How long did it take you...
 

to be able to use Linux as functionally as you used to use Win/OSX? Basically, Im wondering how long it took you to get to know linux really well. Im on my 5th day, and it seems really difficult. Ive spent all of my time fixing things, with little sucess. I know learning Linux is worth it, though. And I know its not easy, but I hate windows and cant afford a Mac. So I know Im on Linux for good:)

It depends on how well you know Windows...

In my case, I was not the leat bit proficient on Windows and I learned to do more on Linux very quickly (few months)

Flip side: Linux has an asymptote--ie one can quickly get to the point where the last bits of knowledge come very slowly.

I probably used linux as functionally as windows after, 6 months top. But, I never knew much about Windows. I know I've learned more about linux (by a lot), than I ever knew about Windows

What was the best learning source? I read alot on linux.org/lessons . Its a really good source. One thing I wished more people would do is instead of giving newbies code, explain what the code does, the aliases, and the reason He/she is having you type it.

One of the things that is difficult for me is typing commands that are drawn out and are very specific.

it took me prolly 6 months before i was comfortable using linux vs windows, i also tried a few different distro's before finding something that i love and use daily now...and here, 3 years later, i'm still learning.

there are some great online references to use. i used rute to get me going...and obviously LQ.org is amazing...and also tldp is full of information.
always remember, google is your friend!

*edit

a lot of times the easiest answer will be someone tossing a code at you, without giving a description of what/why it is or does. i do that myself sometimes. it's a bad habit, and i apologize if i ever do it to you...but i know if i'm checking the forums here and someone says "hey, how do i???" it's second nature almost for me to say "oh just type "code here" and although i know how and why it works, i sort of assume everyone who reads it does too...which obviously isn't true...so if anyone tosses code at you, don't be afraid to ask why or what or how...people here are great, and will usually tell you more than you ever needed to know about something...lol.

How long did it take you....?

Well, still working at it. I came to linux with little pc experience. Windows was such a hassle to maintain, my thoughts were "there has to be something better out there". So far no regrets. Maybe not having much windows knowledge and ingrained windows habits was an advantage.

The learning process went something like;
1) Figuring out the filesystem. This helped http://www.pathname.com/fhs/
2) Learning about permissions
3) Printing out a bash cheatsheet and posting it on the wall behind the monitor
4) Learning the package manager and alternative ways to install software

After that it was mostly a matter of learning the desktop (kde in my case) and the apps/utilities. Is a learning a microsoft product really much different? Other than the fact MS documentation is better (more centrally) organized

This is an excellent question...

Consider someone with no pc experience (umm, grandma, for instance). How long would it take her to learn Windows? Now then, once she's used to Windows, let's switch her over to Linux. There...she's confused because a lot of the stuff she learned for Windows doesn't work the same in Linux.

Now imagine if she learned Linux first. The same "learning curve" would apply if she switched to Windows.

Point is, sometimes it's harder to learn something if you've already got experience with a similar, yet fundamentally different, system. Linux and Windows serve the same purpose, yet they go about it differently, introducing a "learning curve" that is in all reality an accidental difficulty when switching from one to the other. I read an article concerning Linux users working with *BSD...the same accidental difficulty was present, but the point is, someone starting with *BSD and switching to Linux had to deal with the same difficulties (even though Linux and BSD are much more closely related than Linux and Windows or *BSD and Windows).

Now then, having come from a Windows background myself (sigh...), I'd have to say that it took me about 30 seconds to realize that I had my hands on something good when I booted up my first Linux installation...and it took me probably two months (or so) to get to the point that I could remove Windows from my computer without any drastic loss in productivity. (I don't play games quite so much as most people, I guess). It depends on how you use your computer.

Hang in there, EYEdROP, you'll be glad you did because it's worth every second of learning.

I'm maybe a late starter, I think it took me about one year of double booting to reach nearly the same efficiency. Not in all tasks, but some worked better then on Windows some worse. When I did the full switch to Linux my learning curve got much faster.

I still consider myself not a Linux expert, but an advanced newbie.

it took me around a year to fully get hold of linux but i still can get get a hold of firewalls!!!
i ve learn a lot from linuxquestions and www.tldp.org
before that i was a full user of ms windows having used all the oses produced by ms billy

I would use the "Unleashed" books. I am currently reading "Fedora Core 6 Unleashed", and it's VERY thurough. I think they have one for Ubuntu. You should check it out, You should start by looking at amazon here

I figure about a year for me. I suppose i am fairly proficient in windows (2k,xp), so i knew which settings to tweak, tools to use etc.

The thing is i find Linux's functionality, scope and toolsets far greater, so i can achieve more using it than a windows system. I am constantly on XP at work wanting to write a shell script or use grep or the package manager, it just makes more sense to me.

I do like to keep my knowledge current in as many systems as i can though, you never know when it will come in handy.

That's a good point. I agree with you 100%. I know some people that are like "I am NEVER using Windows again...I'm replacing everything with (Insert other operating system here)" But they don't realize is that the more you know about a variety of thing...the better. Although I agree that Linux is better (IMO) and I prefer it; I don't think that Windows will go away. So as an IT person, you should have at least SOME knowledge in Windows (an yes this does mean using VISTA once in a while....wow...that left a bad taste in my mouth...)

-custangro

I would say it took close to a year to be as competent in linux as windows for me. I was lucky enough to have 2 machines, so I kept one with 2000 professional then the other with Red Hat 9 then Fedora Core 1. I bought a new machine about 9 or so months into the linux project with the intent to dual boot, and never bothered to install win on it. I also had the good fortune to discover Debian and drop Fedora in the trash.

I think one of the best things you can do to help yourself along would be to do everything at the prompt rather than through the GUI. It is good that you're asking questions about written codes, because that is where the power of linux really comes out. Clicking on pictures is great, but you have no real knowledge of what is happening. The command line is not that forgiving. Also, the CLI is much better when moving between systems. If I get placed on slackware 11 when I'm used to Debian I can get around well through the CLI, but if you use KDE and get put on a machine with Gnome, you're fairly useless.

Another thing that might help is if you use KDE, within Konqueror, click on windows and select "show terminal emulator". That will show you at the command line how to do everything you are doing graphically. There probably is a similar tool in Gnome, I just don't know what it is.

Peace,
JimBass

I started using Linux back in 2002. It took approximately 1 year to safely say, "Yep, now I can delete MS for good".

As I went from DOS to Linux and then learned Windoze later on it's a whole different situation. I always found the MS OS to be frustrating and nearly useless.

i'm a :newbie: to linux, just installed slackware 11 less then a week ago, system setup has been horrible, but "titopoquito" has really been helping me out, once i can get the internet working properly i think things will settle down alot more.

My best friend as a child owned a mac so i first learnt how to work a mac. Then, my parents bought a windows based computer, i remember how confused i was with this new fangled machine, i remember hateing windows since i first started using it.....

I've been windows user for the past 10+ years, I've always been curious about linux, and countless blue screens of death made me wonder if there was something better, an alternative.

I heard about linux, but it wasn't until i got a major virus which wouldn't even let me boot up into safe mode to fix the problem. I had it with windows, and decided to take the plunge into the wonderful world of linux, and even though i feel totally overwhelmed once again with this whole new world to explore, it's exciting!

Once I learn to use linux and feel comefortable with it, I plan to help other fledglings in turn ^_^ maybe even convert a few people to linux by reformating their PC in the middle of the night:jawa: hehehe

~!L O N G L I V E L I N U X!~

Andrew

Ok, where is that in konqeror? Is there a tab named windows or is it a submenu? Can't find that feature in Mepis, not even in configuration.

yes but for a 7 year old linux user like me testing an ms os can be very frustrating
i remember testing winxp when it first came out at my university and guess what!!!!:confused:
with my bad habit of openning 8 o 9 windows on linux, i crashed a newly installed winxp!!!

maybe we should go back to windows once a while to confirm that we linux users are still using quality os :p

I started using linux around 2 months ago. but since i am dual booting, i think the actual time spent with linux is about 1 month. I am comfortable doing somethings on linux, but for others, i have to go to windows. But i am hoping that in around 6 months time, i would be able to do most of my tasks in linux.

I have linux (Fedora 6) machines at my work place, so that should speed up the learning curve a bit..lol since there i do not have access to windows.

Didn't take long at all, but as others said it depends on the person and their repsective backgrounds with "puters".

I was trouble shooting at a client site the other day when someone asked me to help them with their Vista desktop. I was lost! A command I am used to running hundreds of times a day simply did not work.....ping, returned General Failure <-- hows that for a descriptive error message. I stood there dumbfounded.

I reckon at my present rate of learning, that I'll be a GNU/Linux Guru by the time I'm ninety.

Muddywaters wrote,
On mine I click on, "Window" in between "Settings" and "Help", and Show Terminal Emulator is 2nd from the bottom.

Peace,
JimBass

That seems like a very reasonable goal. If you go back to my earlier post, you'll see that it took me about a whole year to completely switch, but that was back in 2002. Linux is becoming easier every year, and I don't think 6 months is bad at all. Hopefully it will take you less than 6 months, but if it takes more don't worry about it. Just enjoy the process.

I wish you the best of luck on your journey. There will be thrilling times and times you'll want to curse. But it's a bridge you'll never forget having crossed.

Check out the awesome tutorial:
LINUX: Rute User's Tutorial and Exposition

It can be downloaded from the web in PDF, or used interactively from several places on the web. This is as good as anything I have seen.

Bob

About a year and a half for me. It took me three months on and off to try and find the right distro. This took a while as I wanted something customizable that I could build really from the ground up. Once installed i took some time trying to find the right software to use. I had a long time switching between GNOME and XFCE. While I was doing this, I learned the basics of the command line.

My first and current distro is Debian, installed with the netinstall cd.

It depends on how deep you want to get into the guts of the Operating System. For all general life uses, it took me a couple months and then I knew I'd never go back. If you want to get into complex inner workings, it will take you longer to know what's going on and where.

There was no item labelled "Window" on my konqueror toolbar, but there is now.
For some reason konqueror in Mepis has a slimmed down configuration. A more traditional setup can be found in /usr/share/apps/konqueror/konqueror-orig.rc.
Looks like the packagers saved the old config for those who want it. Copying that file to my home directory solved the issue.

In linux all is possible :)

Yep, plain text configuration is a beautiful thing. Glad you were able to sort out that issue. I would have thought you were on some reality altering medication, I never thought somebody would remove standard elements from a config, but I've never seen Mepis.

Peace,
JimBass