Adventures Learning Linux

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My introduction to Linux

From years ago I've heard of the advantages of using the Linux operating system and so I determined to make an all out effort to learn it. In 2003 I downloaded and experimented with several Linux distributions. All my previous attempts ended in discouragement. The Linux distributions I tried to install did not find all the devices on my machine, and I didn't know how to install the needed device drivers even if I had them available. I realized that if I, a person considered to be a power user in Windows and MS-DOS couldn't figure out how to install and use a Linux system, the common user who still has troubles with Windows certainly wouldn't be able to learn it either. So I determined to find a Linux distribution that I considered simple enough for the average person to install.

Finally in February 2005 I found the distribution that I like best and works for me -- Fedora! If you are going to download it rather than order installation CDs or DVDs, you definitely need a broadband connection. Fedora 8 installation files add up to approximately 3.3 gigabytes in either a DVD ISO file or 5 CD ISO files. (However later I learned that it's possible to get by with only downloading the first two CD ISO files and choose the default minimum installation so that you can download later within Fedora what you need later.) Downloading with Bittorrent is also preferable to a direct FTP connection because Bittorrent has resume capabilities in case the connection breaks.

If you can install Windows on your own, you can install Fedora Linux. In fact, I would say Fedora is even easier to install than Windows XP. One reason is that Linux will give you your choice of a default language to use. That means if you are not a native English speaker and you would prefer to use the language of your mother tongue, that language is available in Fedora to use. Not so with Windows. You would have to buy that particular language version of Windows if you want to use that language for your interface.

Fedora will also give you your choice of a keyboard layout. It was no problem for me to install an English setup using a Japanese keyboard layout. Not so with Windows. Windows will balk at you if you try to change to a Japanese keyboard using an English version of Windows and tell you that you are making a mistake, ha! I counted 26 steps to change the keyboard layout in Windows from English to Japanese! This is because the keyboard driver needs to be changed. In the Gnome Desktop in Linux, there are only 3 steps.

I am very pleased with Fedora Linux! In spite of some things I don't understand yet, and possible bugs in some applications, I really believe my production level has increased. I can do things more efficiently than I could in Windows, and in less time. This web page was created in Fedora Linux using Bluefish, a HTML editor.

Feb. 25, 2006 update: I got a brand new cell phone and it took me a while to figure out how to use certain functions, like composing email for example . At first I was tempted to think that I made a mistake in changing phones because the older one seemed easier to use, but then as I learned more and more about the new phone, I saw new features that the older one lacked and also noticed various improvements. I realized then that changing cell phones is like moving to a different operating system! In the beginning there are learning pains but the efforts are well worth it.

July 27, 2005 update: It has been nearly 6 months since I've used Fedora as the only OS on my desktop. Though I still consider myself a Linux newbie, I've learned how to do everything I really need to do on a daily basis with my PC just as I did in Windows! And yet there is so much more to learn. That's really the fun part for me working with computers: learning and mastering new skills. Don't think you are too old to learn it; I was 37 when I started out with a PC (MSDOS) and now at 55 years old I picked up a whole new way of working in Linux!

Nov, 2008 update: I've now upgraded to Fedora 8 and it is indeed the best version of Fedora I've used so far.

Why I switched from Windows to Linux

I became quite concerned over certain issues about Windows, namely, virus attacks, the need for registry cleaning, registry corruption, security questions, web bugs, trojans, file fragmentation, and general maintenance. The average Windows user seems to be woefully ignorant of most of these problems. When something bad happens, very few people know how to fix the problem.

Though I enjoy helping my friends and associates in solving their various Windows problems, it's been very discouraging to see them have the same problems over and over again. Their kids get on the computer and install junk games, malware, pick up web bugs and spyware. The PC gets slower and slower and eventually comes to a grinding halt. I heard that Linux is much stronger and wanted to prove it to myself and take up the challenge to see if I could actually use it to the point that I can live without Windows. And I have! At the time of this post it has been nearly 2 years since I've been using Linux on my main desktop PC.

Here is a good comment about Linux from www.softwaredomain.co.uk/Linux/linux.html

" It is also worth noting that the linux operating system, once setup is unlikely to need any user intervention or changes for a long time to come unlike some commercial operating systems that continuously distract the user from their task."

Isn't that a good enough reason to at least try it?

Web resources about Linux vs. Windows:

Linux compared to Windows:

Web reference: Linux vs. Windows - An excellent article by Michael Horowitz with links to many other resources about Linux.

Is Linux for you?

I am writing this section to help you count the cost before attempting to move from Windows to Linux. There is a learning curve. Below are 12 points you should consider before downloading and installing Linux on your computer:
  1. Unless you are a computer geek or a hobbyist who really likes to learn new procedures, and has the time to learn them, you may wind up highly frustrated when you run into snags!
  2. You have to do some command line work to install certain plugins manually. Installing the Macromedia Flash plugin for Firefox is an example. Some people think it's a throw back to the MS-DOS days to do that. I think its fun because I used be a power user in DOS.
  3. If you use encryption and need to open PGP files closed with the Idea algorithm, you will not be able to use the default GPG program but have to download the source and the Idea.c file and compile the program yourself! I have done this a few times already.
  4. You may have to learn how to compile certain software that is not yet available in RPM format. I have had to do this from time to time. But it's fun to do - if you like to do command line work.
  5. You may have to manually edit some system settings files like the fstab file if you install a second hard drive, or xconf.conf file to get your video card to work properly. I had to do that with my new Nvidia graphics display card to enable dual monitor support. The graphical setup in Fedora just couldn't do the job right! There was no way I could figure out how to do this on my own. I had to do a bit of Internet browsing to get the information on how to edit these files. (Info posted on this web site.)
  6. You will not be able to play certain streaming video like Microsoft ASF files from the Internet. Thank God there are not so many web pages that use ASF or context that MS IE alone can play.
  7. Unless you have a broadband ADSL or cable connection, Linux updates will be very slow to download and will use up your telephone line time and raise your phone bill. Linux was raised on the Internet. In the early days programs and updates were small and so a dial up network was no problem then, but in my opinion, it would be a problem today.
  8. Though many Linux programs like the Gimp graphic editor are advanced and stable, some are still in the Beta stage and may crash from time to time. Your system as a whole, won't crash with it, however.
  9. Your choice of applications is somewhat limited compared to what is available in Windows. You may be able to get some Windows applications to work in Linux, however, but you will have to learn how to set up Wine to do that.
  10. The only on line support you will have is from Internet forums like the Fedora Forum or your friendly Linux tech if you have a relationship with him by email.
  11. Big programs like OpenOffice writer (similar to MS Word) are slow to open unless you have at least a Pentium 4 or equivalent processor. If you want to use bleeding edge software from Fedora, you need a machine that is not yet 3 years old or you will wind up frustrated.
  12. If Linux doesn't recognize a certain device on your PC, or doesn't install the correct driver for it (example: video card lacking drivers for 3 D acceleration), you will have to do research from forums and driver web sites to learn how to find and install that driver. Either that, or you change devices like I had to do with buying a used PCI audio card because Linux didn't recognize the on-board sound card on my motherboard. It's much easier to find and install device drivers in Windows compared to Linux. Fortunately, however, the popular Linux distributions usually have everything you need. Moreover, if you have a choice of buying a graphic card, you should know that Nvidia GeForce cards are much better supported than ATI Radeon cards.

Linux alternatives to proprietary Windows software

The web page Alternatives to Windows Software will give you a good idea of what software is available in Linux that can be used to replace what you have been using in Windows. Please know the page is by no means a comprehensive list.

Can Linux get infected by viruses?

Here is a good page about that: http://www.netproject.com/wn/17aug00.html There are not many viruses written for Linux, and even if a user downloaded one by email, because the user is by default logged in to a limited account, the virus cannot modify system settings. Only a "super user" can make system changes or add more software by logging in as "root". Even a computer administrator would normally log himself in as a limited user in Linux and only log in as root to make changes. Though Microsoft encourages people to do the same in Windows XP or 2000, very few people actually do that. And because some Windows software will run properly only if run in an account with Administrator privileges, most users would prefer to be always logged in as the Administrator. They can therefore with administrator privileges damage the system by their own hand! Not so with Linux. All common user applications run perfectly fine in a normal limited user account. System command line tools such as mounting or formatting disks or partitions will only run when logged in as root with the Super User password. This means you can set up a user account for your kids or your mother, and even your enemies with the assurance that they will not be able to hurt your Linux system accidentally, let alone maliciously!

Macintosh computers also have the same security concept of always working as a limited user with the ability to log in as an Administrator from within the user account to make system changes. That's because Macs are based on Unix just like Linux is!

I've been reading that Windows Vista which is supposed to come out in 2007 is finally going to implement the Unix / Linux / Mac concept of always working in a limited user account with the ability to log in as an Administrator from within the limited account with a password. However I hear that in Vista Microsoft goes to the extreme and won't even let you delete a shortcut on your desktop without going through a bunch of dialog boxes!

Things I like about Linux

Gnome or KDE?

Gnome is the default desktop interface for Fedora and Redhat, whereas KDE is the default for Mandrake (now called Mandriva) Linux. Both have their good points. I have both installed. You can switch back and forth by logging off and on to another desktop. And there are even others. I prefer Gnome to KDE as it seems easier to learn and solid as a rock. I had problems using KDE. KDE's built in browser, Konqueror, is not nearly as good as Firefox and doesn't interpret CSS code correctly. Gnome can run all KDE applications, but KDE cannot run Gnome applets. This is one reason I use Gnome rather than KDE. And I think it's prettier too.

Command line work in Linux

Some people seem to think that working in Linux is typing commands from the command line prompt as in the good old DOS days. This does not have to be so. You can work completely in the graphic interface of Gnome or KDE. There are only a few things like basic changes to the system that need to be done from the command line.

Windows XP has a command prompt too but most people don't use it. In Linux using a command line can be more powerful and even faster than clicking several times to run the program you want to run! For example, from the command line you can extract the contents of a whole directory full of zip files with a single command! Moreover, you can put "switches" or "arguments" after the command to do certain things that the application is programed to do. Some Windows applications can do that too but most people don't know / care about it.

There are several command line terminal interfaces in Linux. I use Gnome Terminal. Pasting text with Ctrl + V into a Gnome Terminal window won't work, but Shift + the Insert key will. I found out later that Shift Insert works in Windows as well. Most of the keyboard shortcuts in Linux are the same as in Windows.

You can run handy little utilities from Terminal that cannot be run any other way.

For example, in Terminal enter the command:
cal
You get an immediate output of a calendar of the present month!

Now enter cal and follow it with the number of the month and the year. Example:
cal 6 1960

You will see the month of June in 1960! What a handy way to determine the day of any date in either the past or the future!

To see a list of running processes, just enter the word top:

top

To exit top, press Ctrl + Z.

To see a list of all your hardward PCI devices, enter:
/sbin/lspci

Many Windows applications are installed in folders which are not necessarily included in the command PATH. This means that from the command prompt the only things you know you can run for sure are Windows system applications. In Linux however, all applications are installed in set directories that are included in the command PATH. This means that if I type the command of my favorite HTML editor "bluefish" at the command prompt, it will run! And so if I'm already working in the command line, it can be faster to run applications by just entering the command name of the application rather than hunt around for it in the Applications list Gnome.

Installing Linux

No matter what distribution of Linux you use, you should understand some basic things before attempting to install it on your PC. The main thing you need to understand is that Linux needs to make its own partitions and format them its own way. This can be done automatically if you have some free space on your hard disk. By "free space" I am talking about un-partitioned space, in other words, space that is not formatted and not even yet a partition. If no free space exists, the Linux installer will ask if you want to delete all existing partitions. You should only say yes if you are installing on a hard disk that has data you do not want to keep!! All data and your previous operating system will be erased forever if you let Linux delete any existing partitions!

If you have Partition Magic and know how to use it, you can create some free un-partitioned space by re-sizing your existing partitions. If you have Windows XP on your first partition and want to have a dual boot system, you could resize the Windows XP partition to make at least 10 Gigbytes free after the Windows XP partition. It is important that you do not make free space before the Windows XP partition or Windows XP will not be able to boot afterwards.

If you have two physical hard disks on your desktop PC, I would recommend you install Linux on the second one. You can therefore backup any data on the second HDD to the first one and don't have to worry about making a mistake of losing data when installing Linux. Just make sure that you have Linux create the partitions on the correct hard disk drive!

Using WINE to run Windows applications

Some folks refer to WINE as a Windows emulator, but the initials of WINE stand for, "Wine Is Not (an) Emulator!" That means it's not a CPU emulator.

The basic idea behind using WINE is to be able to use Windows applications that are not yet available to use in Linux. On July 13, 2005 I got the Theophilos Bible software to work in Wine. To do so I had to install Truetype Core fonts for it to display correctly. So I only recommend tinkering with WINE to try to use applications that are not yet available in Linux. Though I liked HTML-KIT in Windows, Bluefish does the job just as well, and is in some ways even better for me!

Windows applications that I still need and use thanks to Wine:

Also see some lessons I learned how to use Wine.

My history in working with PCs

I've been working with computer from 1987 or the time of MS-DOS. Learning DOS and computer in general was a challenge for me as I had to grasp a whlie new set of concepts like "file", "directory", "save" etc. The first version of MS-DOS I ever used was 2.11. Eventually after a few years I got to to the point I knew DOS commands inside and out and could even make complex batch files using the "for in do" command. I was able to do everything I really needed to do in computer. And then Windows 3.1 came along....

The first thing I noticed about Windows 3.1 was that certain tasks took a bit longer. Programs crashed, the system crashed at times. The only good thing to be said about it was that using a graphic interface to tie all the software together was more user friendly.

Then Windows 95 hit the market. Windows 95 was supposed to be a substantial improvement over Windows 3.1 using 32 bit applications. But unless you had enough memory and good hardware to support it, it ran even slower than Windows 3.1 So of course the common solution to the problem was to upgrade one's hardware. At the time this was an expensive option for me.

I eventually did upgrade and continued to upgrade and upgrade to keep up with all the new versions of Windows that came along. And I learned a lot about Windows and how to maintain it. I soon learned that every Windows system I ever used would run slower and slower over time. The Windows Registry needed to be cleaned at least once a month, the file system needed to be defragmented, temporary files need to be purged, the system needed to be scanned for web bugs, trojans. I really wanted to be free from doing all these constant maintenance tasks which became almost an obsession with me! This was my main reason for dropping Windows in favor of Linux. The only time I really need to use a Windows system is to do a certain report on the 25th of each month using software that will only run on Windows.

Remember: Windows is for the masses. Linux is for the computers.

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