install suggestions for a linux noob?
 

Hello, as the topic suggests, I am very new to linux and attempting to switch from windows to linux. After reading several different forums I have decided to install Mandrake 10.1 from DVD (mostly because it is stated by many to be quite user friendly).

I was hoping to get some pointers as to what packages I should install to make the transition easy. Gnome or KDE (I read something I don't fully understand about KDE licensing issues)? Email (I currently use thunderbird), Video viewer etc.

My concern is if I install an email client written for Gnome but installed KDE (or vice versa) will it work OK?

I'm not really attempting to start another debate (I have read many already), I just want everything to work OK so I can learn from there.

Also, if I'm concerning myself about too much too soon, let me know. I have no problems doing the research and finding most my own answers to my problems so long as when I install linux I get my Internet up and running.


Thanks for you time (flame away),
Atnot

PS, I have a nforce2 motherboard and nvidia 5200.

To gnome or kde is a matter of taste, you can install both if you want and try them out.

Apps that are made for gnome require gnome libraries to run, but should run in kde. Similarly, kde apps need kde libraries installed but will run in gnome. Your choice is really one of desktop taste rather than what applications you want.

You can continue to use thunderbird. For browsing, firefox is good. As for video, mplayer and xine are popular, xine particularly for dvds. For music, xmms is a popular player with many good plugins available to perform some dandy tricks. These are probably shipped in your distro in which case you may choose them at install time.

Happy computing, and don't be shy in the forums :) Sharing problems is a linux experience.

I would go with KDE, but like you said that is a personal preferrence.

How do you connect to the internet? If it is a cable/dsl, do you connect to the modem with a cat-5 cable or is it a USB modem? If it is dialup, is the modem a win modem (most PCI are)? If it is a Win modem you will have some problems.

If you decide to install KDE and want to run some Gnome apps, just install the GTK packages, that should fix you up there for the most part. If you decide to run Gnome, install the QT packages. The apps depend on the QT or GTK packages, not Gnome or KDE itself. I use gftp with KDE, but I do not have Gnome installed. I just install the GTK packages.

If this is your first install, I would install everything or do a workstation install and install both Gnome and KDE. You can then switch between the two til you decide what you like best.

Depends on the distro you choose, you might want to keep Windows til you get Linux up and running. If you have one partition, you can resize it with fdisk (the Linux version). Just make sure you defrag Windows before you resize.

One last thing, good luck and have fun. I personually love Linux and I hope you have much fun as I have with it.

Go ahead and install both Desktop Environments if you have sufficient space. Heck, install the myriad of Window Managers, too! You won't know what you like until you've tried them. ;)

And there is no real licensing issue for home users of KDE. All I know about is that TrollTech (who makes QT/KDE) says *commercial* developers need to be licensed. For a home user running KDE - no problems. :)

Thank-you all for you responses, I'll install both KDE and Gnome then.

tangle, I use cat-5 to connect to my adsl using the nforce2 onboard lan.