can i just take up a whole lot of column inches? my sister is just about to start using linux and i put together some links i thought were useful for a total beginner to linux, so i have them on hand and i thought i would post them here.
Also, might i say that my first info about GNU/Linux came from that book The Rebel Code (by Glyn Moody) too and i'd heartily recommend it to anyone.
Here are the links:
http://www.yourlinux.co.uk/index.html a site that sells incredibly cheap software on CDs in the UK.
http://www.yourlinux.co.uk/whatis.html a quick history of linux
http://home.c2i.net/dark/linux.html a document for linux beginners, won't teach you much initially, but keep it around it has a lot of hints for after you've been using the system for a couple of weeks. This one i found out about from Acid Kewpie having it in his signature.
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/opens.../stallman.html a fantastic chapter by Richard Stallman telling the story of how the Free Software Foundation came into being, allowing free operating systems such as we have today.
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/opens...ook/linus.html a chapter written by Linus Torvalds telling his story about linux and how it came to be what it is today.
http://newsforge.com/newsforge/02/04...6.shtml?tid=23 a page telling you about /proc and /dev, the two parts of the linux filesystem that do not have a windows counterpart.
http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/index.html try this large index of help files and articles written specifically for newbies.
http://pluto.phys.nwu.edu/~zhaoyj/le...system/toc.htm a really good book for using unix in general. it covers your journey from a total newbie to a unix system administrator.
You will want to read chapters one to five, possibly six and seven, definitely eight and ten, probably nine, and also a few chapters from section three, probably chapters sixteen to eighteen and maybe nineteen, although the whole book is good, and you might want to read it all.
here are a few good articles from linuxworld.com.au, these are not too technical and are designed for the beginner:
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=77&tid=8 start here, it's a page for a total linux beginner
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=4&tid=1 a page describing the graphical interfaces available for linux
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=6&tid=1 a page to start you off using Emacs, which is an open source text editor.
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=19&tid=8 a page to start you off using vi, a unix text editor
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=27&tid=8 a page about different user accounts on yr system, this is more important than in windows, since user accounts actually work in linux.
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=66&tid=8 a page to get you started on installing things in linux. this is an irritating area, since there's still no
real hard and fast standard easy way to install something.
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=58&tid=8 a page describing how to run windows programs in linux.
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=128&tid=8 a page about mounting filesystems.
http://linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=131&tid=8 a page about upgrading your kernel.
http://linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=280&tid=8 a page about running M$ office in linux, though why you would want to do so when you have openoffice is beyond me
http://linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=283&tid=1 a page about recovering deleted files
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=88&tid=4 a page about reading pdfs in linux (which is easy)
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=121&tid=8 an article about connecting to the internet
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=122&tid=8 an article about basic computer security
http://linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?aid=166&tid=4 how to tell if your security has been compromised
not all of those links will be useful but hope there is something in there for you g3nz0...