On Thu, 13 Aug 2026 at 11:23, kerry via GLLUG <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi all, > I am a new volunteer at a charity and am a deputy system admin. I need to > learn lots about installing Linux servers, preferably on debian, as that is > what we use. The system admin says he used to recommend using a site called > debianhelp, as it covered lots of servers and explained things quite well, he > says it has turned into an online gambling site, so is no use anymore. he has > suggested that i document everything i do and put it on some web pages to > help people in the future. he also says 'learning by doing' is good. he used > to attend gllug meetings, at a university, years ago and told me he learned > so much from the group and that i should join the mailing list. > kerry >
Welcome and you will get friendly answers here. Youtube is also helpful if you have a specific thing you are doing, someone else might have already done a video about it. The debian channel on IRC is also helpful sometimes. I would say that, at the moment, security seems to be very much in everyone's minds. So, if the Linux server is reachable from the internet, I would advise you to get some security training, otherwise it might be quite easy for someone malicious to cause problems. If the server is mainly for internal users, then the risk is somewhat lower, and you can focus on what services and applications will help the charity. I did all my learning about Linux by doing, so I agree with that advice. But, it only works, if you actually have a specific task you need to do, because then it is easy to tell if you succeeded or not. If you get stuck, AI / LLMs like copilot, chatgpt and gemini can help, but be warned, blindly following their advice can sometimes do more harm than good, so try to make sure you understand the commands / steps they are suggesting, before actually doing them. Also, make a note of every command before you do it, so that if things go wrong, you can backtrack / undo them. With regards to "installing Linux servers". I would say it probably depends on how many servers there are, because there are various tools like ansible, terraform, docker, kubernetes that can help automate it all. -- GLLUG mailing list [email protected] https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/gllug
