Re: [tlug] Please help with e-learning of Linux OS.

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com>]

>>>>> "rubioj" == rubioj  <rubioj001@example.com> writes:

    rubioj> Please help with e-learning of Linux OS.

Download an ISO image.  (Knoppix may be a good one, it will run from
the CD, and it's the one a good friend of mine, a Linux consultant,
distributes as a freebie with his business card), and burn it to a CD
in the usual way.  There's a list at

http://www.knopper.net/knoppix-mirrors/index-en.html

You can use your browser to download the links labeled [ftp] or [http].)

Boot from CD in the usual way.  If you get a distribution labelled
"Live CD", then you do not even have to install it to disk.

    rubioj> Please provide CD-Rom about Linux, I would like to learn,
    rubioj> here is expensive for take a classes.

What else is new?  If you need it for your business, bite the bullet
and take the class, then take the certification test to prove that you
took the certification test.  No real IT person will be fooled, but it
will get you in the door at places where traditional personnel
departments do the hiring or purchasing departments do the
contracting.  I have to swallow the bile as I write this, but it
matters (especially in the Socialist State of Hawai'i, where there's
probably a "Linux programmers' union"), and it's probably worth it.

If you don't need it for business, pretend Linux is your favorite new
toy and play with it.  I suggest you find a LUG and scare up some beer
and pizza and invite some of the more experienced-seeming guys over
for an install-fest.  Uh, maybe you wouldn't recognize "experience."
Those are the guys that sit in the back of the room at meetings,
chuckling at the notebooks they've lugged in and occasionally asking
stupid questions that somehow the presenter never figures out how to
answer.  Look for one who shows up at the drinkathon afterward and
eats all the pizza; they're usually easy to get to come over.

Or just take a spare old notebook (see next topic) with you, and have
them install linux for you at the meeting.  Odds are good that
somebody is carrying a CD or the tools to create a boot-from-Windows
installation.  Don't forget to buy them beer and raw fish afterward,
in honor of Our Founder, Linus Torvalds.

For hands-on learning, I can't emphasize enough that you need to get
your hands on the hardware and you need any advisors to be close
enough to touch the screen to explain what you're looking at.  Once
you've got the basics down, you can try long-distance learning, but
even with relatively experienced users it's mostly an exercise in
frustration.

    rubioj> Please provide information for hardware for Linux OS.

Any old Windows box will do, and I do mean old.  You will find that
your Linux-using friends have boxes every bit as new and shiny as the
ones the Windows and Mac crowd have.  The difference is that Windows
and Mac OS X are unusable without them; Linux just gives enhanced
performance.

For example, the mailserver that passed your message to me is an '97
Pentium running at 120MHz with 80MB of RAM.  (It does have an Ultra
133 controller and a reasonably fast disk.)  The box I am typing this
on is my normal workstation, a Pentium II at 450MHz and 256MB RAM
(effectively more like 150MB, as about 100MB are used by the Coda
server and client which are never swapped out).  I'm sufficiently
happy with it that I have not moved anything except kernel compiles
and the like (ie, building software whose source code is in the 100MB
range) to the 2GHz, 1GB RAM machine 2 meters away.  Oh, yeah; my PDA,
a Sharp Zaurus, runs a nearly stock version of Linux in about 24 MB of
RAM and about 40MB of "disk", with an additional 350MB of "disk" in
plugin memory cards.  All are Linux 2.4.

If you want more detail than that, we're talking "work", and that will
be "$1000 in advance, small unmarked bills, please."  Seriously,
anything that will run any version of Windows 9x, ME, NT, 2000 or XP
will run Linux well enough to get started.  If you have specific needs
for applications (I mean, beyond wordprocessing and web-browsing), once
again I suggest you bite the bullet, find a trustworthy consultant,
and shell out the money to get good advice.  If you already know the
difference between "HTTP" and "HTML", then you can skip the money and
go direct to the meeting.

If you already have hardware and are wondering if Linux will support
it, then Googling on "linux", the manufacturer's name, and the
hardware's model will normally get you more information than we're
likely to be able to give.

NB:  Linux also runs on PPC (ie, old Macs), Sparc, DEC/Compaq Alpha,
ARM (like my Zaurus), IBM mainframes, and Cray supercomputers.  These
generally more specialized applications and not necessarily
recommended to newbies.

Anything above that made no sense will be explained by your new Linux
friends.

HTH,

-- 
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences     http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
University of Tsukuba                    Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
               Ask not how you can "do" free software business;
              ask what your business can "do for" free software.