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[Vanillalite]

Fedora Project!

Release Notes!'

1.2. Overview
As always, Fedora continues to develop (RedHat contributions) and integrate the latest free and open source software (Fedora 14 Features). The following sections provide a brief overview of major changes from the last release of Fedora. For more details about other features that are included in Fedora 14 refer to their individual wiki pages that detail feature goals and progress:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Releases/14/FeatureList

The following are major features for Fedora 14:

Spice - Spice aims to provide a complete open source solution for interaction with virtualized desktops and provides high-quality remote access to QEMU virtual machines.

Mobility options - This release includes software from the MeeGo™ project which is designed to support platforms such as netbooks, nettops, and various embedded devices.

Amazon EC2 - For the first time since Fedora 8, Fedora will release on the EC2 cloud.

D Compiler - Support for D, a systems programming language. Its focus is on combining the power and high performance of C and C++ with the programmer productivity of modern languages like Ruby and Python.

Some other features include:

Updating Perl to version 5.12, Python to version 2.7, Boost to version 1.44, Netbeans to version 6.9, KDE to version 4.5, Eclipse to the Helios Release, and Sugar to version 0.90.

 

[TheSeks]

Knoppix is still good, but honestly I see no reason not to just use the live cd version of whatever your general favorite nix flavor is UNLESS you plan on taking it around to random comps with iffy specs. Then you might want to go with a light distro like Damn Small or Puppy.

PS: Going with Unity makes me want to pull hair out. Seriously it's a nice try, but it's not even close to being good for a full on desktop.

Ah, there's live CD's out there that aren't DSL and Knoppix now?

Maybe I should find the ditro CD's so I can futz about with them and see which direction/distro I want to go with some older PC's.

 

[Vanillalite]

Ah, there's live CD's out there that aren't DSL and Knoppix now?

Maybe I should find the ditro CD's so I can futz about with them and see which direction/distro I want to go with some older PC's.

Every distro under the sun is a live cd now with the option to install. IMO just grab either the recently released Fedora 14 that hit yesterday or Ubuntu 10.10 that hit last month on the 10th. Hell you can put either on a usb stick with unetbootin too.

Only reason not to use either Fedora or Ubuntu is either you regularly use another distro or you need something that could work on old computers that have shit for RAM. If your using it stuff that'll all have 512 or more fuck it, and just use the latest shit that you normally use.

 

[itxaka]

Ubuntu is gonna abandon X.org and move to Wayland as OpenGL management system.

Nvidia owners, forget about running shit as this relies on kernel modesetting, which nvidia has already said they won't implement on their propietary drivers, so we will have to use the noveau driver, which is shit for anything but displaying the desktop.

Unity on Wayland
Thursday, November 4th, 2010
The next major transition for Unity will be to deliver it on Wayland, the OpenGL-based display management system. We’d like to embrace Wayland early, as much of the work we’re doing on uTouch and other input systems will be relevant for Wayland and it’s an area we can make a useful contribution to the project.

We’re confident we’ll be able to retain the ability to run X applications in a compatibility mode, so this is not a transition that needs to reset the world of desktop free software. Nor is it a transition everyone needs to make at the same time: for the same reason we’ll keep investing in the 2D experience on Ubuntu despite also believing that Unity, with all it’s GL dependencies, is the best interface for the desktop. We’ll help GNOME and KDE with the transition, there’s no reason for them not to be there on day one either.

Timeframes are difficult. I’m sure we could deliver *something* in six months, but I think a year is more realistic for the first images that will be widely useful in our community. I’d love to be proven conservative on that but I suspect it’s more likely to err the other way. It might take four or more years to really move the ecosystem. Progress on Wayland itself is sufficient for me to be confident that no other initiative could outrun it, especially if we deliver things like Unity and uTouch with it. And also if we make an early public statement in support of the project. Which this is!

In coming to this view, several scenarios were considered.

One is the continued improvement of X, which is a more vibrant project these days than it once was. X will be around a long time, hence the importance of our confidence levels on the idea of a compatibility environment. But we don’t believe X is setup to deliver the user experience we want, with super-smooth graphics and effects. I understand that it’s *possible* to get amazing results with X, but it’s extremely hard, and isn’t going to get easier. Some of the core goals of X make it harder to achieve these user experiences on X than on native GL, we’re choosing to prioritize the quality of experience over those original values, like network transparency.

We considered the Android compositing environment. It’s great for Android, but we felt it would be more difficult to bring the whole free software stack along with us if we pursued that direction.

We considered and spoke with several proprietary options, on the basis that they might be persuaded to open source their work for a new push, and we evaluated the cost of building a new display manager, informed by the lessons learned in Wayland. We came to the conclusion that any such effort would only create a hard split in the world which wasn’t worth the cost of having done it. There are issues with Wayland, but they seem to be solveable, we’d rather be part of solving them than chasing a better alternative. So Wayland it is.

In general, this will all be fine – actually *great* – for folks who have good open source drivers for their graphics hardware. Wayland depends on things they are all moving to support: kernel modesetting, gem buffers and so on. The requirement of EGL is new but consistent with industry standards from Khronos – both GLES and GL will be supported. We’d like to hear from vendors for whom this would be problematic, but hope it provides yet another (and perhaps definitive) motive to move to open source drivers for all Linux work.

http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/551


You gotta be kidding me. They are starting to try too hard to be different from other distros. Time for Fedora to step up, and fill the casual distro place?


EDIT1: Ok, this shit was made by intel and it's used on Megoo, the sent-to-die intel-nokia collaboration. Sounds like a business movement with those 2 companies more than a normal, natural roadmap. UGH

EDIT2: LOL. They are porting gtk+ to wayland in order to ensure compatibility with all gtk apps. Which means that the thing will run on a compatibility layer, doing absolutely nothing at all different from X.org . Do they really expect people are gonna export their gtk+ apps to be wayland compatible?
This can only end being a clusterfuck, like the pulseaudio incident. Go ubuntu go, you can fuck something up :lol

 

[Dimmuxx]

Ubuntu is gonna abandon X.org and move to Wayland as OpenGL management system.

Nvidia owners, forget about running shit as this relies on kernel modesetting, which nvidia has already said they won't implement on their propietary drivers, so we will have to use the noveau driver, which is shit for anything but displaying the desktop.



http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/551


You gotta be kidding me. They are starting to try too hard to be different from other distros. Time for Fedora to step up, and fill the casual distro place?


EDIT1: Ok, this shit was made by intel and it's used on Megoo, the sent-to-die intel-nokia collaboration. Sounds like a business movement with those 2 companies more than a normal, natural roadmap. UGH

EDIT2: LOL. They are porting gtk+ to wayland in order to ensure compatibility with all gtk apps. Which means that the thing will run on a compatibility layer, doing absolutely nothing at all different from X.org . Do they really expect people are gonna export their gtk+ apps to be wayland compatible?
This can only end being a clusterfuck, like the pulseaudio incident. Go ubuntu go, you can fuck something up :lol

It's good that somebody is willing to take the risk to bring linux forward as a proper desktop os. Wayland will mean the end of all the tearing issues and if ubuntu takes the step then maybe nvidia will follow.

 

[Wads]

Anybody have success with Ubuntu on a USB drive? It's a 5400 rpm laptop drive. Have a SSD as the primary drive (112gb usuable) and I don't really want to split that up to do dual-boot. Saw the reco for Puppy linux on the first page, but would prefer Ubuntu as I've used it before.

 

[markot]

Why do you think Meego was sent to die >_>? Its backed by Intel and Nokia and other huge names. Its designed to work on pretty much everything, and everything I have seen of it has been pretty awesome >.<

I cant wait to see the dist mature, I played around with it, its pretty good.

 

[jiien]

So what ever happened to Chromium OS? They released the source almost a year ago, and said that it was about a year from official ready-for-users release. But we've heard no word about it at all. Booooo.

 

[Krelian]

Ubuntu is gonna abandon X.org and move to Wayland as OpenGL management system.

Nvidia owners, forget about running shit as this relies on kernel modesetting, which nvidia has already said they won't implement on their propietary drivers, so we will have to use the noveau driver, which is shit for anything but displaying the desktop.



http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/551


You gotta be kidding me. They are starting to try too hard to be different from other distros. Time for Fedora to step up, and fill the casual distro place?


EDIT1: Ok, this shit was made by intel and it's used on Megoo, the sent-to-die intel-nokia collaboration. Sounds like a business movement with those 2 companies more than a normal, natural roadmap. UGH

EDIT2: LOL. They are porting gtk+ to wayland in order to ensure compatibility with all gtk apps. Which means that the thing will run on a compatibility layer, doing absolutely nothing at all different from X.org . Do they really expect people are gonna export their gtk+ apps to be wayland compatible?
This can only end being a clusterfuck, like the pulseaudio incident. Go ubuntu go, you can fuck something up :lol

I'm glad Ubuntu is taking this step. I'm pretty sure most other Linux distributions will follow, maybe Fedora will even include it first seeing how they like trying out new things (like systemd). X will still be around but the mainstream Linux desktop distributions will use Wayland. There will also be a Wayland X client allowing X apps to run under Wayland without any changes.

 

[itxaka]

Why do you think Meego was sent to die >_>? Its backed by Intel and Nokia and other huge names. Its designed to work on pretty much everything, and everything I have seen of it has been pretty awesome >.<

I cant wait to see the dist mature, I played around with it, its pretty good.

Not sent to die per se, but it comes from 2 failed platforms that sucked big time (Moblin and maemo) and I seriously doubt nokia commitment to the platform and intel software has never been something great.

Also is designed to work only on atom and nokia ARM based phones, not on everything. And the commits on the git server are pretty poor.

I'm glad Ubuntu is taking this step. I'm pretty sure most other Linux distributions will follow, maybe Fedora will even include it first seeing how they like trying out new things (like systemd). X will still be around but the mainstream Linux desktop distributions will use Wayland. There will also be a Wayland X client allowing X apps to run under Wayland without any changes.

Why? Nvidia is pretty stubborn and I don't want to be stuck with a 2d only driver for my card. Also I don't think Fedora will ever move to wayland. They are Red Hat testing platform for future implements. No way they are gonna abandon x.org, a proven, reliable, tested, secure environment for an alpha product.

 

[Krelian]

Why? Nvidia is pretty stubborn and I don't want to be stuck with a 2d only driver for my card. Also I don't think Fedora will ever move to wayland. They are Red Hat testing platform for future implements. No way they are gonna abandon x.org, a proven, reliable, tested, secure environment for an alpha product.

According to his blog he's a software engineer at Red Hat. I don't know what that tells you, but to me it's a pretty clear sign that Fedora might abandon X.org at some point. Also, no one is talking about implementing it right now, of course the software has to get more stable and reliable first.

 

[Veidt]

Ubuntu noob here.
Please help teach me how to change my theme/skin. I have no idea how any of it works.

 

[itxaka]

According to his blog he's a software engineer at Red Hat. I don't know what that tells you, but to me it's a pretty clear sign that Fedora might abandon X.org at some point. Also, no one is talking about implementing it right now, of course the software has to get more stable and reliable first.

whoah, my sources said he was from intel...that is pretty different then.

 

[Vanillalite]

I have mixed feelings on the x.org thing. I hate the whole idea of having to have that compatibility layer. That being said some of this is shit that just needs to get done. There is way to much shit that use to be good and is just sort of hanging around in the well I'm not that bad and you've always used me so stay with me category in the Nix world.

That being said on the flipside I'd agree it does feel like Shuttleworth want's to just change as much shit as possible because he can and really wants to change and evolve Ubuntu. That's all well and good, but I feel like they're making some choices just to make fucking choices instead of actual solid back end reasoning either because it solves a current issue or the change is just obviously better.

Good to know I'm not the only one this week that thought hey Fedora I know you don't care about the casual desktop space but you might have a big opportunity if Canonical keeps going crazy with 11.04....

So what ever happened to Chromium OS? They released the source almost a year ago, and said that it was about a year from official ready-for-users release. But we've heard no word about it at all. Booooo.

Actually Omg Ubuntu had a post just a few days ago saying the Chrome OS just slid into beta form.

Chrome OS Article!

 

[jiien]

Actually Omg Ubuntu had a post just a few days ago saying the Chrome OS just slid into beta form.

Chrome OS Article!

Ah, nice. Glad that it hasn't disappeared or been swept under a rug never to be heard of again.

 

[Elfforkusu]

Ubuntu is gonna abandon X.org and move to Wayland as OpenGL management system.

Nvidia owners, forget about running shit as this relies on kernel modesetting, which nvidia has already said they won't implement on their propietary drivers, so we will have to use the noveau driver, which is shit for anything but displaying the desktop.



http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/551


You gotta be kidding me. They are starting to try too hard to be different from other distros. Time for Fedora to step up, and fill the casual distro place?


EDIT1: Ok, this shit was made by intel and it's used on Megoo, the sent-to-die intel-nokia collaboration. Sounds like a business movement with those 2 companies more than a normal, natural roadmap. UGH

EDIT2: LOL. They are porting gtk+ to wayland in order to ensure compatibility with all gtk apps. Which means that the thing will run on a compatibility layer, doing absolutely nothing at all different from X.org . Do they really expect people are gonna export their gtk+ apps to be wayland compatible?
This can only end being a clusterfuck, like the pulseaudio incident. Go ubuntu go, you can fuck something up :lol

Are you serious? X.org is the biggest piece of garbage I've ever had the honor of installing on my computer. Anything that kills it is a good thing.

Spoiler

It's not really X's fault, it was never intended to be used as it is.

Also, I sincerely doubt they'll make the switch before applications are ready. Step off the ledge, dude.

Why? Nvidia is pretty stubborn and I don't want to be stuck with a 2d only driver for my card. Also I don't think Fedora will ever move to wayland. They are Red Hat testing platform for future implements. No way they are gonna abandon x.org, a proven, reliable, tested, secure environment for an alpha product.

:lol :lol

They'll find middle ground with Nvidia.

 

[Vanillalite]

Also, I sincerely doubt they'll make the switch before applications are ready. Step off the ledge, dude.


:lol :lol

They'll find middle ground with Nvidia.

IDK normally I'd agree, but I feel like Shuttleworth and crew have just been like fuck it we'll go with shit even if it's early lately. In theory I wouldn't mind the switch, but only after shits been straightened out. Some might argue if nobody switches nobody will bother fixing shit or making apps and shit work, but that's a separate chicken and egg argument to be had at a later time.

 

[Krelian]

I can certainly understand the mixed feelings. X.org (and XFree86 before it) has been around a long time and is a proven solution that has the advantage of network transparency. But there needs to be a change to be able to keep up with the other big operating systems. And Wayland provides just that change. I just hope Ubuntu won't switch to Wayland too prematurely.

We'll see what Nvidia will do once they switched (and maybe once others switch too).

 

[suffah]

It sure doesn't sound like we'll see Wayland in Ubuntu till 11.10 at the earliest...why the fuss? The earlier devs know about it, the better. By 13.4 maybe they'll have it ready for primetime.

 

[thcsquad]

I'm actually excited for this. At first I thought you all were insane, because Unity is just the netbook interface. Then I googled it and found that Unity is expanding to the desktop distro. Ditching x.org is kind of weird, but I don't game on it so I don't really care if I can't use nVidia proprietary drivers.

 

[itxaka]

Are you serious? X.org is the biggest piece of garbage I've ever had the honor of installing on my computer. Anything that kills it is a good thing.

Spoiler

It's not really X's fault, it was never intended to be used as it is.

Also, I sincerely doubt they'll make the switch before applications are ready. Step off the ledge, dude.


:lol :lol

They'll find middle ground with Nvidia.

I am talking mainly regarding workstations in the business part. Moving from X to wayland in the long run would do nothing to it, and I want to see linux grow in that part of the business. X.org while being bloated to hell, is now in a really sweet spot. Got drivers for all the cards out of the box, composition thanks to compiz (which is being totally rewritten from 0), support for a ton of windows makers, no more x.conf file (thank god!) and it's been and old product for a long time which in business means is stable enough and proven.


Regarding making the switch, I still remember pulseaudio and how they didn't even contact the autor, pulled a version and integrated in ubuntu and when it didn't work because they kind of just sticked it there, they claimed it was pulseaudio's fault. That shows thay they sometimes don't give a fuck about making it stable and shove things in there to say "we have x now!"

Another example, ubuntu one. That was another business movement that sucked big time with all the bugs it had, but I guess they had to do it asap to get ubuntu tied with it.

I'm probably more critical on this that I should be but it is because I don't like the way Mark S. do things sometimes. Don't get me wrong, the guy has done incredible things for the linux world getting into people's homes but sometimes he seems to take decisions based on how much attention it will get and how controversial it will be.

I wonder how would they work when they adopt wayland with the upstream. They will have to do much much work when they switch than now because I cannot really see debian changing to wayland until 2020 at least :lol

Regarding nvidia...I don't know. The FAQ I saw where they commented on the KMS thing ("It's not coming, don't ask") saw like they didn't really were open to do anything special with the linux driver but the minimun to make it work. I don't have faith on them.

I wonder if wayland + something (Theme?) could get the Wayland+Yutani name. That would be awesome

 

[Vanillalite]

Interesting it's as if the crew at OMGUbuntu were stalking our thread or something, and came up with this post for today! :lol :lol

OMGUbuntu Article!!

NVIDIA have ‘no plans to support Wayland’
By Joey Sneddon, posted November 7, 2010

With the current flurry of excitement over the announced aim of Ubuntu the current X server with the promising ‘Wayland’ display server in the near future, NVidia have decided to join in the jamboree by stating their intentions on delivering support for it.

Put simply by NVidia spokesman AaronP : -

"We have no plans to support Wayland."

Way to spoil a party, dude. Or is it?


What does this mean for me?

For now it means nothing as Ubuntu won’t be switching to Wayland just yet..

By the time the "switch" (which is far too clean a phrase to use, but simplicity here folks) occurs the impact it has on your desktop will be minimal as Wayland, currently, is compatible with pretty much every driver the current X server is.

NVidia have often been tepid at best when it comes to adding support for open-source technologies. They already ‘declined’ to add support for Kernel Mode Setting (KMS, the thing which gives many Ubuntu users a pretty boot screen and the rest of us a lame one).

It’s also worth keeping in mind that much progress will have been made on the free and open-source NVidia driver ‘Nouveau’ which, dare I say, we’ll all the better for using.

 

[ghostofsparta]

Is there a way to install itunes on Ubuntu that will update my ipod?

This is the only thing keeping me from fully switching to Ubuntu and never looking back.

 

[itxaka]

Interesting it's as if the crew at OMGUbuntu were stalking our thread or something, and came up with this post for today! :lol :lol

OMGUbuntu Article!!

NVIDIA have ‘no plans to support Wayland’
By Joey Sneddon, posted November 7, 2010

With the current flurry of excitement over the announced aim of Ubuntu the current X server with the promising ‘Wayland’ display server in the near future, NVidia have decided to join in the jamboree by stating their intentions on delivering support for it.

Put simply by NVidia spokesman AaronP : -

"We have no plans to support Wayland."

Way to spoil a party, dude. Or is it?


What does this mean for me?

For now it means nothing as Ubuntu won’t be switching to Wayland just yet..

By the time the "switch" (which is far too clean a phrase to use, but simplicity here folks) occurs the impact it has on your desktop will be minimal as Wayland, currently, is compatible with pretty much every driver the current X server is.

NVidia have often been tepid at best when it comes to adding support for open-source technologies. They already ‘declined’ to add support for Kernel Mode Setting (KMS, the thing which gives many Ubuntu users a pretty boot screen and the rest of us a lame one).

It’s also worth keeping in mind that much progress will have been made on the free and open-source NVidia driver ‘Nouveau’ which, dare I say, we’ll all the better for using.

Just saw it. As I said, when nvidia was asked about KMS support for the coming plymouth they totally gave us the finger.

Still I don't know this part:

as Wayland, currently, is compatible with pretty much every driver the current X server is.

That makes no sense. If the point of wayland is having the composite integrated, and it's not possible without using KMS or GEM, nvidia users are fucked as the propietary driver won't support that.


Also, I just remember...unity has already a composition manager but it's becoming the default desktop...which means that it won't be compatible with weyland or they will have to mix unity minus composite plus wayland?

Too much changes to the desktop "base" in a couple of years.

 

[Vanillalite]

The Register!

Red Hat launches Enterprise Linux 6

Dudes, get RHEL
By Timothy Prickett Morgan • Get more from this author

Posted in Operating Systems, 10th November 2010 23:25 GMT


Red Hat!

Enterprise Version 6 has launched for the world!

 

[Vanillalite]

Alright Ubuntu peeps it's starting....

OmgUbuntu Article!

Compiz-based Unity coming to PPA tomorrow
By Joey Sneddon, posted November 11, 2010

And so it begins! The Compiz-backed version of Unity – to be the default Ubuntu 11.04 desktop – has arrived on Launchpad.

For those with itchy fingers and brave hearts ‘Unity Compiz’ (‘Compinity’ anyone?) will be available for installation via a PPA tomorrow according to Ubuntu Desktop Experience lead njpatel.

 

[Suitcase Test]

Alright Ubuntu peeps it's starting....

OmgUbuntu Article!

Yeah, this sounds cool. Looking forward to trying it.

 

[Lambtron]

Is there an iPod manager for Ubuntu I can use to fix my corrupted DB?

 

[Old Lace]

So this thread has inspired me to try dual booting Windows 7 and Ubuntu. Is there any reason why I shouldn't run the 64 bit version of Ubuntu? Also, I remember hearing about problems with Linux and ATI cards. Is this still the case?

 

[Vanillalite]

So this thread has inspired me to try dual booting Windows 7 and Ubuntu. Is there any reason why I shouldn't run the 64 bit version of Ubuntu? Also, I remember hearing about problems with Linux and ATI cards. Is this still the case?

I have a 4xxx series Ati card that runs fine.

 

[nitewulf]

is it possible to install Ubuntu or Fedora on a USB stick and boot from it?

 

[Jerk]

Slackware + Gnome = awesome.

That is all.

 

[Vanillalite]

is it possible to install Ubuntu or Fedora on a USB stick and boot from it?

Yes as long as the bios on said comp has the option to boot from USB. Some older comps don't have this.

 

[markot]

http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/article/368079/amd_joins_intel_meego_os_effort/
AMD joins Intel's MeeGo OS effort

 

[Old Lace]

Reformat, installation, and dual boot success!

Spoiler

I don't really know how to use Linux :lol

 

[markot]

Which one? Its pretty obvious mostly >.<

 

[Suitcase Test]

So this thread has inspired me to try dual booting Windows 7 and Ubuntu. Is there any reason why I shouldn't run the 64 bit version of Ubuntu? Also, I remember hearing about problems with Linux and ATI cards. Is this still the case?

Flash is the only thing that gives me problems on 64 bit, but I think that's easily solvable (it's been a while since I last did that).

As for ATI: I wouldn't know. Searching on the internet often doesn't help, because no matter what hardware you're using, you'll always find people with problems. I've seen forum posts with hardware problems even though that same hardware works great on my end.

Best way is probably to simply boot the Live CD and go from there.

I don't really know how to use Linux :lol

If you're using Ubuntu I wouldn't worry about it. And otherwise ask here.

I think switching from Windows to Linux is harder than using Linux without any experience though, because you'll be doing everything "the Windows way". For instance: searching for apps on the web instead of using the Software Center.

Just takes some getting used to.

 

[itxaka]

The Register!

Red Hat launches Enterprise Linux 6

Dudes, get RHEL
By Timothy Prickett Morgan • Get more from this author

Posted in Operating Systems, 10th November 2010 23:25 GMT


Red Hat!

Enterprise Version 6 has launched for the world!

Fuuuu. Now to study the RHCE again...oh god.

Manuals for the people!

http://docs.redhat.com/docs/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/index.html

 

[ghostofsparta]

I've google this but I though Id also ask in here.

I know you can, but is it easy to install ubuntu on a Macbook?

 

[Vanillalite]

KDE 4.6 has hit RC1 with another month of testing to go before it's official release! New stock wallpaper for 4.6...

Merry Xmas, Happy Holdiays, and Happy New Year to all my Nix crew!

 

[Solaros]

What's the best way to learn about Linux?

So far I have installed Ubuntu Server and messed around with it a bit (Setup OpenSSH, Snort, tripwire, made some iptables rules, and things like that). What would be the best way to have a solid grasp of multiple Linux variants? Just download the distro, install it, and go through the manual?

Since I am doing independent study of Linux on my own, as it is something I have an interest in, what would be the best way to go about it?

 

[theBishop]

I've google this but I though Id also ask in here.

I know you can, but is it easy to install ubuntu on a Macbook?

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/MacBookPro

You're welcome.

 

[-KRS-]

What's the best way to learn about Linux?

So far I have installed Ubuntu Server and messed around with it a bit (Setup OpenSSH, Snort, tripwire, made some iptables rules, and things like that). What would be the best way to have a solid grasp of multiple Linux variants? Just download the distro, install it, and go through the manual?

Since I am doing independent study of Linux on my own, as it is something I have an interest in, what would be the best way to go about it?

The way I started was to switch to Ubuntu as my only OS on my main machine. I used that until I got comfortable enough to feel that I was ready for something a bit more involved. That took me around a year of using Ubuntu every day.

Then I switched to Slackware with the whole KDE package installed, as to not make things overly complicated. I still basically needed a GUI to survive. Then I had to learn how to install new applications in Slackware, because Slackware doesn't have a traditional package manager that grabs pre-compiled packages for you and installs them. You have to compile applications by hand in many cases with Slackware, and this is the unified way of installing stuff in linux. Because of this, I also had to learn how to navigate the filesystem and do basic things like move and copy files etc, using the command line interface.
There are packages for Slackware that you can download with your browser and install with "installpkg <packagename>". But if you want to learn how things work you should try and compile applications yourself. It's a good way of learning the filesystem structure, because you learn where applications usually put their stuff. And it's a good way of learning how to use the cli, or at least to become comfortable with it.

Eventually I started using "checkinstall" instead of running "make install" when installing the application to make a slackware package out of it and then install that. That way it is a lot easier to manage upgrades and removing applications because a package keeps track of which files and folders belongs to a certain application. You can use checkinstall to make ubuntu packages (.deb files) as well.

Then after using Slackware for about 2 years, I felt comfortable enough to switch to basically any linux-distro. I eventually got interested in building my own distro and joined a newly started project that aimed to do just that. That way I really learned the ins and outs of a GNU/Linux system a lot faster than I probably would have otherwise. But use Slackware for a while and you'll see that you'll have no problems using any distro afterwards.

Slackware is a bitch to actually use for everyday things, but it's really good for learning how Linux works. So after you're done with that I suggest you switch to Arch Linux which has the same init-system as Slackware, bsd-init, so the switch will be almost seamless only you will now have one of the most powerful package managers available for a GNU/Linux system. I have tried a lot of distros, but I feel that Arch Linux is the ultimate distro for advanced Linux users.

Here is some obligatory reading: http://linuxcommand.org/index.php

The ubuntu forums are really nice ways of getting help btw. And here is a wiki page with guides for most smaller things you could potentially want to do in ubuntu http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu:Maverick

Also, if you install slackware, here are some good sites for pre-compiled slackware packages:
http://www.linuxpackages.net/
http://packages.slackware.it/ (broken at the moment)

And don't forget, and this is important: Google is your friend.

 

[Solaros]

*snip*

Thank you for taking the time to post that!

The majority of the time I operate from the command line, as that is what I want to become proficient with. I'll load up Slackware on one of my free computers and do what you suggest.

Any opinion on CentOS? Is it very similar to RHEL? I am student of Information Security and I want to absorb that most I can about Linux.

 

[Vanillalite]

Thank you for taking the time to post that!

The majority of the time I operate from the command line, as that is what I want to become proficient with. I'll load up Slackware on one of my free computers and do what you suggest.

Any opinion on CentOS? Is it very similar to RHEL? I am student of Information Security and I want to absorb that most I can about Linux.

Another good idea if you just want to check things out is to download different linux isos and put them on a usb stick to run as a "live" os (you could also burn the isos but why waste the discs when you have a thumb drive). Then you can just run the os without an install just to check them out.

The larger way most people check things out is to have one version of linux installed, and then install a virtual machine. That way you could run different versions of linux inside whatever version you currently have installed. A program called VirtualBox is a free virtual machine that most everyone uses for this type of thing.

If you have say Ubuntu installed VB is available in the software repo. Ditto that it's easily obtained for Fedora as well. Once you have it installed VB will give you a list of distros you can try out, and it'll download the iso file for whatever you select. It's easy and clean.

In general though the best way to learn about linux is to just dual boot a distro with whatever your normal os of choice is, and then just stick with that version of linux for a while. Then just try and use it for daily use as much as possible. Everyone has their favorite distro, but the general consensus is that Ubuntu, the desktop version, is the easiest and most user friendly. Even if you want to go with a different distro, I found it best that I just stuck with one for a few months to really get familar with the system. Distro hoping just confuses most new comers IMO.

PS: Distro Watch is a cool website that updates daily on whatever the latest Linux variants are to have released. I'd also highly suggest visiting the official forums to whatever distro you end up choosing. I'd also like to point you to this nice YouTube channel called This Week In Linux (which is also suggested in the OP to this topic) which updates all the time with all kinds of Linux stuff. Finally if you decide to roll with Ubuntu I'd highly suggest following the OMGUbuntu blog, and post in the comments. On more than one occasion they've cleared up a news story for me or helped me stuff that wasn't working.

PPS: Also the obvious answer to is to become a regular poster in this thread! I'll admit fully that I'm a *nix newb, but I'm always more than willing to try and help or point you in the right direction!!!

 

[Fireye]

Any opinion on CentOS? Is it very similar to RHEL? I am student of Information Security and I want to absorb that most I can about Linux.

My shop used CentOS for projects that didn't want to pay for a RHEL basic license. CentOS is, if I remember correctly, almost exactly the same as RHEL. Go read THIS for some more info.

Now for my own question... I have a server that has a phantom samba mount. The host of that samba share went offline and broke the mount, now I can't umount it, smbumount, and so on because it claims the device is busy. I've tried bringing the target host back online, but I haven't had any luck. No files are listed as having something open in the affected mountpoint (via lsof). Any ideas on how to get it to unmount so I can reuse the mountpoint, without rebooting the box?

 

[BronzeWolf]

Hello peeps! I am kind of new to Linux. I used OpenSuse to get some servers running at college, and ubuntu trun some utilities at work, but never delved too much into it. It is time now to get my hands dirty and learn a thing or two about this whole thing so I just installed Ubuntu 10.10 on my laptop and desktop

Right out of the bat, some issues with my mobo's fan control made me go right into the heart of the OS and fix my way around until I could control those noisy mofos!! I also changed my grub resolution and splash screen image. It feels awesome doing something that involved. I don't even know what to do next, there are so many cool things and tweaks to do!

Well, my plan is to run a cheap low power server at home. I don't know why. It's just something that seems useful and cool. I was thinking of something like this this:




to experiment. What do you guys think?

I also have a VERY VERY VERY BAD backtrack4 distro on a 8 gig EVIL USB that is EVIL! *grin*

I am like a child with new toys

 

[-KRS-]

I think the Zotac will do just fine as a server. You probably won't be able to have a php heavy site with hundreds of visitors, but for personal use it'll be fine. Install Debian or Arch Linux on it (without installing a GUI, you don't need one) and you'll be serving stuff in no time

 

[Suitcase Test]

I don't even know what to do next, there are so many cool things and tweaks to do!

Try to make your perfect Conky setup.

We'll see you in a few months.

 

[norinrad]

hey guys am still a newbie at this.

I just downloaded this file and would like to install it but am having a hard time doing so.

can anyone please help?

file name is sp-auth.tgz

I'm using openSUSE