Career Optrions

I am an older, competent, windows user who would love to migrate to Linux. Unfortunately there is no easy path. Linux seems to be a program written by geeks who want it to be different, forcing a windows user wanting to move over to completely learn a new way to use the internet. Even moving to Apple is easier. To learn Linux is like forcing us to learn Chinese from scratch. That will not happen.

Unless a pathway, or a bridge, which is "somewhat" like windows is provided so we can assimilate into this new OS called Linux, I, we, will never really accept Linux to replace Windows. Even though we want to get away from Windows, there is no way to do it, because Linux is just too different to easily learn. I can play with Linux, but that is all I can do - play with it, not use it on a daily basis.
SAD.

And here we are, going to be forced to accept Windows 10 as the next OS, and I have nothing to say about it, for MS will soon kill Win7 like they killed XP, and force me to go to Win10, when I don't want to. I would love to use Linux, but the learning curve is just toooooo steep.
SAD

It would be nice to have a version which would make moving from Windows to Linux easy. The reality is, though, Linux is an OS for the younger geeks, or experienced programmer, not an OS for the avg user. Why can't that change? I realize this is an age old question, which has been around for years, but I'm realizing it is now becoming a reality I need to face.

Hi all,

Apologies if this is off-topic. I searched a while and couldn't find out whether or not the Newbie forum is strictly for technical questions or not.

I am new to Linux and have been using it the past 4 months or so. Currently I work in a support job as an MS technician. I'm mostly using it to advance my career. Management told me if I devote time to learning Linux to the point where I can do very basic maintenance tasks on the company Linux servers, and the ability to support our few Linux clients, I would be promoted to a senior support position.

One of the greater challenges so far is trying to figure out WHAT to focus on and how long to devote to it each day. I find that if I spend multiple hours/day trying to learn Linux (like 2-3 hours), I don't retain much of what I've learned. Conversely, if I don't spend enough time each day, I worry that I will not learn enough to become proficient in a reasonable amount of time. I sometimes start reading up on a Linux topic, for instance, how to send mail to users, and wonder if my time could be better spent learning another aspect. Then again, I feel like a lot of this basic knowledge can be built upon.

I'd like to become proficient enough to achieve this senior position in 1.5-2 years. Given my current job and personal responsibilities I am able to devote 1-2 hours of learning Linux each day.

In that amount of time, I've been learning new bash commands daily and practicing yum, tried setting up a web server, extracting/compiling software, messing around with inittab, cron jobs, etc. very basic things and building upon that.

Does this sound reasonable? I'd very much appreciate some pointers and to see if I am on the right track from a Linux community perspective.

Thanks.

Hi, please excuse any misunderstanding about the title.

I'm an experienced computer user, but not with Linux. As a matter of fact, even with Windows, I only do so much at the command prompt.

I am looking for a very fast (boot and etc.) Linux system, that has nothing more than a command prompt. No X-Windows. However, I would like to configure X-Windows immediately after an installation.

I noticed the LFS project. Very cool, but way too complex for me. It is exactly what I'm looking for, except, I would like the basic system to already be proven, maybe even with security updates.

The biggest most important thing is (ONLY WHAT I WANT). I don't want dozens of browsers, a hundred text editors, or any other cool or stupid open source or commercial software. I simply am looking for what Dos 6.22 was in Linux.

There are many distros. Can you guys help me pick one out that is light, secure and ready to be configured to run X windows or X-Free or Xorg, I'm not sure what the best is right now.

PS: I'm a linux noob, but I have had several decent installations of Ubuntu, and some experience with the command line, including compiling software, but still a beginner.

Hi all! Just joined. First post.

Looking around Amazon.com I see that there are a lot of books out there. I was wondering if there were a small number that were generally considered to be the best for a newbie to learn Ubuntu and the command line.

I am a Windows refugee having bought a clean machine from System76 in May 2014 with Ubuntu 14.04 LTS installed. I got my first computer back in the early 90's and actually liked DOS! Kind of full circle I guess.

Any suggestions are appreciated.

Thanks!

Kevin

Hello all.
I have been using Linux OS's of and on since 1996. I completely gave up on MS in 2006. I change out a hard drive in my PC and MS thought I should purchase a new site license, I did not agree with that train of thought.
I found that popping in a disk and getting Linux up and running was easy to the belief that "Nothing could be this easy". It really was. The learning curve was encountered when trying to make Linux Fly. I recommend that everyone new to Linux or anyone with a desire to do a bit more than e-mail, catalog some photos or music get your hands on a Linux command reference guide and learn the terminal. There is so much to understand and do With Free Open Source Software and there are so many ways to access, install and configure the available software. There are so many resources for help and trouble shooting all things Linux however, here's the caveat; I really had to learn how to ask the question to get an answer that worked for me. General question will get you general answers and rarely ever was the answer I sought found the hodgepodge of generalities found in forums or Google searches and the like. I learn to be very specific in my question and the answers were discerned with less difficulty. There are really answers or fixes for the questions I have had concerning Linux.

I am in the process of setting up my first VPS to host a website that I have been working on. By profession, I am a programmer, so I know nothing of Linux or web hosting!!

Thanks to lots of help on here this weekend, I finally learned how to access my VPS using SSH. (That only took a day or two to learn!) And my first command-line task was learning how to copy a file to another folder while maintaining the original modified date. (That only took another half-day!)

Whew!

So the next thing that I need to do is set up MySQL on my VPS...


My VPS runs on CentOS 6, and it also comes with cPanel, but since astrogeek and Miati were persistent in explaining why it is better to do things via the command-line versus using a GUI, I figured I would check things out...

My cPanel comes with some "wizard" that supposedly sets up a MySQL database for you, but whenever I see "wizard" I tend to run!

Advanced Support for my web host said that I should definitely use cPanel to create my database and create the users, because if I did it using phpMyAdmin it would supposedly mess things up as cPanel wouldn't recognize things?

(BTW, I requested MySQL Root access this morning, but I do not have Root access to my VPS - by choice for now!)


Questions:
1.) Should I listen to my web host and use the cPanel wizard to create a new MySQL database?


2.) If I decide to bypass cPanel, how exactly would I use my MacBook to talk to my VPS and do MySQL stuff over command-line?

FWIW, I developed my entire database using phpMyAdmin in MAMP on my MacBook. When I created my original database in development, I used phpMyAdmin's GUI. And then for everything else (e.g. create table, indexes, queries, etc.), I hand-wrote the SQL in TextEdit and then ran it in phpMyAdmin.

But I have no clue how to do any of this on my VPS!!


3.) How would I use the command-line to create a new database and set up groups and users for MySQL?


4.) If I did things by command-line, is it true that I would break cPanel?


I have been working on my website for the last 3 years, and it is ready to "go live", but I am discovering that setting up my VPS properly - and with lots of security - and getting things like PHP and MySQL set up is a very daunting task!!!



Sincerely,


Rob

I just got a new laptop with Windows 8.1 and I cannot figure out how to install Linux Mint by booting from a CD or USB drive. Previously, I had installed Linux Mint on my old desktop and netbook computers that were running Windows XP. I had no trouble booting from a CD. Now that the process has been complicated in Windows 8.1 I don't know what to do. Any help would be greatly appreciated, I would really like to get rid of Windows 8.1 ASAP. Thanks!

I'm not actually that newbie,I already experienced Kali linux, Ubuntu and Slackware, but the last one was to much hands on to me. I don't want something simple like Ubunt, but nothing that slack, like slackware. My interests are programing, using matlab, learn the basic of script and general linux programing, run windows aplications, develop for linux windows and android. I really get into something challenger, but also smart, Wich could recognize my cards and install drivers. Something advanced wich i would personalize, and something wich would make me learn, but please, no slackware! Maybe someday, but not this time.
Another thing. KDE or GNOME environment

Please, be reliable and honest as such is possible and I'll have no words to thanks. I really want to get into linux in first category. If I would to use a slogan to my life I'd say: Quote:
"Not the hard or easy way, not the curved path or the straight line, the smarter choice!
Why to go in the full way when I can get a shortcut? The answer: Will I learn with it, learn enogh to take a shortcut in the future? What is gain and when the questions will stop? Will they stop if i choose the shortcut?
If a have to make something, let's do it in the easy way, no need to reinvent anytihng.
The only thing that I don't want is to be alone. This doesn't mean to be without anyone to talk or help, however it also makes part, besides what really minds is to have someone else with information; the only thing that can go faster than light, the only thing that can make the world make sense; to share with you and to share for us. Just like univeverse couldn't make sense with only two electrons, it also could'nt make sense without people and coletive learning, for us, by us, through us... "
That was to much, but now you must now what I want.

Hey guys, im a long time Mac user but I want to have a Linux computer in my office for web based stuff and fixing hard drives.... I'm going to buy a used computer from eBay to install my Linux software as I believe that Linux is a lot faster than Mac or windows and doesnt need the latest hardware to compete.

In order to be at least as fast as a windows computer but no more than $100. What range of computer should I be looking at? What specs should I look for? And once I get it should I run Ubuntu or mint for web based things and hard drive repair? As you no doubt know, the Linux lingo is a bit difficult sometimes so please bear with me. I'm doing the best I can.

Weird question I know, but I'm sure you know what I mean.

Hi. Sorry to be so stupid, but I just managed to load and install this Linux (which I really like a lot) on my previously windows <--(bad) system.
But now I need to upgrade some software (like Adobe flash), and I have no clue how to do this. I understand I should go to my original linux distrubutor, and select software thru them (my "Linux distro").
But actually, it's been awhile since I did the install, and I dont exactly remember where I even got this distribution. (I know, I'm dumb--sorry).
Is there a way I can look at my linux system files and see who my distribution is thru, and where is their website. Or would it be easier if I just went thru the whole download and install of linux again <--(not really looking forward to that).
Or even, am I wrong about going thru the distro to do installs/upgrades?
Anything you can tell me will be greatly appreciated.

Long Live Linux !! David K