you really learn linux like this.
> >
> > Otoh, you can run mac or windows and just access linux through putty or
> > terminal.app and get tons of experience.
> >
> > In the end, I suppose it just depends what you want to get out of it.

What is wrong with doing a default install and then using this list for 
problems?

Lisi


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Re: New to Linux

[Jude DaShiell]

Actually, if a new user reads the contents of debian-reference before 
doing much else with Debian they'll solve that problem.  The problem 
behind that is that debian-reference doesn't install by default on 
systems.  A question like "Are you new to Linux (y/n)? in the install 
script might not only install that package by default but also configure 
boot up sequence such that once all was finished booting the user would 
land inside the debian-reference application.  I can't really predict 
what amount of pain would be reduced by such steps so am not 
recommending them unless testing gets done with a significant sample 
size of users new to Linux first.  If follow up study shows these users 
progress faster on their learning curves, then I'd recommend making 
these modifications.  The bsd system has a learn utility that teaches 
several topics once set up correctly using computer-assisted instruction 
and if that were ever successfully ported to Linux (maybe some on this 
list remember using it), that might also be a good utility to use to get 
more knowledge in areas where debian-reference is missing or goes 
lightly through.  I know I certainly got lots from it back in late '80's 
and it's command line too.

On Sat, 16 Apr 2011, shawn wilson wrote:

> On Apr 16, 2011 11:18 AM,  wrote:
> >
> > > Like I said, "A Lot has changed in 12 years".  Debian is more friendly
> > > today than yesterday as are most distros, but there are others that are
> > > friendlier, a lot friendlier.
> > >
> > > So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not suitable for the
> > > Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to a noobie.  With Debian,
> > > you need to know, at least somewhat, what you're doing.
> > >
> > > B
> > >
> >
> > I think if someone is capable of reading and comprehending the excellent
> > documentation available, there should be no problem using Debian. This is
> > how many people have learned.
> >
> 
> The debian documentation is among the best (along with gentoo and FreeBSD).
> That said, when I want to get something done this isn't the first place I
> look - I google and what I find there. I don't suppose I could consider
> myself 'new' anymore and it did take me a year to figure out how to find
> things on the net.
> 
> I think that any distro that doesn't do quirky things is good for beginners
> (ie, sles having aliases and definitions for everything is just stupid). If
> a distro keeps its etc pretty standard, puts things in the right place in
> the directory tree, and has a good user base, it should be good to learn on.
> (the first and second reason are why I hate mandrake)
> 
> There is also the issue of how you use linux. If you want a free OS that
> just works, you can install debian or ubuntu (or maybe fedora - idk) and
> most things should pretty much work. You can use this environment and that's
> great. However I don't think you really learn linux like this.
> 
> Otoh, you can run mac or windows and just access linux through putty or
> terminal.app and get tons of experience.
> 
> In the end, I suppose it just depends what you want to get out of it.
> 



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Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

On Apr 16, 2011 11:18 AM,  wrote:
>
> > Like I said, "A Lot has changed in 12 years".  Debian is more friendly
> > today than yesterday as are most distros, but there are others that are
> > friendlier, a lot friendlier.
> >
> > So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not suitable for the
> > Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to a noobie.  With Debian,
> > you need to know, at least somewhat, what you're doing.
> >
> > B
> >
>
> I think if someone is capable of reading and comprehending the excellent
> documentation available, there should be no problem using Debian. This is
> how many people have learned.
>

The debian documentation is among the best (along with gentoo and FreeBSD).
That said, when I want to get something done this isn't the first place I
look - I google and what I find there. I don't suppose I could consider
myself 'new' anymore and it did take me a year to figure out how to find
things on the net.

I think that any distro that doesn't do quirky things is good for beginners
(ie, sles having aliases and definitions for everything is just stupid). If
a distro keeps its etc pretty standard, puts things in the right place in
the directory tree, and has a good user base, it should be good to learn on.
(the first and second reason are why I hate mandrake)

There is also the issue of how you use linux. If you want a free OS that
just works, you can install debian or ubuntu (or maybe fedora - idk) and
most things should pretty much work. You can use this environment and that's
great. However I don't think you really learn linux like this.

Otoh, you can run mac or windows and just access linux through putty or
terminal.app and get tons of experience.

In the end, I suppose it just depends what you want to get out of it.

Re: New to Linux

[foldingstock]

> Like I said, "A Lot has changed in 12 years".  Debian is more friendly
> today than yesterday as are most distros, but there are others that are
> friendlier, a lot friendlier.
>
> So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not suitable for the
> Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to a noobie.  With Debian,
> you need to know, at least somewhat, what you're doing.
>
> B
>

I think if someone is capable of reading and comprehending the excellent
documentation available, there should be no problem using Debian. This is
how many people have learned.


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Re: New to Linux

[Andrei Popescu]

On Vi, 15 apr 11, 22:26:54, Patrick Bartek wrote:
> 
> So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not suitable for 
> the Linux firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to a noobie.  With 
> Debian, you need to know, at least somewhat, what you're doing.  

For mere users (no administration) Debian stable is wonderful IMVHO.

It should also work if someone knowledgeable does the initial install 
and major upgrades and let the user do only security updates 
(update-manager or even completely automated).

Regards,
Andrei
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Re: New to Linux

[Patrick Bartek]

--- On Fri, 4/15/11, Krzysztof Bieniasz  wrote:

> > FWIW: O'Reilly published a
> Special Edition book LEARNING DEBIAN
> > GNU/LINUX (c. 1999).  It was a very good
> introduction and step-by-step
> > guide to installing and using Debian.  I got it
> for free from the Debian
> > booth at Las Vegas COMDEX 1999.  This was the
> first year Linux had a
> > major presence at COMDEX.  Having the Linux
> people all in one exhibit
> > hall greatly simplified my investigations of making
> the switch from the
> > Amiga. I still have the book.  However,
> ultimately, I chose Mandrake 7
> > as my first distro.  Debian was not a distro for
> the noobie, either then
> > or now.
> 
> I wouldn't agree. I started with Debian being a complete
> noob and I 
> manage somehow.

A lot has changed in 12 years.  Very few Linux distros back then were 
noob-friendly.  (Mandrake was one that was.)  They were put together by 
computer techies for computer techies.

> Actually some of my first experiences were
> with compiling 
> the kernel because the one bundled with stable (Lenny)
> didn't have the 
> module for my wireless interface :). And I managed to get

Your average Linux noob doesn't know about compiling kernels.  They mostly come 
from Windows where such a thing isn't done. 

> it to work then 
> although I suppose the process must've looked funny. I
> wouldn't try that 
> today though... Nowadays just about any distro is
> noob-friendly enough, 
> perhaps excluding Gentoo and Slackware. 

Like I said, "A Lot has changed in 12 years".  Debian is more friendly today 
than yesterday as are most distros, but there are others that are friendlier, a 
lot friendlier.

So, I stand by my initial statement that Debian is not suitable for the Linux 
firsttimer.  I would never recommend it to a noobie.  With Debian, you need to 
know, at least somewhat, what you're doing.  

B


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Re: New to Linux

[Patrick Bartek]

--- On Fri, 4/15/11, shawn wilson  wrote:

> On Fri, Apr 15, 2011 at 1:36 PM,
> Patrick Bartek 
> wrote:
> > --- On Thu, 4/14/11, Marc Shapiro 
> wrote:
> >
> >> On 04/12/11 09:15, Patrick Bartek
> >> wrote:
> >> > --- On Tue, 4/12/11, rishabh animesh
> >> wrote:
> >> >
> > FWIW: O'Reilly published a Special Edition book
> LEARNING DEBIAN GNU/LINUX (c. 1999).  It was a very good
> introduction and step-by-step guide to installing and using
> Debian.  I got it for free from the Debian booth at Las
> Vegas COMDEX 1999.  This was the first year Linux had a
> major presence at COMDEX.  Having the Linux people all in
> one exhibit hall greatly simplified my investigations of
> making the switch from the Amiga. I still have the book.
>  However, ultimately, I chose Mandrake 7 as my first
> distro.  Debian was not a distro for the noobie, either
> then or now.
> >
> 
> yeah, but mandrake isn't a distro for any sane human :)

At the time--circa 2000--Mandrake was the overall recommended distro for the 
Linux tyro.  The most "plug-n-playable" distro of the day.  I used it through 
version 9, IIRC, before tackling Slackware to really learn the ins-n-outs of 
Linux.

> that's ok, because back then, i think i was upgrading to
> slackware 4
> (or maybe they made the jump in versions to 7 at that
> time). watch a
> newbie try to get x windows up on that stuff - that was
> fun.

I think 7 debuted late 1999 or early 2000.  Right about the time I began 
checking out Linux as my new OS of choice. 

B


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Re: New to Linux

[Krzysztof Bieniasz]

> FWIW: O'Reilly published a Special Edition book LEARNING DEBIAN
> GNU/LINUX (c. 1999).  It was a very good introduction and step-by-step
> guide to installing and using Debian.  I got it for free from the Debian
> booth at Las Vegas COMDEX 1999.  This was the first year Linux had a
> major presence at COMDEX.  Having the Linux people all in one exhibit
> hall greatly simplified my investigations of making the switch from the
> Amiga. I still have the book.  However, ultimately, I chose Mandrake 7
> as my first distro.  Debian was not a distro for the noobie, either then
> or now.

I wouldn't agree. I started with Debian being a complete noob and I 
manage somehow. Actually some of my first experiences were with compiling 
the kernel because the one bundled with stable (Lenny) didn't have the 
module for my wireless interface :). And I managed to get it to work then 
although I suppose the process must've looked funny. I wouldn't try that 
today though... Nowadays just about any distro is noob-friendly enough, 
perhaps excluding Gentoo and Slackware. 

KTB


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Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

On Fri, Apr 15, 2011 at 1:36 PM, Patrick Bartek  wrote:
> --- On Thu, 4/14/11, Marc Shapiro  wrote:
>
>> On 04/12/11 09:15, Patrick Bartek
>> wrote:
>> > --- On Tue, 4/12/11, rishabh animesh
>> wrote:
>> >
> FWIW: O'Reilly published a Special Edition book LEARNING DEBIAN GNU/LINUX (c. 
> 1999).  It was a very good introduction and step-by-step guide to installing 
> and using Debian.  I got it for free from the Debian booth at Las Vegas 
> COMDEX 1999.  This was the first year Linux had a major presence at COMDEX.  
> Having the Linux people all in one exhibit hall greatly simplified my 
> investigations of making the switch from the Amiga. I still have the book.  
> However, ultimately, I chose Mandrake 7 as my first distro.  Debian was not a 
> distro for the noobie, either then or now.
>

yeah, but mandrake isn't a distro for any sane human :)

that's ok, because back then, i think i was upgrading to slackware 4
(or maybe they made the jump in versions to 7 at that time). watch a
newbie try to get x windows up on that stuff - that was fun.


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Re: New to Linux

[Patrick Bartek]

--- On Thu, 4/14/11, Marc Shapiro  wrote:

> On 04/12/11 09:15, Patrick Bartek
> wrote:
> > --- On Tue, 4/12/11, rishabh animesh 
> wrote:
> > 
> >> I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way
> to start on things?
> >> Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have
> experience only with
> >> algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++ but willing to
> learn more to help me
> >> get started with the OS mentioned above!
> > 
> > The best way?  Buy a non-distro specific text on
> Linux, first, to
> > establish a good foundation for additional
> learning.  Don't waste your
> > time searching the web for information.  There is
> a lot of stuff out there,
> > and it will just overwhelm and confuse you.  I
> suggest RUNNING LINUX
> > (O'Reilly, pub.).  I think the most current is
> the 5th edition, which
> > although is 5 years old is still a good place to
> start.  I have the 3rd
> > Edition which is 12 years old and I still use it as a
> reference.  It was
> > the first Linux book I purchased.
> 
> That was my first Linux book, as well.  But mine is
> the 2nd Edition, copyright 1996.

FWIW: O'Reilly published a Special Edition book LEARNING DEBIAN GNU/LINUX (c. 
1999).  It was a very good introduction and step-by-step guide to installing 
and using Debian.  I got it for free from the Debian booth at Las Vegas COMDEX 
1999.  This was the first year Linux had a major presence at COMDEX.  Having 
the Linux people all in one exhibit hall greatly simplified my investigations 
of making the switch from the Amiga. I still have the book.  However, 
ultimately, I chose Mandrake 7 as my first distro.  Debian was not a distro for 
the noobie, either then or now.

B


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Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

On Fri, Apr 15, 2011 at 1:26 AM, Marc Shapiro  wrote:
> On 04/12/11 09:15, Patrick Bartek wrote:
>>
>> --- On Tue, 4/12/11, rishabh animesh  wrote:
>>
>>> I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things?
>>> Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with
>>> algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++ but willing to learn more to help me
>>> get started with the OS mentioned above!
>>
>> The best way?  Buy a non-distro specific text on Linux, first, to
>
>> establish a good foundation for additional learning.  Don't waste your
>> time searching the web for information.  There is a lot of stuff out
>> there,
>> and it will just overwhelm and confuse you.  I suggest RUNNING LINUX
>> (O'Reilly, pub.).  I think the most current is the 5th edition, which
>> although is 5 years old is still a good place to start.  I have the 3rd
>> Edition which is 12 years old and I still use it as a reference.  It was
>> the first Linux book I purchased.
>
> That was my first Linux book, as well.  But mine is the 2nd Edition,
> copyright 1996.
>

well, if you're going to drop $$ on a computer book, i would
definitely go with o'reilly. however, my point is that there is *so*
much documentation on the net, i'd read that first and then think
about whether you need a book. ie, i got the 'perl cookbook' because i
kept finding examples online that were cited from that book. also,
i've checked 'running linux' at least 4 times from libraries over the
years :)

as a student, if you're thinking about another book that costs half as
much as o'reilly, think hard - it generally isn't worth it.
if you want an excellent example of the great documentation that i
would probably pay for if it weren't free:
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/web/library/ <-- is one of the
reading on the net (not specific to linux or anything really but just
great stuff).


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Re: New to Linux

[Marc Shapiro]

On 04/12/11 09:15, Patrick Bartek wrote:

--- On Tue, 4/12/11, rishabh animesh  wrote:


I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things?
Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with
algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++ but willing to learn more to help me
get started with the OS mentioned above!


The best way?  Buy a non-distro specific text on Linux, first, to

> establish a good foundation for additional learning.  Don't waste your
> time searching the web for information.  There is a lot of stuff out 
there,

> and it will just overwhelm and confuse you.  I suggest RUNNING LINUX
> (O'Reilly, pub.).  I think the most current is the 5th edition, which
> although is 5 years old is still a good place to start.  I have the 3rd
> Edition which is 12 years old and I still use it as a reference.  It was
> the first Linux book I purchased.

That was my first Linux book, as well.  But mine is the 2nd Edition, 
copyright 1996.


Marc


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Re: New to Linux

[rishabh animesh]

Thanks Larry! I'll get hold of the book asap!

On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 7:00 PM,  wrote:

>
>
>  - Original Message -
> *From: *rishabh animesh 
> *To: *debian-user@lists.debian.org
> *Sent: *4/12/2011 11:41:13 AM
> *Subject: *New to Linux
>
> Hello People,
>
> I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things?
> Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with
> algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++
> but willing to learn more to help me get started with the OS mentioned
> above!
>
> I need suggestions on projects I can participate in considering I am just a
> noob in this.
>
> I have experiences with the Search Technology. I have also created a forum
> to promote programming among my peers where we organize monthly contests on
> this portal. www.code.vrglinug.org
>
> Regards
> Rishabh
>
> I'm sure you will have lots of courses involving operating systems in your
> future curriculum.  However if you want to start now I would recommend a
> very simple (and quite old) text Operating Systems Design and Implementation
> by Tanenbaum.  The O/S described is much like UNIX (or Linux), written
> primarily in C, and the book comes with source code.
>
> Larry
>
>

Re: New to Linux

[Peter Beck]

On Wed, 2011-04-13 at 14:36 +0200, Erwan David wrote:
> The author (or the copyright owner, depending of the country) may
> change the licence at any moment.
> However, he cannot remove rights to people who obtained the software
> under GPL. 

a recent example is NoMachine NX4...they changed to closed source
http://www.nomachine.com/news-read.php?idnews=330



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Re: New to Linux

[Erwan David]

On Wed, Apr 13, 2011 at 02:32:23PM CEST, Chen Wei  said:
> On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 01:41:58PM -0400, Chris Brennan wrote:
> > GPL doesn't promise future freedom when someone else legally buy's the
> > rights to the source and changes it. That being said, Final versions of a
> > program released under GPL or another F/OSS licence allows that snapshot in
> > time of the code to remain unchanged(9and thus still free for another
> > developer group/project to pickup and continue)
> > 
> > These are very real fears being expressed all over Open Source communities,
> > it has been of much debate on the FreeBSD mailing lists as well as Gentoo.
> > 
> I am confused. My impression is once a software GPLed, it will remain
> GPL, all modifications/improvements/bug fixes etc. will be GPL as well.
> Therefor regardless the owner, the GPLed source can not be un-GPLed.

The author (or the copyright owner, depending of the country) may
change the licence at any moment.
However, he cannot remove rights to people who obtained the software
under GPL.


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Re: New to Linux

[Chen Wei]

On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 01:41:58PM -0400, Chris Brennan wrote:
> GPL doesn't promise future freedom when someone else legally buy's the
> rights to the source and changes it. That being said, Final versions of a
> program released under GPL or another F/OSS licence allows that snapshot in
> time of the code to remain unchanged(9and thus still free for another
> developer group/project to pickup and continue)
> 
> These are very real fears being expressed all over Open Source communities,
> it has been of much debate on the FreeBSD mailing lists as well as Gentoo.
> 
I am confused. My impression is once a software GPLed, it will remain
GPL, all modifications/improvements/bug fixes etc. will be GPL as well.
Therefor regardless the owner, the GPLed source can not be un-GPLed.


-- 
Chen Wei


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Re: New to Linux

[Steven]

On 2011-04-12 18:41, rishabh animesh wrote:
> Hello People,
> 
> I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things?
> Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with
> algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++
> but willing to learn more to help me get started with the OS mentioned
> above!
> 
> I need suggestions on projects I can participate in considering I am
> just a noob in this.
> 
> I have experiences with the Search Technology. I have also created a
> forum to promote programming among my peers where we organize monthly
> contests on this portal. www.code.vrglinug.org
> 
> 
> Regards
> Rishabh


The following books with get you started:

Debian GNU/Linux Bible. Debian release version 6.x only a short time ago
so the book will most like be for the older version.

The Debian System concepts and techniques.

Moving to Linux, Second Edition: Kiss the Blue Screen of Death Goodbye!
(2nd Edition)

Also look at the Debian doc web site.
http://www.debian.org/doc/books


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Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

On Wed, Apr 13, 2011 at 12:47 AM, Ron Johnson  wrote:
> On 04/12/2011 07:17 PM, Dr. Ed Morbius wrote:
>>
>> on 17:11 Tue 12 Apr, rishabh animesh (rishabh.anim...@gmail.com) wrote:
>
> [snip]
>>
>>> I have experiences with the Search Technology. I have also created a
>>> forum
>>> to promote programming among my peers where we organize monthly contests
>>> on
>>> this portal. www.code.vrglinug.org
>>
>> Um.  So, are you asking a question or spamming your website?
>>
>
> Nah, he's just an over-enthusiastic geek.  None of us were ever like that...
> :)
>

i seriously hope he tries to actually learn this stuff. i really do
hate dealing with cs people who get out of college, know theory and
think they can run anything. i truly don't know what college
teaches people, but it doesn't seem to be how to run a network or
write good code or any other life skill.

ok, i really shouldn't be so down on cs majors - i don't have to deal
with them as much as some friends of mine who manage university
networks or hire these folks fresh out of college. they've got more
room to bitch than i.

this said, there is something to be said for theory - i recently
learned about mvc programming and can't recite the upper 4 osi layers
off hand and didn't know about event handling (programming again)
until recently. this is mainly theory that should be taught in school.


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Re: New to Linux

[Ron Johnson]

On 04/12/2011 07:17 PM, Dr. Ed Morbius wrote:

on 17:11 Tue 12 Apr, rishabh animesh (rishabh.anim...@gmail.com) wrote:

[snip]



I have experiences with the Search Technology. I have also created a forum
to promote programming among my peers where we organize monthly contests on
this portal. www.code.vrglinug.org


Um.  So, are you asking a question or spamming your website?



Nah, he's just an over-enthusiastic geek.  None of us were ever like 
that... :)


--
"Neither the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure
the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally
corrupt."
Samuel Adams, essay in The Public Advertiser, 1749


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Re: New to Linux

[Ron Johnson]

On 04/12/2011 12:41 PM, Chris Brennan wrote:
[snip]


As to Shawn's response: "per the source of virtualbox - oracle owns it.
however, it is all
under a gpl type license exept the usb driver which is close source."

GPL protect the current incarnation of a project, what's to stop Oracle from
release ver5 that *is not* under the GPL licence and the same name?



Depends on how many "external" developers there are and whether The 
Project can (like the FSF and OOo) get them to assign their copyrights 
to the Project.


That is, after all, how the FSF was able to do a mass, instantaneous 
switch to the GPL3 of projects with thousands of contributors.


--
"Neither the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure
the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally
corrupt."
Samuel Adams, essay in The Public Advertiser, 1749


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Re: New to Linux

[Doug]

On 4/12/2011 8:17 PM, Dr. Ed Morbius wrote:

on 17:11 Tue 12 Apr, rishabh animesh (rishabh.anim...@gmail.com) wrote:

Hello People,

I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things?

There's a two-step process, I recommend:

1: install  Linux.
2: use it.


Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with
algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++ but willing to learn more to help
me get started with the OS mentioned above!

I need suggestions on projects I can participate in considering I am just a
noob in this.

So:  what are your goals?

1.  Become proficient as a Linux user (GUI)?
2.  Become proficient as a Linux user (CLI)?
3.  Become proficient as a Linux administrator?
4.  Become proficient as a Linux programmer?
5.  Contribute to Free Software / Debian projects?

In all cases, start by installing and using Linux.

/snip/

I have experiences with the Search Technology. I have also created a forum
to promote programming among my peers where we organize monthly contests on
this portal. www.code.vrglinug.org
I know that someone on this thread discouraged you from learning shell 
programming, but
with your present background and experience, I think you ought to go for 
it.  If your experience is
with a Unix system, you probably are familiar with the C-shell, and then 
you should concentrate
on that.  If you don't have that background, Linux "defaults" to the 
bash shell, an offspring of the
Bourne shell, so that would be the one to learn. (Both, and some others, 
are available in Linux.)
You are going to have to learn at least a smattering of the commands 
anyway, and there is not
an awful lot of difference between Csh and bash.  If you are already 
familiar with Unix editors,
they are all here on Linux.  And if not, there are simpler ones like 
pico, nano, and MC, which is
more than just an editor.   And, btw, shell programming derives a lot 
from the C language, so if
you have that--which I'm reasonably sure you do--then you have a good 
head start.  There are
a batch of books available free for the download on bash usage and 
programming.  They are
in PDF format, so all it costs is the paper to print them on.  (Hint: 
set your printer to do
double-sided!)  Look on Google for leads to them, or get some advice 
right here.  Not being a

guru myself, I will refrain from recommending any study material.

Good luck on your new adventure--doug



Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend.
Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read. --G. Marx


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Re: New to Linux

[Scott Ferguson]

On 13/04/11 10:17, Dr. Ed Morbius wrote:
> on 17:11 Tue 12 Apr, rishabh animesh (rishabh.anim...@gmail.com) wrote:
>> Hello People,

> 
> Um.  So, are you asking a question or spamming your website?
> 
:-D
A quick look at the about page on the main domain that the poster claims
to have created

Cheers

-- 
Tuttle? His name's Buttle.
There must be some mistake.
Mistake? [Chuckles]
We don't make mistakes.


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Re: New to Linux

[Dr. Ed Morbius]

on 17:11 Tue 12 Apr, rishabh animesh (rishabh.anim...@gmail.com) wrote:
> Hello People,
> 
> I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things?

There's a two-step process, I recommend:

1: install  Linux.
2: use it.

> Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with
> algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++ but willing to learn more to help
> me get started with the OS mentioned above!
> 
> I need suggestions on projects I can participate in considering I am just a
> noob in this.

So:  what are your goals?

1.  Become proficient as a Linux user (GUI)?
2.  Become proficient as a Linux user (CLI)?
3.  Become proficient as a Linux administrator?
4.  Become proficient as a Linux programmer?
5.  Contribute to Free Software / Debian projects?

In all cases, start by installing and using Linux.

Start at http://www.debian.org/

The installation/getting Debian links are at the top of the page:

http://www.debian.org/distrib/

I'd suggest the "Download a small installation image" option.  The
64-bti PC netinst iso link is right there:


http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/6.0.1a/amd64/iso-cd/debian-6.0.1a-amd64-netinst.iso

Take a look at the Installation Manual.  While you don't have to read
the whole damned thing, if you run into problems, it's a very good
guide.  The installer is pretty self-explanatory these days:

http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/installmanual

The support pages point you at a bunch of resources from documentation
to support forums, mailing lists, IRC, and more:

http://www.debian.org/support

Roll through the reading on the main docs page:

http://www.debian.org/doc/

Most of the first of those (Installation Guide, Debian GNU/Linux FAQ,
Debian Reference, Debian Wiki) are excellent and highly recommended.

If you want to start doing Debian package development, read the "Deiban
New Maintainers Guide" and "Debian Developer's Reference".

Don't forget that Linux includes extensive documentation on the system
itself:  man pages, info pages, package documentation under
/usr/share/doc/, HOWTOs, and others.  Once you've got a
desktop installed, you can access much of this locally on your system's
own webserver by installing dwww and swish++:

aptitude install dwww swish++ dlocate info2www

Then point your browser at http://localhost/dwww

> I have experiences with the Search Technology. I have also created a forum
> to promote programming among my peers where we organize monthly contests on
> this portal. www.code.vrglinug.org

Um.  So, are you asking a question or spamming your website?

-- 
Dr. Ed Morbius, Chief Scientist /|
  Robot Wrangler / Staff Psychologist| When you seek unlimited power
Krell Power Systems Unlimited|  Go to Krell!


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Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

I suppose my point was, get a virtualization platform and go to town. I
disagree with the fears of some about vbox (at worst, it may go the way of
LibraOffice). But use whatever really.

Ps - knowing code has little to do with knowing a system. Than again I meet
dumb as hell cs majors all the time that will spit theory like gospel - half
the time the theory doesn't make sense in any real application. Don't be one
of them. Learn the system, learn to code, and learn the theory, then you can
know what to apply.

Sorry for replying out of the thread. I'm hoping this email won't be
responded to and will instead get this thread back on track answering his
question.

Re: New to Linux

[Chris Brennan]

On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 1:24 PM, Jonathan Matthews
 wrote:

They got borged by Oracle, IIRC, leaving them with at least 3
> different virtual platforms: virtualbox, solaris zones, virtual iron.
> Ooo, and maybe one more whose name escapes me. They also bought up
> Q-Layer, who were *great* ... and then dropped it entirely.
>
> OVM - that's what I was thinking of. Oracle VM, a RHEL-based Xen
> product with a web UI. Not too shabby, but why would you /bother/?
>
> ISTR there are some more exceptions than /just/ USB, but can't recall
> them at the moment.
>
> I'd honestly not recommend an Oracle-owned product at this point.
> They're showing themselves to be too hostile to FLOSS to trust them.
> And while I /know/ virtualbox is good and useful, the (relatively
> small!) extra work required to get KVM+libvirt (i.e. virt-manager)
> going will repay you many times over for the greater control and
> understanding you'll have of the underlying system. IMHO
>

IIRC, MySQL is another one that has been called into question do to Oracle's
resent acquisition of Sun Microsystems Products.

As to Shawn's response: "per the source of virtualbox - oracle owns it.
however, it is all
under a gpl type license exept the usb driver which is close source."

GPL protect the current incarnation of a project, what's to stop Oracle from
release ver5 that *is not* under the GPL licence and the same name?

Also keep in mind that when Oracle acquired Open Office, the Sub Developers
on the project left/quit the project (to start LibreOffice).

GPL doesn't promise future freedom when someone else legally buy's the
rights to the source and changes it. That being said, Final versions of a
program released under GPL or another F/OSS licence allows that snapshot in
time of the code to remain unchanged(9and thus still free for another
developer group/project to pickup and continue)

These are very real fears being expressed all over Open Source communities,
it has been of much debate on the FreeBSD mailing lists as well as Gentoo.

-- 

Did you know...
If you play a Windows 2000 CD backwards, you hear satanic messages,
but what's worse is when you play it forward
  ...it installs Windows 2000
   -- Alfred Perlstein on chat at freebsd.org

Re: New to Linux

[Jonathan Matthews]

On 12 April 2011 16:34, shawn wilson  wrote:
> On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 10:53 AM, Chris Brennan  wrote:
>> On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 10:12 AM, shawn wilson  wrote:
>>>
>>> another thing about times changing - virtuals are great. download some
>>> popular distros (don't limit yourself to linux either). i'd suggest
>>> debian, fedora, centos, ubuntu, and freebsd. then get virtual box and
>>> have fun. go, install, snapshot and then mess everything up. if you
>>> can't figure out how to put it back together again, revert to the
>>> snapshot.

I suggest Debian, CentOS and a BSD are enough to get started with :-)
No need to scare the chap off /that/ soon ;-)

>> You'll need VMWare or VirtualBox (VBox is free but because it's not Oracle
>> owned, it's licence might radically change without warning ... If you
>> *really* want to make a project out of it, try Gentoo too, fair warning
>> though, it can be time consuming.
>
> virtualbox, vmware, xen, hyperv, kvm, qemu, virtual iron (are they
> still in business?)

They got borged by Oracle, IIRC, leaving them with at least 3
different virtual platforms: virtualbox, solaris zones, virtual iron.
Ooo, and maybe one more whose name escapes me. They also bought up
Q-Layer, who were *great* ... and then dropped it entirely.

OVM - that's what I was thinking of. Oracle VM, a RHEL-based Xen
product with a web UI. Not too shabby, but why would you /bother/?

> and i'm probably missing some others. the reason
> i just mentioned virtualbox is because it's easy. there is also
> proxmox which is a bare metal environment but that requires spare
> hardware and isn't as mature as virtualbox.
>
> per the source of virtualbox - oracle owns it. however, it is all
> under a gpl type license exept the usb driver which is close source.

ISTR there are some more exceptions than /just/ USB, but can't recall
them at the moment.

I'd honestly not recommend an Oracle-owned product at this point.
They're showing themselves to be too hostile to FLOSS to trust them.
And while I /know/ virtualbox is good and useful, the (relatively
small!) extra work required to get KVM+libvirt (i.e. virt-manager)
going will repay you many times over for the greater control and
understanding you'll have of the underlying system. IMHO.

Jonathan
-- 
Jonathan Matthews
London, UK
http://www.jpluscplusm.com/contact.html


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Re: New to Linux

[Patrick Bartek]

--- On Tue, 4/12/11, rishabh animesh  wrote:

> I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things? 
> Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with 
> algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++ but willing to learn more to help me
> get started with the OS mentioned above! 

The best way?  Buy a non-distro specific text on Linux, first, to establish a 
good foundation for additional learning.  Don't waste your time searching the 
web for information.  There is a lot of stuff out there, and it will just 
overwhelm and confuse you.  I suggest RUNNING LINUX (O'Reilly, pub.).  I think 
the most current is the 5th edition, which although is 5 years old is still a 
good place to start.  I have the 3rd Edition which is 12 years old and I still 
use it as a reference.  It was the first Linux book I purchased.

Worry about programming "projects" later.  Until you know how Linux works, 
you'd be wasting your time coding for it now.


B


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Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 10:53 AM, Chris Brennan  wrote:
> On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 10:12 AM, shawn wilson  wrote:
>>
>> another thing about times changing - virtuals are great. download some
>> popular distros (don't limit yourself to linux either). i'd suggest
>> debian, fedora, centos, ubuntu, and freebsd. then get virtual box and
>> have fun. go, install, snapshot and then mess everything up. if you
>> can't figure out how to put it back together again, revert to the
>> snapshot.
>
> You'll need VMWare or VirtualBox (VBox is free but because it's not Oracle
> owned, it's licence might radically change without warning ... If you
> *really* want to make a project out of it, try Gentoo too, fair warning
> though, it can be time consuming.

virtualbox, vmware, xen, hyperv, kvm, qemu, virtual iron (are they
still in business?), and i'm probably missing some others. the reason
i just mentioned virtualbox is because it's easy. there is also
proxmox which is a bare metal environment but that requires spare
hardware and isn't as mature as virtualbox.

per the source of virtualbox - oracle owns it. however, it is all
under a gpl type license exept the usb driver which is close source.


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Re: New to Linux

[Chris Brennan]

On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 11:03 AM, Peter Beck  wrote:

On Tue, 2011-04-12 at 10:53 -0400, Chris Brennan wrote:
> > You'll need VMWare or VirtualBox (VBox is free but because it's not
>

s/not/now (Dyslexia first thing in the morning caught me off guard :D)


>  > Oracle owned, it's licence might radically change without warning
>
> why not KVM ? If your processor supports VT I would go for KVM.


Choice I suppose  my CPU supports VT and so does VBox, so that
functionality is passed to the Guest OS anyway


-- 
Did you know...
If you play a Windows 2000 CD backwards, you hear satanic messages,

but what's worse is when you play it forward
  ...it installs Windows 2000
   -- Alfred Perlstein on chat at freebsd.org

Re: New to Linux

[Peter Beck]

On Tue, 2011-04-12 at 10:53 -0400, Chris Brennan wrote:
> You'll need VMWare or VirtualBox (VBox is free but because it's not
> Oracle owned, it's licence might radically change without warning

why not KVM ? If your processor supports VT I would go for KVM.



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Re: New to Linux

[Chris Brennan]

On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 10:12 AM, shawn wilson  wrote:

another thing about times changing - virtuals are great. download some
> popular distros (don't limit yourself to linux either). i'd suggest
> debian, fedora, centos, ubuntu, and freebsd. then get virtual box and
> have fun. go, install, snapshot and then mess everything up. if you
> can't figure out how to put it back together again, revert to the
> snapshot.


You'll need VMWare or VirtualBox (VBox is free but because it's not Oracle
owned, it's licence might radically change without warning ... If you
*really* want to make a project out of it, try Gentoo too, fair warning
though, it can be time consuming.

Re: New to Linux

[shawn wilson]

On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 7:41 AM, rishabh animesh
 wrote:
> Hello People,
>
> I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things?
> Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with
> algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++
> but willing to learn more to help me get started with the OS mentioned
> above!
>

well, best i can do is tell you how i did it - things have changed
much with the internet in the last 15 years or so. i read some of the
how to docs (tldp.org). now, i was going to recommend the 'windows to
linux' howto (maybe it was a mini) that sorta described the different
ideas with how the file system is laid out and drive letters vs
mounting but i don't see it. another good one (that i do see) is the
partitioning one.

now, as i mentioned, times have changed. so, i wouldn't put too much
effort in reading these (especially if they start putting you to
sleep). there are tons of resources, youtube videos, books (though i'm
done buying $30+ linux books that contain popular man pages with
author notes).

another thing about times changing - virtuals are great. download some
popular distros (don't limit yourself to linux either). i'd suggest
debian, fedora, centos, ubuntu, and freebsd. then get virtual box and
have fun. go, install, snapshot and then mess everything up. if you
can't figure out how to put it back together again, revert to the
snapshot.

> I need suggestions on projects I can participate in considering I am just a
> noob in this.
>

projects? what do you mean and what do you want to get into? i mean,
hacking around with kernel drivers is fun, some people like gui stuff,
if you find some program that doesn't have a package for some distro,
you could always contribute and learn tons that way.

> I have experiences with the Search Technology. I have also created a forum
> to promote programming among my peers where we organize monthly contests on
> this portal. www.code.vrglinug.org
>

search technology? what the hell do you mean by that? heh ok, just to
give you some (ot) stuff to ponder over, check out the solutions here:
http://www.ioccc.org/


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Re: New to Linux

[owens]

- Original Message -
From: rishabh animesh 
To: debian-user@lists.debian.org
Sent: 4/12/2011 11:41:13 AM
Subject: New to Linux


Hello People,

I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things? 
Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with 
algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++ 
but willing to learn more to help me get started with the OS mentioned above! 

I need suggestions on projects I can participate in considering I am just a 
noob in this. 

I have experiences with the Search Technology. I have also created a forum to 
promote programming among my peers where we organize monthly contests on this 
portal. www.code.vrglinug.org 

Regards
Rishabh

I'm sure you will have lots of courses involving operating systems in your 
future curriculum.  However if you want to start now I would recommend a very 
simple (and quite old) text Operating Systems Design and Implementation by 
Tanenbaum.  The O/S described is much like UNIX (or Linux), written primarily 
in C, and the book comes with source code.  

Larry

Re: New to Linux

[Ron Johnson]

On 04/12/2011 06:41 AM, rishabh animesh wrote:

Hello People,

I am new to Linux and Debian. Whats the best way to start on things?


What things?

Have you yet actually *installed* Debian?


Currently I'm a Computer Science student and have experience only with
algorithms! Comfortable with C/C++
but willing to learn more to help me get started with the OS mentioned
above!



Honestly, being a Comp Sci student and knowing C++ are completely *not 
necessary* to using Linux: many of us just use it to browse the web, 
watch videos, play games, etc.



I need suggestions on projects I can participate in considering I am just a
noob in this.



What interests you?  What has the teacher assigned you?  What "itches" 
do you need scratched?



--
"Neither the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure
the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally
corrupt."
Samuel Adams, essay in The Public Advertiser, 1749


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Re: New to Linux

[Eduardo M KALINOWSKI]

Frank Lanitz escreveu:
> I was referring to the confidential stuff ;)
>   

But you quoted Eugene's comment ont it, which made your message somewhat
ambiguous as to what you were refering to.

-- 
Eduardo M Kalinowski
edua...@kalinowski.com.br


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Re: New to Linux

[David Goodenough]

On Monday 05 January 2009, Martin, Larry D wrote:
> I have downloaded the Debian 40r5 for S390 and have it on CD.
>
>
>
> When I load the CD into the HMC (zSeries z9BC) and try to do the "Load
> from CD/DVD" operation I get:
>
> ""An error has occurred while trying to obtain a list of the software
> that can be loaded."
>
>
>
> I am not sure if this is an HMC or a Debian message.  It has a message
> number of ACT36201 but I cannot find a reference to that message.
>
>
>
> Does anyone have an idea what I have done wrong?
>
>
>
> Thanks,   ..Larry
>
>
>
> Larry D. Martin
>
> Mainframe Systems Support
>
> Office of Information Technology and Communications
>
> 301.883.7335
>
>
>
>
>
> ...
>... This E-mail and any of its attachments may contain Prince George’s
> County Government or Prince George's County 7th Judicial Circuit Court
> proprietary information, which is privileged and confidential. This E-mail
> is intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to which it is
> addressed. If you are not the intended recipient of this E-mail, you are
> hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution, copying, or action
> taken in relation to the contents of and attachments to this E-mail is
> strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. If you have received this E-mail
> in error, please notify the sender immediately and permanently delete the
> original and any copy of this E-mail and any printout.


That looks like an IBM style error message to me - Linux does not tend to
go in for message numbers.

I would guess that what you need to do is boot from the CD rather than 
Load from it.  You may find the best thing to do is to ask on the Linux-390
list ( linux-...@vm.marist.edu ) as that is where most of the Linux 390
experts are to be found.

David


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Re: New to Linux

[Frank Lanitz]

On Mon, 05 Jan 2009 17:41:57 +0200
"Eugene V. Lyubimkin"  wrote:

> Frank Lanitz wrote:
> > On Mon, 05 Jan 2009 17:03:17 +0200
> > "Eugene V. Lyubimkin"  wrote:
> > 
> >> Martin, Larry D wrote:
> >>> This E-mail and any of its attachments []
> >> This is off-topic, but any info on Debian public lists is publicly
> >> archived and therefore the noted message has no sense.
> > 
> > Notes like this doesn't make sense at all ;) 
> I don't agree. Have you deleted first letter in this thread just
> after reading it? :)

I was referring to the confidential stuff ;)

Cheers, 
Frank
-- 
http://frank.uvena.de/en/


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Re: New to Linux

[Ron Johnson]

On 01/05/09 08:20, Martin, Larry D wrote:

I have downloaded the Debian 40r5 for S390 and have it on CD.

 

When I load the CD into the HMC (zSeries z9BC) and try to do the “Load 
from CD/DVD” operation I get:


“"An error has occurred while trying to obtain a list of the software 
that can be loaded."

 

I am not sure if this is an HMC or a Debian message.  It has a message 
number of ACT36201 but I cannot find a reference to that message.


 


Does anyone have an idea what I have done wrong?


There's a Debian list dedicated to S390, which should have the 
specialized info you need.


--
Ron Johnson, Jr.
Jefferson LA  USA

I like my women like I like my coffee - purchased at above-market
rates from eco-friendly organic farming cooperatives in Latin America.


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Re: New to Linux

[Eugene V. Lyubimkin]

Frank Lanitz wrote:
> On Mon, 05 Jan 2009 17:03:17 +0200
> "Eugene V. Lyubimkin"  wrote:
> 
>> Martin, Larry D wrote:
>>> This E-mail and any of its attachments []
>> This is off-topic, but any info on Debian public lists is publicly
>> archived and therefore the noted message has no sense.
> 
> Notes like this doesn't make sense at all ;) 
I don't agree. Have you deleted first letter in this thread just after reading
it? :)

-- 
Eugene V. Lyubimkin aka JackYF, JID: jackyf.devel(maildog)gmail.com
Ukrainian C++ Developer, Debian Maintainer, APT contributor



signature.asc
Description: OpenPGP digital signature

Re: New to Linux

[Lisi Reisz]

On Monday 05 January 2009 14:20:16 Martin, Larry D wrote:
> I have downloaded the Debian 40r5 for S390 and have it on CD.
>
>
>
> When I load the CD into the HMC (zSeries z9BC) and try to do the "Load
> from CD/DVD" operation I get:
>
> ""An error has occurred while trying to obtain a list of the software
> that can be loaded."
>
>
>
> I am not sure if this is an HMC or a Debian message.  It has a message
> number of ACT36201 but I cannot find a reference to that message.
>
>
>
> Does anyone have an idea what I have done wrong?

This is purely a guess...

It sounds to me as if you were trying to load the software into your computer 
as you would a Windows program.

Or did you download the iso file, create a bootable CD and try to boot from 
it?  

If the answer is "no" or "You what???", come back again and I'll try to give 
you clear instructions.  (Or someone else will.)

HTH
Lisi


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Re: New to Linux

[Frank Lanitz]

On Mon, 05 Jan 2009 17:03:17 +0200
"Eugene V. Lyubimkin"  wrote:

> Martin, Larry D wrote:
> > This E-mail and any of its attachments []
> This is off-topic, but any info on Debian public lists is publicly
> archived and therefore the noted message has no sense.

Notes like this doesn't make sense at all ;) 

Cheers, 
Frank
-- 
http://frank.uvena.de/en/


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Re: New to Linux

[Eugene V. Lyubimkin]

Martin, Larry D wrote:
> This E-mail and any of its attachments []
This is off-topic, but any info on Debian public lists is publicly archived
and therefore the noted message has no sense.

-- 
Eugene V. Lyubimkin aka JackYF, JID: jackyf.devel(maildog)gmail.com
Ukrainian C++ Developer, Debian Maintainer, APT contributor



signature.asc
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Re: new to linux-ipchains trouble

[Andreas Janssen]

Hello

jones joens (<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>) wrote:

> Hello, I am new to the linux game and am running into some difficulty.
>  I cannot get ipchains, iptables, or ipfwadm to work.  All three give
> me errors that say something is missing in the kernel.  Such that
>  
> ipfwadm --> Generic IP Firewall Chains not in this Kernel
> ipchains -L --> Incompatible with this Kernel
> iptables -L --> can't initialize iptables table 'filter': iptables
> who? (do you need insmod)  Perhaps iptables or your Kernel needs to be
> upgraded.
>  
> I got these packages using dselect.  Kernelversion shows 2.2.  For
> ipchains and iptables I am using a generic -L (list) command since I
> am not exactly sure about setting up rules.  I  want to make sure that
> the programs where properly installed and are working before I get
> into the rules part of it.  Do I need some library or a kernel upgrade
> or patch?

iptables is the new interface for Kernel 2.4, for 2.2 you should use
ipchains. Try to load the necessary kernel modules (at least: modprobe
ipchains).

best regards
Andreas Janssen

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Re: new to linux, trying to get netscape to work

[D. Hoyem]

Peter,
  When you installed if you did not add an sources to
your system on the install, go to /etc/apt and with vi
do a vi  sources.list.   This will open the
sources.list in a text editor. In the sources.list you
will see lines that start with the # space then
deb-ftp, or # space deb-src.  For those lines move the
cursor to that line and then press the x key twice,
that will delete the # and the space.  Do that on
every line, when your done press the Esc key then type
:wq that will save the changes that you just made. Now
type apt-get install communicator.  That will download
teh Netscape files and install them.  Netscape is
called a non-free program and does not come on the
cd's.
  Hope this isn't to confusing and it helps.
Don
--- Peter Christensen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> I'm so frustrated with Windows frequently "freezing
> up" that I'd really
> like to get Linux to work on my machine.  I bought a
> release of Debian
> about two years ago from Cheap*Bytes.  The disks say
> that it's release
> 2.1, though when I was installing it I noticed a
> message that seemed to
> imply that I had Debian 2.0.34.  (But I don't
> remember the exact
> message, unfortunately.)  I ended up not using Linux
> back then because I
> had a "Winmodem" on my machine.  Now that I have an
> external USRobotics
> modem I'm trying Linux again.  
> 
> The installation went fine, and I was able to dial
> my ISP using "PON" 
> In the windows manager FVWM95 there's a button on
> the taskbar for
> Netscape.  Nothing happened when I clicked on it. 
> This also happened
> for the Files, Editor, and Xview buttons.  But the
> Xterm, Xcalc, Kill,
> and Ghostview buttons do work.
> 
> I installed Netscape from my Netscape 4.75 CD, using
> the instructions
> that came with the CD.  (copy the .tar file, issue
> the tar -xvf command,
> then run ns-install.)  I assume everything went OK
> since there were no
> error messages.  But I still couldn't start
> Netscape!
> 
> Where did I go wrong?  Was it a mistake to buy
> Debian from Cheap*Bytes? 
> Do I just need a newer release?  Is Netscape
> normally included with the
> Debian release?
> 
> Thanks,
> Peter Christensen
> 
> 
> -- 
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> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
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> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Re: new to linux, trying to get netscape to work

[Oliver Elphick]

Peter Christensen wrote:
  >I'm so frustrated with Windows frequently "freezing up" that I'd really
  >like to get Linux to work on my machine.  I bought a release of Debian
  >about two years ago from Cheap*Bytes.  The disks say that it's release
  >2.1, though when I was installing it I noticed a message that seemed to
  >imply that I had Debian 2.0.34.  (But I don't remember the exact
  >message, unfortunately.)  I ended up not using Linux back then because I
  >had a "Winmodem" on my machine.  Now that I have an external USRobotics
  >modem I'm trying Linux again.  

2.0.34 is a Linux kernel version number; 2.1 is a Debian release number.
Debian is a collection of software that includes the Linux kernel; the 
Debian release number doesn't mean very much because you can upgrade
individual packages; it doesn't do much more than identify the CD's
approximate age.
  
  >The installation went fine, and I was able to dial my ISP using "PON" 
  >In the windows manager FVWM95 there's a button on the taskbar for
  >Netscape.  Nothing happened when I clicked on it.  This also happened
  >for the Files, Editor, and Xview buttons.  But the Xterm, Xcalc, Kill,
  >and Ghostview buttons do work.
  
Look into the manual pages for fvwm95 and learn how it's put together.  It
is quite configurable, and you can change the buttons or the commands they
run or both.  If the package containing the command linked to a button has
not been installed, the button will do nothing.

  >I installed Netscape from my Netscape 4.75 CD, using the instructions
  >that came with the CD.  (copy the .tar file, issue the tar -xvf command,
  >then run ns-install.)  I assume everything went OK since there were no
  >error messages.  But I still couldn't start Netscape!
  
On your CDs you may well find a Netscape installer package.  But what you
have done is pefectly valid; it may just need a bit more effort on your
part to learn what is happening.  The problem is probably that fvwm95
expects Netscape to be in a particular place, but you will have put
it somewhere else.  You would do best to look at a basic tutorial on using
Debian such as http://www.newriders.com/debian/html/noframes/debian-tutorial.ht
ml
and learn about search paths.

Somewhere under the directory where you installed Netscape there should be
an  executable program called netscape; if, in an xterm window, you change
into that directory and type ./netscape it should start up, or give an
error message that will explain what is going wrong.

  >Where did I go wrong?  Was it a mistake to buy Debian from Cheap*Bytes? 
  >Do I just need a newer release?  Is Netscape normally included with the
  >Debian release?
 
You do have a fairly out of date CD set, and it would be worth spending a small
amount of money or a large amount of download time in updating it.  (All
Debina packages are available on the net.)

-- 
Oliver Elphick[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Isle of Wight  http://www.lfix.co.uk/oliver
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  unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, 
  forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain 
  in the Lord."  I Corinthians 15:58 

Re: new to linux, trying to get netscape to work

[ktb]

On Wed, May 09, 2001 at 04:46:13PM -0400, Peter Christensen wrote:
> I'm so frustrated with Windows frequently "freezing up" that I'd really
> like to get Linux to work on my machine.  I bought a release of Debian
> about two years ago from Cheap*Bytes.  The disks say that it's release
> 2.1, though when I was installing it I noticed a message that seemed to
> imply that I had Debian 2.0.34.  (But I don't remember the exact
> message, unfortunately.)  I ended up not using Linux back then because I
> had a "Winmodem" on my machine.  Now that I have an external USRobotics
> modem I'm trying Linux again.  

2.0.34 more than likely refers to the kernel your running.  Sounds like
your using Debian 2.1.  Stable is now 2.2 running a kernel 2.2.xx.

> 
> The installation went fine, and I was able to dial my ISP using "PON" 
> In the windows manager FVWM95 there's a button on the taskbar for
> Netscape.  Nothing happened when I clicked on it.  This also happened
> for the Files, Editor, and Xview buttons.  But the Xterm, Xcalc, Kill,
> and Ghostview buttons do work.
> 
> I installed Netscape from my Netscape 4.75 CD, using the instructions
> that came with the CD.  (copy the .tar file, issue the tar -xvf command,
> then run ns-install.)  I assume everything went OK since there were no
> error messages.  But I still couldn't start Netscape!
> 

How are you trying to start it?  If your using one of the buttons in
your window manager, it might not be mapped to the executable.  Try
starting Netscape from the command line if you haven't -
$ netscape

> Where did I go wrong?  Was it a mistake to buy Debian from Cheap*Bytes? 
> Do I just need a newer release?  Is Netscape normally included with the
> Debian release?

You should upgrade to the latest stable release, 2.2 (Potato).  I don't
know if it would be more pertinent to upgrade onto your existing setup
or just install from scratch.  It has been too long for me to remember.
I usually just reinstall instead of "dist-upgrade"  Once you are running
Potato you can install Netscape with "apt-get" 
kent

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Re: Re: New to Linux

[benalb]

  

  ATENCIÓN: su mensaje no ha sido leido.

  La dirección que UD. ha utilizado no es bien recibida en
  este dominio. Esto quiere decir que, o bien intenta
  enviarme un mensaje con una cuenta que no cumple las
  normas básicas anti-spam, o bien, directamente está UD. en
  mis filtros. Pongase en contacto con su administrador para
  solucionar el problema.

Re: New to Linux

[Robert Cymbala]

--- The Grand Oral Disseminator <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> ...Please provide detailed information so that
> I can understand it...

If you would do me a favor and look at some documentation
and let me know what parts are not easy to understand:

  "Debian GNU/Linux on Toshiba T4700ct Notebook"
  http://www.lafn.org/~cymbala/Debian/t4700ct.html

Over two years I've developed a familiarity with Debian, but
can't tell if it has been expressed in a way that others can understand.

-Rob Cymbala
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[EMAIL PROTECTED]



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Re: New to Linux

[David B . Harris]

To quote "The Grand Oral Disseminator" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
# Hi...
# 
# I'm new to Linux, let's start with saying that!  But I am thnking
about installing Linux on my PC (Intel PIII 667MHz)...  Can you give me
some information about which distribution (A free distribution, since it
is just my goal to have a mere 'meeting' with Linux, to get to know it -
if you wish) would be best for me (I know about the Debian
Distribution), where I can downlaod it, how I should install it, what
other items I need, etc..

I think it depends on how much you know about computers, how quickly you
learn new things, and how much you're willing to read. The last point is
very important.

People who know next to nothing about computers, and arn't too
interested in learning should stick with Red Hat or Mandrake; they take
care of a lot of setup chores which a lot of people just don't get. Most
hardware in Debian has to be configured manually, at least partially.

If you don't learn new things too quickly, I'd suggest Red Hat. It does
a pretty good job of adding an eyecandy layer to everything, but
underneath it it's a Linux system, no matter what. And no matter what
people say, it's still designed primarily as a server OS. Using Red Hat,
you'll likely be able to get up and running quickly, using a nice GUI,
and then you can slowly get yourself accustomed to the hairier aspects
of Linux.

If you're unwilling to read much, you might as well not use Linux at
all; you'll be stuck in GNOME or KDE, and you'll be missing out on the
best things Linux has to offer.

If you're a quick study, you don't mind reading, and you're familiar
with the hardware within your computer, I strongly suggest Debian. It
takes a little while to learn where everything is, and how you
accomplish tasks, but once learned, Debian is extremely easy to use.
Things are laid out, generally, with a fair bit of forethought. There
are lots of little, very handy, Debian-specific utilities that are
invaluable. Maintaining a Debian system is generally easier too, if
you're using the stable variant. With Debian, "stable" means more than
"it won't crash", it also means "we won't change things out from
underneath you without due notice". On a Potato(the stable variant of
Debian) system, you can generally safely upgrade the system without
paying attention.

I've also found that Debian's packages are generally of much higher
quality. Since it's a community of volouteers, most people just package
the apps they use on a daily basis, the apps they're most fond of. Since
they only have one or two, and since they'll be using it themselvse, I
find that they take to time to really make things right.

Anyways, just my thoughts :)

David Barclay Harris, Clan Barclay
Aut agere, aut mori. (Either action, or death.)

Re: New to Linux

[Kent West]

will trillich wrote:


On Sun, Mar 04, 2001 at 01:40:26PM -0600, Kent West wrote:

You might also post what part of the world you're in; you might have a 
Debianite close by that would be willing to loan/burn/give you a CD and 
act as an "elmer" (teacher/friend/guide) to help get you going.


whence "elmer"?


Sorry; mixing my hobbies. The term "elmer" is popular in Amateur Radio 
(ham radio) circles.



and are there any elmers in southern indiana, u.s.a. ?




Kent, KC5ENO

Re: New to Linux

[will trillich]

On Sun, Mar 04, 2001 at 01:40:26PM -0600, Kent West wrote:
> You might also post what part of the world you're in; you might have a 
> Debianite close by that would be willing to loan/burn/give you a CD and 
> act as an "elmer" (teacher/friend/guide) to help get you going.

whence "elmer"?

and are there any elmers in southern indiana, u.s.a. ?

-- 
It is always hazardous to ask "Why?" in science, but it is often
interesting to do so just the same.
-- Isaac Asimov, 'The Genetic Code'

[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/newbieDoc -- we need your brain!
http://www.dontUthink.com/ -- your brain needs us!

Re: New to Linux

[Kent West]

The Grand Oral Disseminator wrote:


Hi...

 

I'm new to Linux, let's start with saying that!  But I am thnking 
about installing Linux on my PC (Intel PIII 667MHz)...  Can you give 
me some information about which distribution (A free distribution, 
since it is just my goal to have a mere 'meeting' with Linux, to get 
to know it - if you wish) would be best for me (I know about the 
Debian Distribution), where I can downlaod it, how I should install 
it, what other items I need, etc...


 

For the moment I am running MS Windows 2000, I also wonder how am I 
going to make my PC into a dual boot machine?




Since this is a Debian list, you'll generally get the response "Use 
Debian". Not wanting to break with the community spirit, let me suggest 
that you use Debian. :-)


There are other distros that are easier to install (well, actually, 
easier to get working with your modem/graphics setup/printer/etc), but 
once set up properly, Debian is the premier distro, and once you get 
spoiled to it, you'll never want to go to any other. In addition, I 
believe Debian is the "purest" Linux distro, so much so that it's not 
even called Debian Linux, but rather Debian GNU/Linux. There are 
philosophical reasons for adopting Debian over those other folks.


However, if you're just trying to get a look-see at Linux and aren't 
interested in the principles of Freedom in software  -  shame on you 
:-)  - and want something that is minimal hassle to take it for a spin, 
you might do better to get hold of a Storm or Corel CD (both of which 
are "Debian-based"); the next choice for a beginner might be Mandrake. 
However, any distro you choose will get you started. You'll have fun, as 
well as frustration, and when you do eventually get hooked and then 
eventually try Debian, you'll ask, "Why didn't I start here to begin with?!"


There are documents for dual-booting, but for now, the easiest method 
would be to simply tell the Debian installer to not make the hard drive 
bootable and to make a boot floppy and to use the boot floppy to boot 
into Debian. If you use another distro, I'm not sure what the best 
method is.


Probably the best place to get started, if you're going to use Debian, 
is to read the Installation Instructions at: 
http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/#new-inst
From the table on that page you'll need to choose which architecture 
(Intel x86), format (HTML?), and language (English?) to access the 
appropriate instructions. Those pages are pretty step-by-step. If you 
have further questions after reading that, post again on this list.


You might also post what part of the world you're in; you might have a 
Debianite close by that would be willing to loan/burn/give you a CD and 
act as an "elmer" (teacher/friend/guide) to help get you going.


Welcome to the world of Linux.

Kent

Re: New to Linux

[Osamu Aoki]

Hi,

I think you should install potato from CD if debian.  

(If you have ultra high speed connection, only 4 FD is needed 
to install with net and understands details.)

read www.debian.org
 www.linuxdoc.org  (HOWTO)

On Sun, Mar 04, 2001 at 03:40:28PM +0100, The Grand Oral Disseminator wrote:
> Hi...
> 
> I'm new to Linux, let's start with saying that!  But I am thnking about 
> installing Linux on my PC (Intel PIII 667MHz)...  Can you give me some 
> information about which distribution (A free distribution, since it is just 
> my goal to have a mere 'meeting' with Linux, to get to know it - if you wish) 
> would be best for me (I know about the Debian Distribution), where I can 
> downlaod it, how I should install it, what other items I need, etc...
> 
> For the moment I am running MS Windows 2000, I also wonder how am I going to 
> make my PC into a dual boot machine?
> 
> Can anybody help me out?  Please provide detailed information so that I can 
> understand it...
> Already thanks!
> 
> "My name is GOD, the Grand Oral Disseminator" - Maxi Jazz, Faithless
> 
> Thomas Delrue
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN 
> Hotmail at  href="http://www.hotmail.com";>http://www.hotmail.com.

-- 
+  Osamu Aoki <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, GnuPG-key: 1024D/D5DE453D  +
+   Fingerprint: 814E BD64 3288 40E7 E88E  3D92 C3F8 EA94 D5DE 453D   +
+   http://www.aokiconsulting.com/pc/  Cupertino, CA USA  +