On Mon, 12 Nov 2001, anarkissed wrote: > Linux sometimes appears to have folders reappearing in other places because > there may be identically named sub folders in different places.
True. > For > instance, \ is root but might actually be some distance down a directory > tree. It's root because that's where the user is expected to call > home. Another user will find themselves at root in a different place in > the tree. Huh??? What distribution are you running? When I login as steve, my home directory is /home/steve. When I login as any user, I'm in /home/user. The only "virtual roots" I can think of are those "document roots" defined by http and ftp servers. http://somewhere.com/ isn't really / of the system but / of the web server... which may be something like /home/httpd/html on the system. (of course, there's chroot, but that's well beyond the scope of this discussion) > Then too in that root they may all have their own subfolders > with the same name as subfolders that superuser has in his folder and then > also the same name as folders that are off the branch meant for system files. > It is all very confusing when you first login, being used to c:> as your > root and always having you precise path back to it written there on the > screen. I know I feel blind in Linux because of how it hides the actual > directory position from the user and creates virtual roots. Your actual directory position isn't "hidden." $ pwd (stands for present working directory) will show your absolute location. There's no need to feel blind. > Now throw in links and you really get messed. It has a different way of > accessing paths and remembering where things are, much more fluid and > flexible, allowing it to seem as though a file is in several places at once > when it's only in one but there are links all over for it. If you could > tell dos to Path \*.* so that it would look everywhere any time you > executed anything, that would be a bit like Linux, Linux doesn't do that. It looks at your $PATH variable. If the command is in your path, the shell will execute it. If it isn't in your path, you must give the path as part of the command. For instance, if I do $ ifconfig I get an error message. If instead, I do $ /sbin/ifconfig then ifconfig executes. > although I am sure that there are times when linux can't find it's own > files either. Linux can always find its own files... unless the hard drive is corrupted. > These things make it hard to comprehend what's going on, but in the long > run contribute to the power of this maniacally challenging OS. > I've been at it 4 years now and still can't make it work. It's getting so > that if I ever do learn it, I fear the world will come to an end. If you work at learning Linux for 1 minute each day for 4 years, then you'll likely forget more than you'll retain. If you work at learning Linux in a systematic manner for 15 minutes each day for 4 years, you should be able to pass any Linux certification exam. I ran across a book about two years ago that I wish had been around when I was a Linux newbie, _SAM'S Teach Yourself Linux in 10 Minutes_. It's just over 200 pages, but packs more newbie-useful info into those pages than just about any other Linux book I've seen. There are 20 chapters, each of which should presumably take 10 minutes to get through... so let's say to get fairly proficient, you go through the book twice. That's 10 minutes a day for 40 days to become quite comfortable with your system. No more feeling "blind" or like "Linux can't find its files." I highly recommend it to anyone just getting into Linux... and it even makes a handy desktop reference for those of us who forget more than we retain. ;-) - Steve
