To all linux noobs: WIKIS ARE YOUR FRIEND

Software & Operating Systems Linux
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#1

I have seen a shit ton of posts today ranging from not rebooting to thinking Wine, of all things, has everything fucked up.

Just, for the love of god, budha, and cthulu, stop running into the wall and slamming your heads into massive spikes. It's really fucking annoying.

In any sense, read some stuff before pressing random buttons.

WineDB: https://www.winehq.org/
Gaming in Wine / Play On Linux: http://www.gamersonlinux.com/forum/
Archwiki: https://wiki.archlinux.org/
Ubuntu Wiki: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/

Wine is what you can use to run windows apps and crap and WineDB provides information about compatibility and what works how where and on what. Bugs are posted and resolved and certain hardware setups have certain bugs. Be sure to check this if you are installing something and don't know about compatibility. Wendell also has videos up about wine and such.

Gamersonlinux is a forum all about Playonlinux and wine providing lots of guides for all sorts of games, basic linux guides which me and a few others are working on, and trouble shooting help.

The arch and ubuntu wiki's are probably some of the best documentation on the planet for troubleshooting and installation of applications in linux as well as kernel modules, UI's, how stuff works.... Basically with a little patience and some learning you can learn how linux works from the ground up rather easily.

Lastly I want to bring up something that a lot of newbies overlook. IRC.

IRC, internet relay chat, is like the facebook of the 90's-era communications. You can jump in a chat and talk to all sorts of people all over the world. What is the benefit of this? Linux trouble shooting.

Rooms are listed as #. Most ubuntu distro's will have hexchat installed and it's pretty easy to figure out. Jump into your OS's respective room (if you have ubuntu #ubuntu, if linux mint #linuxmint, etc) or ask what room to join.

Just for gods sake, read up some stuff before giving a vague explanation that doesn't really have anything to do with your problem. We get this in the archlinux IRC a lot and it grows ever so infuriating.

Good luck.

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#2

As a side note. man is your friend.

just type "man man" in a console. The world will get a lot bigger.

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#3

I don't think man pages should come in on day one, certainly not week one.

Yes, look at man in the near future after you are comfortable with your specific distro, whatever it is, then start learning about Man and terminal use.

Also: If anyone has any websites that are a good resource feel free to PM me them or put them here. There needs to be a sticky on the forums like this.

#4

I donno, We didn't have GUIs back when I started on this adventure... You pesky kids don't know how good you have it......

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#5

I agree. I think man pages in conjunction with wiki's and forums can be a life saver. I've been tempted more than once the last week to run to the forums here and ask a question....but then I stop, collected my wits and did some googling.

I think we have gotten so used to throwing our hands up at the first sign of trouble and running for help that we forget that it's about learning and assimilating new knowledge. Instead we just go to someone who has been there and will spoon feed the knowledge.

#6

A wonderful resource for any Linux enthusiast, The Urban Penguin.

Link: http://theurbanpenguin.com/

#7

GUIs were around when I started learning (properly) but I effectively learned how to use Ubuntu by managing a CentOS server.
Later, I started learning C#, using knowledge obtained by programming in VB.NET. I don't do literally everything bass ackwards though!

Can I point out that, by simplifying the OP, you get: "To all Linux noobs: RTFM".
Also, I'd recommend "How Linux Works: What Every Superuser Should Know" by Brian Ward, which has been a very informative book for me, explaining Linux pretty much from the ground up. He also goes into detail much further than most people ever require, though those areas come with a warning to skip to the next chapter.

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