Anyway to see my NTFS drive when using a Live CD?
 

So I tried Linux for the first time by downloading an Xubuntu distribution, the XFLD 0.3 live CD. Is there a way to see my main NTFS hard drive on Live CDs or on this one at all? For that matter, since I've never done anything in Linux, I don't know if my question refers to just Live CDs, this distribution, this Live CD, XFCE, or all Linux distributions.

Other than that, I don't know if I'm even asking the right question. I did manage to figure out how to switch to the Dvorak keyboard layout. Yay.

You have to mount the HD partition.
This will mount hda1 (the first partition on the first pata drive) on the directory /media/myntfs. If you a sata drive, you need to replace hda1 by sda1. If it's not the first HD, the 'a' has to change to something else ('b' for the second HD, 'c', etc). And if it's not the first partition, change the '1' to '2', '3' etc (whatever is applicable).

The first line is only required to create the mountpoint. Once the mountpoint exists, you don't have to do that step (after every boot of the liveCD you have to do this).
You can replace myntfs by any name that you fancy (as long as it does not exist yet).

The commands start with sudo as you need root privileges.

PS you have to enter the commands in a terminal (applications>accesories>terminal)

Thanks for this. Though the NTFS hard drive is already in use as a non-partitioned primary drive for a proprietary operating system. Would mounting the first partition endanger files of this operating system?

With the -r mount option (as given in my mount example above), it is mounted read-only.
So there should not be an issue.
'Normal' NTFS support is (as far as I know) still unreliable with regards to writing. There is a program that works around it by using the Windows driver. Unfortunately I don't know the name.