Learning the basics of Linux, where should I start? what should I do or teach myself
 

Hi All,

I am absolutely new to Linux, I have installed Fedora 7 and would like to learn the basics, can any one recommend the fundementals they feel I should learn first, suggested reading material would be great.


Much Appreciated


450Nappa

I always recommend the Rute tutorial and exposition for the basics. You might also like to browse through some of the introductory guides at the Linux Documentation Project. If you want a dead-tree book, O'Reilly's Running Linux is a good choice.

What you should learn depends on what you want to do. Do you just want to use your system for browsing and e-mail? Do you want to really learn how to be a programmer or sysadmin, etc.? In any case, a solid understanding of the command line will be helpful for diagnosing problems.

Welcome to LQ

I would suggest looking into the hierarchy of the filesystem. It helped me troubleshooting my system, installing progams, uninstalling programs, etc. The link above provides good information of some important configuration files for customization and security as well. The link that btmiller provided may already contain this information, but this a good site to bookmark for reference.

If you want an audio tutorial of using linux try these two podcasts:

http://www.linuxreality.com/

This podcast has ceased, but they still have all 100 episodes. The episodes covers general linux topics and using linux as a desktop and server. There are some projects like setting up a file/printer server, a simple IMAP server and a music server.

http://goinglinux.com/

This podcast covers using linux mostly as a desktop. Great for beginners like you.

All episodes are downloadable from both sites. Welcome to linux...

first fedora 7 has passed it's end of life and is no longer supported ( NO updates )
also yum may not work any more for updating the OLD code on the dvd to the version at the EOL.

Manual installs might be the only way to install software rpm's.

Your best bet , if you stay with 7, is to BUILD all programs from the source code .
using
or install fedora 9 -- recommended
http://fedoraproject.org/en/get-fedora
but have a red through "Read This First -(Good Tips)"
http://forums.fedoraforum.org/forumdisplay.php?f=61
and " Guides & How-To Articles"
http://forums.fedoraforum.org/forumdisplay.php?f=12
As to help learning Linux look here
http://www.linuxcommand.org/index.php
http://tldp.org/LDP/Bash-Beginners-G...tml/index.html
http://rute.2038bug.com/rute.html.gz
http://www.shell-fu.org/

Why? Seriously, I'm interested in why it is I keep seeing people posting who say they are completely new to Linux and have just installed [insert name of an utterly obsolete past it's end of life version of Linux here].

What was it that led you to installed Fedora 7 when the current version is 9?

Linux moves fast. Much faster than Microsoft Windows. Free distros have a supported life span of around 18 months at most after which installing them is a waste of time. (Long Term Support releases of Ubuntu being the exception.) By installing a version that is past end of life you are setting yourself up for problems.

most likely because it was in a book .I have a copy of fedora 7 this way , for Christmas i said " get me a gift certificate because the F8 book is not out yet" i got fedora 7 book
with install disk
running 8 and get a 7 dvd .