I am currently brand new to linux and need to download a live cd version of linux. I am working on a project where I need to to code a server in linux that will communicate with a vb6 client. I have the vb6 client set up with winsock and am hoping that linux will support winsock as well. What is the best linux live cd distro for this case? Will linux be able to support winsock and if not how will I get the server in linux to communicate with the client in vb6? Does the coding simply go into a text editor and then made executable? What is the easiest text editor to use for this type of coding being that I am new to linux?

First off, WinSock (as the name suggests) is a Windows only socket API. You can use the standard Linux socket APIs to communicate with a WinSock program though. There's an excellent tutorial on using sockets in C here .

To get C code running, you'll need to edit the code in a text editor of some kind. Emacs or vim are very popular, but something like Kate is much more newbie friendly. Then you'll need to run gcc -o program-name source-file-name to compile, then ./program-name to run.

If using C scares you then you do have other options. I think you can use all the same functions in C++, or alternatively you could use Java. If you're after a more VB like environment, you could try Gambas, although I don't know what sort of socket support it has.

I think that any Live CD should have the necessary tools.

If you need any more advice (or I've left you even more confused ) then keep on posting! Hopefully I've been some help though.