What is Linux??

Ive not heard much about Linux except my friend said i should get it - what actually is it??

 

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Linux is an operating system for your computer.

Unlike Windows, Linux is open-source. Which means the computer code for it is free and there are no restrictions to how you can change that code. But Window's code is hidden and jumbled and kept away from the public.

The original Linux was created by a man named Linus. He used another operating system called Unix and changed the code to create his own operating system and that became Linux. Today there are many Linux operating systems out there. Some of the more popular and user friendly distributions of Linux are RedHat and Mandrake.

To put it in perspective: when using Linux, your part of a community....when using Windows your a "user".

Some people like the idea they are cheating the big guy (Bill Gates) and thus they use Linux and try to spread the word about it, which is probably the case with your friend. But Linux doesn't rely on commercials or a company...it relies on the people who want to make it better and it's basically spread through word of mouth.

 

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thanks - is it possible to run both linux and windows, because i share a computer with my family and they probably wouldnt like using anything else but windows. is it even worth it??

 

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Definately it is.

I'm doing that right now. As long as you have Windows installed before you install Linux.

 

so how do you get linux is there a particular site u go to to download it or something - as u can probably tell i know very little about it

 

Mandrake Linux Click the second "Now" button at the bottom of the page. Then scroll down and find the closest site to download from. It's 3 CDs.

Don't rush into this though. I just started using Linux too and picked Mandrake because it was easy to install and looks simliar to a Windows desktop. I'd wait before installing and let some more experienced guys tell you about Linux and what's the best distribution for a new Linux user.

By itself, Linux is just text and a command line. But there are many graphical "skins" that make using a Linux OS as easy as Windows. Mandrake comes with a few skins that are easy to use.

just a side note, having Windows and Linux on the same computer is called duelbooting.

Also, check out this thread it might shed some light. http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=25407

 

k, ive read that thread but before i go to deep in to this what are the actual advantages of using linux?

 

Google is a helpful tool

www.freebsd.org is as well

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thats MY distro of choice

 

im just too lazy to actually search through the crap u get in google, if i can just ask someone who knows and get a simple answer whats the point of searching the websites for some scrap of useful information. ill still have a look now u said tho

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im pretty sure im gonna end up getting linux but before i make up my mind how hard is it to partition a hard drive - i really dont want to muck my computer up - ive tried lookin but i cant c any helpful info

 

Advantages to Linux, hmm. Security is a big one. There are far, far, far, far fewer viruses and hackers going for Linux systems and Linux offers better security than Windows. As for others...I haven't discovered any yet. It's a pain in the ass to install things like Flash player for your web browser, and there are far, far, far, far fewer drivers for Linux. So my nice sound card is using default drivers and can't do anything special except play sound out of 2 speakers...even though I want it to do more. But if I attempted to learn how to navigate through Linux and learn the commands of the command prompt, I bet I'd find it easy.

Partitioning a hard drive is simple, if you have available space. You can do it from WindowsXP by clicking Start, then right clicking on "My Computer", choose Manage, then to Disk Managment. You'll see if you can partition any available space on the drive there.

If you installed Windows and just made one partition, the C:, then it'll be harder. Mandrake's installer lets you take available space from a Windows partition and resize the partition, so you'll have space for Linux, but theres a chance you'll lose data on the Windows partition...definately don't want that happening. You need 3 partitions for Mandrake (I don't know about other distributions): the root, the user, and the Linux swap partitions. Mandrake can automatically spilt up available space between the 3.

 

right, ive just had to reformat my computer for reasons so i have 50gb free, if thats what u meant by seeing if i could partition, but i still dont see how you do it (i think im just being really stupid, but i am tired!!) oh and ive only got the one "C:" drive -and, can u still use msn messenger with linux? -and (i know im bein lazy here but ive been on the computer for 7 hours and its 5am) how much space do you need to run mandrake because it might be easier to run it on my old computer but it has in total 2gb and about 500mb free if delete some crap - isthat too little??????//

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Don't get nervous about partitioning your HDD just take your time and read everything on the screen carefully before you click "next" or "OK."

I use Mandrake 9.1 with windows also... it's called dual booting (like he said but he spelled it wrong)... I have used Mandrake, ASP Linux, Debian, Red Hat, ArkLinux, Slackware... I have used a lot of them! Use Mandrake it is the most user friendly of all of them, in my opinion.

You can download them for free but you need at least a cable internet connection. The files you want are called iso files. Download each one into your documents or whatever then double click the file and your CD Burning program should open. Or just open your Burning program and look in help to find out how to burn the iso files (some programs are different). Once finished you can then boot from your CD Rom drive (put the linux disk in) and start the process.

It is very easy and straightforward (actually in some ways better than windows install). You can do a simple install by using free space in a windows installation. It will ask you how much space to use... Give yourself like 10 GBs if you have it, you shouldn't need more than that to try it and play around with linux. It will then set up a / (root) partition (kinda like c:\windows), a swap partition(file swap), then a /home (My documents, if you will) partition. It does it all for you. I have done this process literally hundreds of times and never have lost any data. Be confident.

Once that is done it will ask you what you want installed... read the descriptions, decide what you want then install....

After that you need a password (administrators password, called root password in Linux) then you will add users with their passwords. Then it will attempt to configure your hardware... always test to see if your graphics display works correctly... if all goes well and you don't have any brand new stuff it should work fine.

If you have cable modem then just use DHCP and automatically detect your IPs, etc... should work fine...always did for me. Phone Modems are a different story.

Finish up and enjoy!

You computer will boot up to a menu with windows and Linux listed (along with a couple other options) chose your playground and play!

 

You may want to defrag your windows as a precaution. And you can use the msn messenger network with linux, but the program itself will of coarse look different, I prefer one called gaim because it handles several messenging networks(msn, ICQ, AIM, IRC, etc...). I've never resized a ntfs partition personally, but others apparently have.

 

k thanks, do you have to use a cd burner program or can you just copy the files onto the cd - thats all i usually do because my cd burner programs is stupid

 

If you are downloading an iso file, it is an image and you will need to burn that to the disk... if it is done correctly it should be a bootable disk. When you browse the CD you should see folders and files.

 

No you cant simply drag the file onto a CD, you have to use a program such as nero, and select something like "burn iso".

 

I am a HUGE advocate of Linux. But I don't want to see you get a bad taste in your mouth. Put it this way...I am a huge advocate of Porche automobiles too, but if you've never driven a high performance automobile..you'll probably crash and die.

Best way to get started with Linux is with Linux training wheels...or at least thats what I call them. Knoppix is a distribution of Linux just like RedHat or Mandrake except that it comes bootable on a CD. You don't change anything on your computer, you just boot the CD and suddenly you are running Linux. This isn't the kind of thing you run forever, but its a great way to try linux before you go head first. You get to learn the interface practice your linux command line skills, etc. Try it out, trust me its the easiest way.

http://www.knoppix.org/

-AntonK

 

Sound advice AntonK, I think it's increasingly evident we shouldn't be encouraging this guy to fiddle with the family computer, and that dual booting Linux might be beyond his current capability.

 

Im not completely stupid - i just want to know everything possible before i go changing things on my computer, and ive asked stupid questions mostly just to make sure of things.