Hello. I am an absolute newbie to computers in general. Seriously, I know how to play games and check e-mail, and that's about it.
I have chosen to learn more, and I have spoken with several people whose opinions I trust. They all keep saying "Learn Linux" but they do not have time to teach me.
I think I have decided to start with Linux not only because it was suggested to me, but because I have never heard a bad word spoken about it. Seriously, nobody I know has ever complained about it, other than to say that it is more difficult to learn than Microsoft or Windows. Well, that's not going to make a difference to me, because I don't know anything about those two programs, either. I learn fairly well and quick, and I'm stubborn as erosion.
Is there some source out there than can help? Some book or program or school that specializes in this sort of thing? I know I'm in for an up-hill battle and would like the best starting point I can find.

Thanks in advance.

Well, I started on Linux with a significantly more technical background than you, but you may find the Slackbook useful (I certainly did). It focuses on a particular distribution of Linux called Slackware, which doesn't have a very good reputation as being newb friendly, but it will almost certainly help no matter which distribution you try.

I recommend giving a few live CDs a shot before you actually install anything. They boot directly from a CD and don't touch anything you have installed on your computer already. Some good ones to start with are Knoppix and Ubuntu. Ubuntu also makes an easy to use full installation.

Congratulations, I see you've discovered why a friend of mine calls his Linux box his desktop mistress - once you get involved with it, you want more...

I recommend the info at http://rute.2038bug.com/index.html.gz. Also, spend as much time using the command line as you can. Even if you decide that you prefer GUI administration, having to learn where config files are and what to do with them as well as learning the layout of your file systems will help you understand the what/why side of the GUI tools.

Sounds like me, and not that long ago either. One idea,if you have the time, check if there is a linux user group nearby.

Hello MikhailRahl and welcome to Linuxquestions! Well first of all if you wt to learn linux I would reccomend the book Linux Bible 2006 Edition By Christopher Negus. It's kind of a "newbie book". What might help you is that with this book comes Knoppix, a very populer Linux "Live CD". A Live Cd is a Cd that boots linux without touching the hard drive. the book also has 7 fully installable Linux Distros. The one I reccomend is SUSE 10. It is very good.

I'd say, if you want to learn to use linux then you'd need to install Slackware. I've found that very helpful. The basic installation is quite easy, especially if you have Slackbook. I've learned very much with slackware, all config files are quite logically placed and well commented so it's quite easy to configure the system and to get know how it works.

Thanks everyone very much for your feedback. I don't know what anyone is talking about, but at least I have some things to look for and start with! Have a great weekend!

To download Iso's of linux distros go to http://www.linuxiso.org

I'm very satified with Open-SuSe 10.0 from Easy-Linux (DVD)
The only thing I couldn't get to work on this was my modem.

But now as I have DSL, no problem no virus no trojan no worms no ....