hi i saw alot of kindness and friendliness here on this forum, and support.

i need someone to explain to me the structure of linux

what i mean is

/sbin/
/usr/
/etc/

and the rest of them.

what do they mean? what is usually stored in the basic linux folders?

i need someone to run this down for me before i can even begin this new adventure into the world of linux. I know basic things, like Sudo, apt-get, root, nano, find, proc, gnome, KDE, (GUI's) but thats about it.. LOL, i hope i dont annoy anyone or offend anyone on this learning quest - im also a poor man living in the USA, 100% legally disabled.. and they dont even pay me enough to live on my own since i have no work history sadly..

the only thing i can contribute to this community is the WHM and cPanel support area, ive been using the WHM since the 31st on a VPS with CentOS and was plagued with problems.. i've finally learned allot about using it with the help of my server host and cPanel support tickets LOL. But there's still more to learn for me. I chose Ubuntu or debian for my own personal VPS on my own computer. Just something to toy with and learn on, i have vmware workstation 12. Pretty sure its old and outdated by now but its the best i can do, either that or virtual box

any way here is my introduction, my name is William, i run http://www.ultraforum.org (its just a ghost lol, theres no one there really) and host websites for friends for free and offer them a cpanel, ftp, sftp, ssh, and webmail (on the VPS i rent with CentOS), most of my friends are foreign but are into computers like me (my first computer was a commador 64, i was about 7 years old) im now 32 years old and have become a hardware expert, im also self taught and became A+ certified without any classes. But i came to find out that where i live (back when my certification was still valid) will not get you a job in my town/state. So if i come across someone in the community with a computer hardware problem or question, ill jump right in and help or if someone can point me in their direction that works too

anyway, thats a little about me, thank you for reading, and i appreciate any and all support/help i get from anyone

if someone could kindly give me a nice run down of the linux structure in full detail i will greatly appreciate it

/boot: files used in booting
/bin: essential user programs (those you must have to hand in an emergency)
/sbin: essential housekeeping programs
/usr/bin: less essential user programs, including all applications
/usr/sbin: less essential housekeeping programs
/lib: essential libraries (if it's in /bin or /sbin, the libraries will be in /lib)
/usr/lib: less essential libraries
/etc: configuration files
/var: changeable program info, logs
/usr/share: static program info (documentation, icon sets, language and time zone data)
/home: parent of all personal user directories (except root)
/root: root's personal directory
/usr/local: programs and libraries built locally from source
/opt: ditto
/usr/include: library headings for use in builds
/run: session temporary files
/tmp: temporary files created by programs
/sys: everything the kernel knows about your hardware
/dev: interface with kernel hardware drivers
/proc: windows into the kernel, showing current state of processes and resources
/mnt, /media: mount points for additional partitions. /media is commonly used for CDs and USB drives.

1 members found this post helpful.

wow thanks! that was a terrific breakdown! -- but what does library mean, like the context? and whats a kernel?

Hi kd0.

On a general level, the following might be useful info for you about Linux:

http://www.tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/

Look up "File System Hierarchy".

A library is a collection of code snippets for carrying out a related series of operations, for example handling a particular media format or parsing XML or doing certain kinds of maths. Windows has them too and gives them the .dll extension. But in Windows, a lot of the libraries are proprietary so they can't be used by software developed by a different company. In Linux, once a library has been developed, any program that needs to do those jobs can use it. That's the beauty of free software. A lot of well-known Linux libraries have been around for donkey's years.

The kernel is the big program that handles all your hardware. In Windows every piece of hardware has its own driver but in Linux, the kernel drives everything. It also manages all running processes, allocates resources to them, swaps them in and out of the cpu and memory, and tidies up after them when they die.

AH okay i get it now, thanks you guys! your so awesome!