Making the choice

Hi,
I am a high school student with very deep interest on Linux but I have never experimented with it and, also, have never ever been brave enough to leave Windows behind. I really want to start learning code and networking but I don't know where to to start. Will you suggest me to install Linux right away? If yes, can you help me find a good and easy distro to start off my adventure with Linux.
Right now I own a Dell Inspiron 15 7559 but I intend to sell it and build a PC with (maybe) a Rysen CPU and a RX480 to game a couple of titles.
Feel free to PM me or just comment below, thank you.

We can suggest dozens of distros, but the reality is that you'll have to find out what suits you best yourself. Linux distros are not products like Windows or OSX, Linux distros are heavily customizable and very similar if you look through the forum bullshit that goes on pro/cintra this/that distro... 90% of that is all politics and coincidental preference.

You select a distro mainly for the package manager and the update model, because the essence of modern distros these days is that distros are like Playstores on Android, basically a repository and software maintenance service.

However, for compatibility and routine to help you out on the work floor later, it's practical to at least regularly use one of the distros that are used in the industry you're aiming for. If it's engineering and low level (e.g. C) development, Fedora is the way to go, if it's networking and management and RTOS applications, OpenSuSE is what you want to know, and if it's high level (e.g. java, android) development and creative stuff, Ubuntu LTS is what you really need to get acquainted with.

There are also a couple of "comfort" criteria to distros, e.g. there are only two linux distros that have an organized user repository, if that's something that's interesting for you, and those are Fedora (COPR) and Arch (AUR).

This should give you a direction where to start looking for the distro that suits you best.

glhf

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I didn't now that. Thanks for the tip.
Now I'll make my own research to find what suits my necessities best. Thanks again.

There's a similar thread, might help you

Thanks I will check it right away.

Just jump right in and install any distro in a vm, secondary machine or dual boot and ask away whenever you need info on something.

Coding and running linux are not co-requisites, for the record. I started dabbling in linux long before I started coding, and I learn to code exclusively in Windows (since the school used windows machines). Just wanted to point that out. But being familiar with using a command line is an invaluable tool if you are going to going into the working world of coding, since at some point, you will end up working in linux, I'm sure.

Thanks for the support! I think I will take that route and see where I get to.

Go try some distros in virtual box see what you like and do a duel boot.

Can't tell what to like but try Opensuse, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu. Those are the largest and most well documented.

Gentoo and Arch have their perks and are very well documented just not super user friendly.

Sabayon is a streamlined Gentoo base.

Manjaro is a streamlined version of Arch.

It really is a matter of taste so go experiment.

A raspberry pi is a great way to learn with Linux as well all the major distros have installs for it. You can try stuff like networking, ftp, Apache/NGNIX and of course ssh.

Thanks @Adobe_Flash_Player!`

Install fedora and start studying for the LPIC1 and 2 / or Linux+

if you want, I have a Linux+ book if you want it, shoot me a shipping address in a dM. I'd rather give it to someone who will use it rather than let it collect dust

@Adobe_Flash_Player

You seem very insecure and open to anything 😉

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Careful, he get's abused all the time

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Every linux user knows that the smallest fraction of the linux users actually stay with the first distro they try, whatever distro that is... everyone just has to go through the process of discovering what works lol.

I'm a new to the Linux platform and started with Mint 18, It's an awesome daily driver for me and it's served me as a near complete replacement to windows for the last 2 or so months, I still dual boot to play the few games I can't play as yet (Overwatch, BF1 and Star Citizen) but other than that 100% of my small business and personal computer time is done through Mint.

I chose Mint only because of the out of the box feature set and from what I had read stability, I Really wanted to shift away from MS Win and to give me the best chance for success I needed a stable, feature rich, well supported & documented distro that would at worst only have me out of action a few days setting it up and it has been that and more.

in the end take my comments with a grain of salt as I'm no vet when it comes to Linux but at least I can share my experience as a entry level user to give you a different perspective, Mint has been a good balance of learning Linux and having something that does most things you need it to do out of the box, I certainly intend to try other distro's (already have 4 I'm playing around with in VM) and I'm really interested in the different desktop environment's on offer.

What's really great about all this is their are young people willing to ask the question and that are interested in running a Linux setup :)

Thanks! I'm still deciding between VM or dual boot. But I'm leaning more to dual boot because I want to replace fully MS Windows, but the only problem I have right now is my Steam library so... While Linux lags behind on gaming, I think having a copy of it is not a bad idea.
In the meantime I will continue with my research.
Thanks again

If you really wanna get started with linux, look at it this way.
M$ has the desktop down to a science(Or rather their bussiness departments has so, and they will pluck you for all you're worth if you use their services, and force you to continue being plucked), and they do it really well.
Everything else runs linux, even M$ runs mostly linux on their back end.
What if you just use Window$ as a desktop for gaming, pretty much all other services has a opensource version, be it a NAS, owncloud, and so on, only your imagination sets the limit.
My best suggestion is starting with making your own NAS forexample, samba is a fairly easy concept, and if you have shared a drive/folder in windows it will be very easily recognicable.
other then that try and check out shell scripting(And this is where the magic happens), and let your imagination guide you, with linux sky's the limit, and it doesn't cost you 3000 dollars in license fees to make a web server.
BUT, and this is the big BUT(T), get acustumed to lets say virtual box(Any free VM will do really), start using a easy distro like ubuntu, and from there on just let the magic happen. Within a year give and take linux will be your best friend, and M$ will be a simple desktop capable of using DX 11-12. It wont cost you money, just ~25 gig's of harddrive space for a virtual machine, and a download of a free ISO.
And also get used to google, and feel free to ask questions about anything in these forums, this is kind of what we live for, getting you away from window$, onto a safe and future proof platform :)

Thanks for the support! I think i will make the final decision this weekend

I use both.. I use an old copy of Win8.1 in a VM for a couple of programs I need for work that don't really have alternatives that I have found on Linux as yet (some plan measuring and estimating software) and a email client that I particularly like to use (EMClient) that takes care of 100% of my work time requirements and having 2 monitors I load the VM up in full screen and it feels for all intensive purpose the desktop has been extended.

the Win10 dual boot is 100% just for gaming nothing else I only ever log on to play BF1/Overwatch with friends atm.. anything I can run in Linux in the steam store I play on Linux hopefully overtime I learn enough to do GPU pass through and I won't need to dual boot at all or even bettter Linux gets taken a little bit more serious by Dev's to make native an actually consistent thing...