whats the best linux for a beginner
matt
i am a complete beginner and am starting to research linux and am wondering
which is the best one to start out with given that i am an absolute
beginner.
thanks,
matt
Haedn Thorn
It depends on how tech-savvy you are. My first and favourite is
Slackware. If you know what hardware you have, and know a few UNIX
commands, I think you should be able to get it up and running. I did
when I was 18 and Bill Gates decided we all had to use Win95. ... Well I
don't like Billy-boy and I don't like Winblows, so I found Linux and
gave it a shot. I only had a little bit of experience on a VMS shell
account I had used for internet access, so short of 'ls' 'cd' and the
like, I was a total newbie too. Many people will recommend RedHat,
Debian and Mandrake ... O, and SuSe is also very popular now. ... While
these are more "user friendly" and less 'learning Linux' whereas
Slackware is still user-friendly-enough and really gets you down in the
trenches without hiding the nitty-gritty under a lot of fluff.
David
I'll second that. Slackware was the first distro I was able to
install it just takes some reading and searching to get things
setup the way you want them but it really isn't that difficult if
you have an open mind and a desire for knowledge.
Welcome to Linux! Newbie! ;-)
--
Confucius: He who play in root, eventually kill tree.
Registered with The Linux Counter. http://counter.li.org/
Slackware 9.1.0 Kernel 2.4.22 i686 (GCC) 3.3.1
Uptime: 9 days, 2:36, 3 users, load average: 2.25, 2.26, 2.26
SuperDeamon
> I'll second that. Slackware was the first distro I was able to
> install it just takes some reading and searching to get things
> setup the way you want them but it really isn't that difficult if
> you have an open mind and a desire for knowledge.
>
I agree that Slackware is the best distro. But as a beginner wanting to get
their feet wet for the first time, I would recommand Mandrake or SuSE.
After using one of these for a while and getting comfortable with linux
move on to Slackware. That way you would appreciate the qualities of
Slackware much more in comparison to bloated (but very newbie friendly)
SuSE or Mandrake.
KRF
There is no "best" Linux, just the best one for what you want to do.
I have found that there are two types of people wanting to learn Linux -
those who are tired of running a worm farm and BSOD theater and who just
want a desktop to replace Windoze. And those who want to learn Linux from
a techie standpoint.
For the first type of person I would have to recommend Red Hat 9. Assuming
that you don't have some out-of-bounds hardware, just boot disk1 and click
a few times and in an hour or so you have a working GUI desktop that runs
very well. And the hardware detect is superior to anything that I have
seen, including any Win version.
If you want to actually LEARN Linux, then you have lots of options. In
fact, any of them would do, but Slackware and Debian are high on the list.
The problem of learning on a distro with a very capable GUI is that when
presented with a problem that you need to research, you tend to "cheat" by
clicking on the menu system and finding a nice box to check. Works great,
but doesn't teach you how the ifcfg-eth0 file works.
KRF
Marc
attempt to install Slackware on my second ide harddisk from scsi cdrom
resulted in horrible evening. My Redhat installation on the first IDE hd
was corrupted afterwards (only a fresh install helped finally) and when
selecting the source media it fails to see the Slackware 9.1 install
disk from which the system booted... Arrghh...
nolo
Mandrake, Redhat or Suse for the beginner
Day Brown
might try to get a copy of bl-2.zip, ie BASIC_LINUX, which is just a 2
meg download, which you can unzip into a dos partition, and launch from
the dos prompt. without reformatting anything. it runs in a ramdisk. it
is textmode, but there is an xwin that I have not tried yet.
root
Basic Linux may be a good choice for the beginner; however, it is only a
bare linux (like a DOS). If the OP wants to experience Linux with GUI
features, then get any complete Linux Distro and give it a try. Personally,
I prefer SuSE over any Linux distro out there mainly because I have been
used to with SuSE since SuSE-6.x. I had use RedHat for many years before.
If you have a news server with a longer retention (one week or so) and it
carries alt.binaries.cd.image.linux (a.b.c.i.l) newsgroup, you might want
to pay a visit to that NG to download the latest SuSE-9.0 Pro. The CD disc
sets have been posted on the a.b.c.i.l NG for a couple of days. And, the
DVD-1 and DVD-2 disc sets are of more recent posts. If you have a DVD-/+ R
W burner, I suggest to download the DVD-1 disc to give it a try. DVD-2 disc
basically contains the source code of the distro. If you want to install a
full bloated distro, I suggest you to get at least 15GB (partition) hard
drive.
--
root/administrator
Mattias Honrendgard
All of them. The best way to learn is through experience. Experience
gives knowledge and wisdom. Don't try one and stop. Try them all. Then
try them again.
nos...@nospam.invalid
On 19-Oct-2003, com...@kissmyfatarse.com (Mattias Honrendgard) wrote:
> All of them. The best way to learn is through experience. Experience
> gives knowledge and wisdom. Don't try one and stop. Try them all. Then
> try them again.
Are you a philosopher?
Mattias Honrendgard
Pretty much like asking "I would like some cheese crisps. I have never
eaten cheese or crisps before. Which cheese crisps are the best" ?
I was sitting my exam the other day. Got stuck on the first question,
"Name", what did you put?
Man, where do they get these weirdos from? :)
David
>
> Man, where do they get these weirdos from? :)
Well most newbies come from the windows world and don't realize
there is anything other than point-N-click.
--
Confucius: He who play in root, eventually kill tree.
Registered with The Linux Counter. http://counter.li.org/
Slackware 9.1.0 Kernel 2.4.22 i686 (GCC) 3.3.2
Uptime: 12 days, 3:36, 2 users, load average: 1.07, 1.22, 1.1
nolo
Perhaps u 2 are related..
Robin Hood
better choice. My Apologies if this is a repetition. It actually
depends on how much tech you are. If you are an avid programmer then
you can choose redhat. But it also suits you even if you are a
beginner. or Try out slackware for instead. It requires much less
skills than redhat. You only have to know some unix commands and thats
it. You can make it run.
But still i prefer redhat. Learn unix and fundementals before you
start of with linux.
Hope this helps you.
"matt" <mat...@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:<d82c56cfec328d6e...@news.teranews.com>...
Walter Mautner
....
> For the first type of person I would have to recommend Red Hat 9.
Or Mandrake :).
> Assuming that you don't have some out-of-bounds hardware, just boot
> disk1 and click a few times and in an hour or so you have a working GUI
> desktop that runs
> very well. And the hardware detect is superior to anything that I have
> seen, including any Win version.
>
Mandrake with the MM kernel detecting my promise SATA out of the box (not
so does winbloze) and also allows for cdrw packet writing - without
having to install directcd.
> If you want to actually LEARN Linux, then you have lots of options. In
> fact, any of them would do, but Slackware and Debian are high on the
> list. The problem of learning on a distro with a very capable GUI is
> that when presented with a problem that you need to research, you tend
> to "cheat" by
> clicking on the menu system and finding a nice box to check. Works
> great, but doesn't teach you how the ifcfg-eth0 file works.
>
You are right, but ifcfg-eth0 and others in /etc/sysconfig are just
configuration files, used by scripts that do the actual work like
ifconfig eth0 .... on every boot.
For sure there are distros that configure ethX otherwise, so it's again
distribution specific.
--
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(3 days grace period).
K Factor
Get a Morphix or Knoppix CD (download for free if you have DSL, and
burn your own). Let's you try Linux without installing it on your HD
- sort of "try before you buy" - the ubiquitious test drive.
The Knoppix site is down due to European patent lawsuit fear, but you
can find it to download if you try. :)
For a newbie, MANADATORY pre-install reading:
http://linux-newbie.sunsite.dk/lnag_before_install.html#which_distro
no spam
www.knoppix.net for newbie and Experts!!!
Linux Rules
"K Factor" <no...@angelhire.com> wrote in message
news:3f96e3f8...@news1.on.sympatico.ca...
Stumpy
Go to www.linux.org and then to the distribution page...search for distros
that "runs on MS Windows" and choose one to your personal liking/needs.
Asking somebody what the best distro is, is like asking a group of people
which color crayon in the box is the prettiest.
Michael
My personal favorite is Red Hat but I don't know if it is best for a
beginner. I run Cygwin (got the download from redhat.com's link) on my
wife's Windows box and I have various free shell accounts I use when I
need more than my install allows or features not on my other computers.
I carry a Knoppix cd whenever I can, just to give it away to anyone who
hasn't tried Linux because there is not much better than saying, "Try
with no committment or cost." I use SCO at work, Solaris on one box at
home and am a FreeBSD fan. The gentleman who said try them all was not
far from my own philosophy. My parents computer has a Slackware install
they never notice while they're running Windows 98, but should they
screw it up, I still have a chance of fixing it.
It comes down to a decision based on how much you already know, how fast
you expect to learn and what you want to learn about it.
My recomendation?
For techies just trying to get just an idea how it works, get putty and
a free shell account. (Google is your friend.)
For techies wanting to really learn about new software and operating
systems with no fear of committment I'd recommend Debian or Slackware.
For techies who want a stable box and indend to leave it the heck alone
after that I'd recommend freeBSD.
For techies who just want to play without having to learn everything
from scratch I'd recommend RedHat.
For non-techies wanting to see what Linux is I'd recommend Knoppix.
For non-techies wanting to go ahead and start really using Linux I'd
recommend Mandrake.
For the curious who want to see what the options are I'd recommend a
visit to www.linuxiso.org where you can get descriptions of most of the
major distributions and download full working versions of many. If you
have a serious internet connection though, it may be better to visit
ftp.planetmirror.com for the actual downloading (since it is usually
faster.)
Thats my 2 cents worth.
~Mike
henk lutgerink
> "matt" <mat...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:<d82c56cfec328d6e...@news.teranews.com>...
>> hi everyone,
>>
>> i am a complete beginner and am starting to research linux and am
>> wondering which is the best one to start out with given that i am an
>> absolute beginner.
>>
>> thanks,
>>
>> matt
>
> Try Knoppix 3.3 for a start which is downloadable from
http://www.linuxiso.org
Its a distro which runs entirely from CD without touching your HDD
If you like it you can always download a other distro from the above site
avatar
Aitor
>On Wed, 15 Oct 2003 19:50:58 GMT, "matt" <mat...@yahoo.com>
>wrote:
>>i am a complete beginner and am starting to research linux and am wondering
>>which is the best one to start out with given that i am an absolute
>>beginner.
>I would recommend Red Hat 8.x.
>
>RH 9 has its own problems.
I prefer RedHat 7.3 rather than 8.0.
Regards,
real
image that's all find it at http://www.jamd-linux.com/index.php
J.O. Aho
I prefer RH7.3 over 8/9/Fedora, but I have stopped to recommend any linux
distro to use for people asking, I do tell what I know about different distros
if asked, but I advice people really try out a couple of distros that seems to
provide those things they need, a good site to begin with is www.linux.org
which has descriptions of quite many distros.
//Aho
Charlie Spencer
This is the kind of comment that keeps Windows users from even trying Linux.
I R A Darth Aggie
Charlie Spencer <casp...@switch.com>, in
<b7cd1bdb.03111...@posting.google.com> wrote:
+> com...@kissmyfatarse.com (Mattias Honrendgard) wrote in message news:<dd394218.03101...@posting.google.com>...
+> > "matt" <mat...@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:<d82c56cfec328d6e...@news.teranews.com>...
+> > > hi everyone,
+> > >
+> > > i am a complete beginner and am starting to research linux and am wondering
+> > > which is the best one to start out with given that i am an absolute
+> > > beginner.
+> > Pretty much like asking "I would like some cheese crisps. I have never
+> > eaten cheese or crisps before. Which cheese crisps are the best" ?
+> >
+> > I was sitting my exam the other day. Got stuck on the first question,
+> > "Name", what did you put?
+> >
+> > Man, where do they get these weirdos from? :)
+>
+> This is the kind of comment that keeps Windows users from even trying Linux.
Really? that doesn't necessarily sound like a bad thing...
James
--
Consulting Minister for Consultants, DNRC
I can please only one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow
isn't looking good, either.
I am BOFH. Resistance is futile. Your network will be assimilated.
Mark Hackett
Red Hat has the advantage of more ubiquity. Mandrake is a better starter for
Linux noob's, or Knoppix for those who don't want to parition their HDD.
Joe Pfeiffer
> com...@kissmyfatarse.com (Mattias Honrendgard) wrote in message news:<dd394218.03101...@posting.google.com>...
> >
> > Pretty much like asking "I would like some cheese crisps. I have never
> > eaten cheese or crisps before. Which cheese crisps are the best" ?
A better analogy might be if you ended with "..the best for somebody
to try for the first time?" which would be a very reasonable
question, and would call for a polite answer (probably some pretty
light crisps with a pretty mild cheese).
> This is the kind of comment that keeps Windows users from even trying Linux.
Yeah.
Back to the OPs question, I've heard very good things about Knoppix
(googling will find it): apparently it's an amazingly good installer,
can run off CD so you aren't making a commitment to abandon Windows
before you've even started, and if you keep it, you use Debian for
upgrades.
--
Joseph J. Pfeiffer, Jr., Ph.D. Phone -- (505) 646-1605
Department of Computer Science FAX -- (505) 646-1002
New Mexico State University http://www.cs.nmsu.edu/~pfeiffer
Southwestern NM Regional Science and Engr Fair: http://www.nmsu.edu/~scifair
John Fettig
On 18 Nov 2003 16:02:33 -0700, Joe Pfeiffer wrote:
> Back to the OPs question, I've heard very good things about Knoppix
> (googling will find it): apparently it's an amazingly good installer,
> can run off CD so you aren't making a commitment to abandon Windows
> before you've even started, and if you keep it, you use Debian for
> upgrades.
Knoppix runs entirely from CD. It is basically a trimmed down Debian on
a single CD. A good suggestion perhaps to get somebody quick started on
linux, but won't do in the long run unless you are masochistic.
If you can manage to get through the installation alive, Debian is a
great distribution. It's a breeze to install if you've installed linux
a lot, but I've heard it is a little confusing if you are new to it.
Xandros, which is based on Debian, I hear has a wonderful installer, but
is not 100% free like Debian.
--
When you are right, you cannot be too radical; When you are wrong,
you cannot be too conservative. -- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Joe Pfeiffer
>
> Knoppix runs entirely from CD. It is basically a trimmed down Debian on
> a single CD. A good suggestion perhaps to get somebody quick started on
> linux, but won't do in the long run unless you are masochistic.
While my experience with Knoppix is limited to establishing that it
really does boot and find the network on one of my machines (which is
more than I had when I posted the other day!), it's my understanding
that there is a way to get it to install itself. It can run entirely
from CD, but doesn't have to.
> If you can manage to get through the installation alive, Debian is a
> great distribution. It's a breeze to install if you've installed linux
> a lot, but I've heard it is a little confusing if you are new to it.
That's a pretty good summary. Debian really assumes you know what
you're doing when doing things like repartitioning your disk, setting
up your video card, deciding which kernel modules to use....
> Xandros, which is based on Debian, I hear has a wonderful installer, but
> is not 100% free like Debian.
Hadn't heard of that one.
Joe Cipale
>
> John Fettig <jfe...@NOuiuc.SPAMedu.invalid> writes:
> >
> > Knoppix runs entirely from CD. It is basically a trimmed down Debian on
> > a single CD. A good suggestion perhaps to get somebody quick started on
> > linux, but won't do in the long run unless you are masochistic.
>
> While my experience with Knoppix is limited to establishing that it
> really does boot and find the network on one of my machines (which is
> more than I had when I posted the other day!), it's my understanding
> that there is a way to get it to install itself. It can run entirely
> from CD, but doesn't have to.
>
> > If you can manage to get through the installation alive, Debian is a
> > great distribution. It's a breeze to install if you've installed linux
> > a lot, but I've heard it is a little confusing if you are new to it.
>
> That's a pretty good summary. Debian really assumes you know what
> you're doing when doing things like repartitioning your disk, setting
> up your video card, deciding which kernel modules to use....
>
This kinda sums up SuSE as well... Of all the distros I have tried,
(SuSE, Mandrake, Knoppix/Debian), I am the happiest with SuSE.
Joe
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Bolwerk
Different distributions have different strengths.
My instinct is to say Red Hat is easiest, but you've probably heard about
their recent marketing decisions.
SuSE is supposed to be really easy to use. So is Mandrake. If you're
willing to pay, maybe try Lindows.
I use Slackware myself, but I wouldn't recommend it to a beginner.
In comp.os.linux matt <mat...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> hi everyone,
>
> i am a complete beginner and am starting to research linux and am wondering
> which is the best one to start out with given that i am an absolute
> beginner.
>
> thanks,
>
> matt
>
>
J.O. Aho
> Well, you might want to clarify what you're planning to do first.
> Different distributions have different strengths.
One way to see if someone is a new to linux, is to see if they top post or not...
> My instinct is to say Red Hat is easiest, but you've probably heard about
> their recent marketing decisions.
In reality it's just a name change of the free linux from RedHat, still the
same guys will be working on it.
//Aho
JEP
> Bolwerk wrote:
> > Well, you might want to clarify what you're planning to do first.
> > Different distributions have different strengths.
>
> One way to see if someone is a new to linux, is to see if they top post or not...
>
In a long thread I would rather see a top post. Most don't seem to
snip all the extra garbage. ( like to way I posted in the center?)
Walter Mautner
...
>> One way to see if someone is a new to linux, is to see if they top post
>> or not...
>>
the concept of usenet, or how much he already knows about that source of
information.
> In a long thread I would rather see a top post. Most don't seem to
> snip all the extra garbage. ( like to way I posted in the center?)
>
NOT!
Every bottom-poster will scroll to the end just to make sure he isn't
missing something important. And then begin to get mad about that TOFU (TOp
post FUll quote). So it's not only about bottom posting - as much important
to cut parts of the message one doesn't reply to.
>> //Aho
Why this non-standard signature? You know, two dashes and a trailing
whitespace and every useful newsreader will automagically clip the .sig
upon the next reply.
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Erik
used to Linux without installing it.
In message
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texmansru47
liked that version, but I found it too basic for me. I agree with
some of the others that Slackware is the best. However, the
installation is a real pain for non-technical folks. dealing with
the cfdisk commands, may become cumbersome.
Thanks,
Tex
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Barry OGrady
>hi everyone,
>
>i am a complete beginner and am starting to research linux and am wondering
>which is the best one to start out with given that i am an absolute
>beginner.
i COULD TRY sOLARIS.
>
>thanks,
>
>matt
>
bosco
PCLInuxOS LXDE
Puppy
Lubuntu
Mepis