I'm in computer science in university so I'm learning my first programming language and the basics of algorithms and very basic digital system architecture.

I've been using Linux for a couple months and I know all of the basics (copying files, navigating, installing software, and a lot more of the basics).

So my question is: what would you recommend for me to learn next? My goal is to have a complete understanding of Linux and all its ins and outs before I finish my degree in 3.5 years. I just don't know what I should learn about next.

Please excuse my English

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Edit: it might be a very vague question, but what I mean by "what should I learn next" is "what major topic/area of linux should I learn next?"

BASH Scripting with just bash internal commands, then external commands. with your programming background you're developing it should come rather easily for the most part.

An excellent suggestion.

I would suggest that you add learning vim to your list, at least enough so that you feel comfortable using it to create and edit text files.

I have a bachelor's in comp. sci.. I program in 3 languages. I was a consultant for 8 years. I've done forensic acquisition and analysis, DBA, custom application programming, security, system design and development, and system analysis over the last 28 years, including 16 years of Linux experience, and I've barely scratched the surface of Linux.

If you can learn everything in 3.5 years, that would make you God!

Nothing like a little slap of reality to wake someone up, or try to .

Computer programming has been my hobby(!) for a great many decades now, and I certainly enjoyed that infatuation in college at a time when minicomputers were the latest thing and microcomputers were still merely very-expensive toys. (But, I played with them, nonetheless!)

What continues to attract me to this crazy business is that you will never know it all, and you will never stop learning new things.

For instance, when a friend of mine posted a Geocache® (a GPS-based treasure-hunt game), which contained both a 21-part logic puzzle ("The man with the red jacket is not sitting next to the lady with the canary.") and a Sudoku puzzle from hell, I didn't sit down and try to solve the thing: instead, I figured out how to write a gprolog program(!) to do so. Which I subsequently did, and had a great time doing it.

(And then, using the same tools to determine that only 20 of the 21 logic-puzzle parts were actually needed.)

If you genuinely enjoy doing this sort of thing, the available software and hardware resources are basically "cheap(!) and inexhaustible." Which they certainly were not in the earlier-days that I very well remember, but enjoyed anyway.

If you don't truly enjoy this – apart from a diploma and the promise of maybe-lucrative employment (heh...) – major in anything else.

If you really want to learn Linux from the inside out, check out Linux From Scratch.

You could also install and use an "Expert" distro for your main box, since using and fixing/maintaining these daily will have you an expert in no time.

Wow didn't expect this many responses.

I already know vim somewhat, but I think I'll start with the bash scripting then continue with the rest of the suggestions.

Thanks!

I'll echo (somewhat) the advice given by Mill J, and say "just use Linux every day". Learn how to deal with the services, how to configure things, and how to troubleshoot.

To put it a different way, think about this as if you were just learning to drive a car. Saying "I know how to put the car in gear, and how to park...what else should I learn to become a good driver?", would elicit the response of, "Well, go DRIVE...apply what you've been taught and have learned". You get better by doing. There is no set formula, no 'master list', and no set schedule. Everyone learns differently, and at different rates.

True. I am using it every day (in fact it's the only OS I use anymore). But the only things I'm doing in school don't expect me to venture too far in Linux into areas I am not familiar with. Just writing and compiling code. So that's why I asked the question

Immersion as others have said.

I'll suggest getting a hobbyist board where you can build a custom Linux distribution as well as do practice projects which are already well established as examples. Therefore a Pi, a Beagle, or something similar. Low budget, great examples out there, and many, many different programming examples as well as technologies you can explore.

Start playing with Slackware, it is one of the last true *nix distros left and offers a great way to truly learn how to use *nix rather then be used by it.

PS: live in the CLI, when you can comfortably do everything from CLI then GUI can be a tool and not a crutch.

Doesn't always go the way you might expect. I tried that but everything just worked - I had to go out of my way to arrange the need to fix things.

That's a good idea. Thinking about it. Don't know if that's biting off too big a chunk though. I'll probably install it over the weekend and see

Well, I guess the best way to learn is to live with it. Be active in Linux, like LQ community.

User it everyday, time will pass by and you won't just know that you have gathered a lot of knowledge in Linux and of course, learn to give back what you have learn.

Cheers!