I thought I might tell ya all a story, about how i've got to where I am with linux (which is not to say that I'm a whiz, but that i can use it).. and i'll try and keep this story short, Here goes:
My cousin first installed Debain Linux for me in about March last year. For a few moths after that, I still used Windows 98 fulltime, and just booted into Linux to play around and get to know it. After a few months I found I was using Linux for most of my day to day stuff, but still bootign Win for printing, scanning, and writing CD's because they wern't working in Linux at this stage, and to use Word and Excel. Over the next 4 or so months I got to know Linux more, and figured out how to get my hardware working. The scanner was the biggest mission, it involved getting USB working first... This was stuff that I could do quite easily now, but at the time I had no idea what I was doing. One of the funniest/nost annoying things, was that for a long time i'd been trying to get the CDR to work, and couldn't... then one day my flatmate wanders in and says he'd just got his to work... It seems the only reason it wasn't working was that one line in lilo.conf that says append="hdc=ide-scsi"... but thats life! My main sources of support was my cousin, who I kept asking my newbie questions to, google, and a book called (I think, (its not actually on my shelf atm)) Linux in a Nutshell... This book covers all the things I needed to know, at that stage of my Linux "career", but not the stuff I didn't need to know. Often I'd ask my cousin questions and he'd reply RTFM. One big things about Linux that I didn't realise at first is the amount of documentation. This can be both good and bad. Last year my fiancee (she wasnt at the time) asked me if i'd install Linux on her comp and teach it to her. So i agreed, reluctantly. I figured she wasn't ready for it, but obviously to have an open mind enough to ask for linux, she thought she was ready (she'd used Linux on my comp, obviously)... So I went and installed RH7.3 for her. Somebody had (mis)informed me that RH was good for learning linux with, they were wrong... it didn't suit our situation at all, I couldn't show or tell her what to do, because everything was different. I never figured out the point of manually downloading RPMs, Vs debains apt-get, and I never figured out how to configure the network without a GUI. Wheres the /etc/network/interfaces file when ya need it? The big issues I had with RH was that it was a different distro, which I didn't know. Its the same on this list, some things are very distro specific, some thing are very hardware specific, and sometimes people can't help, except for sitting down with your comp, and figuring it out the hard way. So over the weekend, RH went, and I installed Debian on Katie's (my fiancee) computer, now it works better than it ever has, with RH or Win, and it runs faster than my comp,... depite being slower, since its running less crap. Its a clean install with just what she needs. Last night I installed Nautilus on Katie's comp, so she can do stuff in a familiar fasion. And I basically told her this story which I've just told y'all. The reason I explained all this to her is by way of saying Don't rush it. As they say on the cheese ad, "Good things take time". I told her that it it gets to frustrating for her (not knowing how to do things), then boot into Windows and do it (half the drive still has Win98, for exactly that reason, dispite her elling me to get rid of it). Personally, when I have Linux issues, I tend to swear alot and thow pens onto the desk, so that they bounce off and hit the walls, (it really is quite cool, try it!)... but that just how I vent my Linux anger. I use a command line alot, and mostly I use it within Gnome. I use keybindings for alot of things; it takes alot of configuring things sometimes, but I find it better in the long run, but thats a personal thing. I started off with gmc, and thought it was great, but then as I got to know Linux discovered there was faster ways to do things, so I tended not to use it, so i removed it. Same with windows.... It was taking up valuable mp3 space, and I didn't use it, so (first time, about 6mnths after I started using/learning Linux) i removed it. Then I put it back another time... then I removed it another time... this happened a few times. You will not realise the satisfaction you get from issuing the command "sudo rm -rf /win/*", until you try it. It is the best stress relief (better than throwing pens at the desk even). Anyway... I've failed in my attempt to make this a short email. The main points that I was trying to make is that Linux takes time. It takes time to get to know the OS, how it works, why its better, why it pisses you off so much sometimes. I constantly advise my friends "Computers suck, dont go into the computer industry", and they do, sometimes... but that what keeps computers interesting, eh? Linux also takes time to get working with hardware, and get it configured to your individual needs, but when its done, it's sooooo good. Hopefully I'll meet some of the newbies, as well as the oldbies at the meeting on thursday... I've never been to a clug meeting before, usually I've been to busy with assignments and the like, but its holidays this time, so no excuse. I also didn't attend the installfest, so basically your all just names to me. So could we have name stickers for the meeting please... I'm not sure you usually do this or not, but it would be good. The other thing I forgot to metion above is that I've been using Linux for about 15 months now, and I know enough to get by, and do what I need to do, but i only know a small fraction of what there is to know, and by the time I die (hopefully not for another 70 years) I still wont know everything about Linux. You've just got to know what you need to know, and that might take time to learn... but don't fear the Manual, and don't fear the command line, just give it a go sometime. And don't rush it, good things take time. Good luck to y'all, Cya thursday (hopefully), Steve P.S. Sorry for such a long post :) -- )--------------------Stephen Nicholas--------------------( Uni Hall Ph: (03) 341 1500 Private Bag 4760 Extn: 54419 Christchurch 021 504 412 [EMAIL PROTECTED] ICQ: 70245950 )---------------www.steve.nicholas.net.nz----------------(
