Looking to use linux - Complete Beginner

I can only echo what's been said about Arch from my personal experience.

It may be throwing yourself in at the deep end but I learned far more reading through the documentation and performing an install (ok who am I kidding I broke it and re-installed several times! :p) than I had previously playing around with Live CD's of other Distro's.

I'd thoroughly recommend it!
 
ooh, will have a look into that too. just installed Mint to a USB pen but not quite got it working yet :( - see my latest thread -

but will look into Arch too as lots about that being banded around
 
Hey guys, I've started learning to program in Python now.... I'm not sure why I've decided this is the language for me.

But Blender seems to use it, it seems Linux has a lot of python based software about. So I figured, why not...And I'm trying it out.
 
A few years ago Ubuntu was all about Python; if you wanted to contribute they strongly recommended you use it. Dunno if that's changed in the meantime.
 
Crazy Climber, how's it going? I missed this thread; I'd have recommended Mint too to be honest. I have ideological reasons for not using Ubuntu any more but Mint is very similar and absolutely splendid for newcomers to Linux. If your USB install still hasn't worked out I would advise you just use a disc.

Personally I'm a Debian man but I couldn't recommend it to beginners because you generally want to do a fair old bit of tinkering to get it working the way you want. But once you do, it's the best. :D
 
Arch is really not that hard to setup. The wiki is really really great, the major plus with arch is its a rolling release unlike Ubuntu's 6 month cycle. SO with arch you just install the bare bones, choose a window manager then just update all the time without having to do a complete reinstall when a new release is out. Also the Arch AUR is great for bleeding edge packages.

But I started on Ubunu/Mint so they are really good distro's to get started. But you won't stay with them when you start to learn Linux, you also start to learn ubuntu is pretty bloaty. So my advice would be to start with Arch right away, save you all the hassle of Ubuntu/Mint.

Cheers

Cheers
 
I love arch, getting the base up is a breeze, even for a beginner, then you start fleshing out your own operating system with exactly what you want, adding to it as you go along.
 
Well the latest update is thus:
I went and broke my windows install by moving/resizing partitions to make a duel boot. So as I was away at the time but just happened to have a DVD and the Mint ISO handy I went and took the plunge so now only have Mint on my laptop - No more windows... :S currently connected to the net via LAN as could'nt get the wireless working on the USB install I had but I see someone has replied to that thread so that is my next port of call to see what we can do :)

Having read up a little bit I think Arch will be my next step - At some point soon I want to build a new PC for playing media/light server duties/ tv playing so think Arch sounds like a plan for that box so I can have only what I need. And by the time I've built that I might know a bit more Linux thanks to fate breaking windows for me :)
 
I have the bug :D

I want to play with Arch now, as after playing around, As much as I love Mint, Its hard to move it away from typical windows look, I'm loving the idea of building arch from the ground up into exactly what I want.

...I've also had a play with Backtrack 4...had to. Followed a tutorial for wireless key "manipulation" and managed WPA and WEP...but we'll leave that talk right there :p
 
Crazy Climber said:
Well the latest update is thus:
I went and broke my windows install by moving/resizing partitions to make a duel boot.
Click to expand...

LOL, I did the exact same thing recently. Tried to fix windows and as usual, it's borked. Very tempted to just clean Mint install but I want to get to the bottom of my sometimes 'disappearing title bar' upon start up. I'm thinking it's something to do with AWN and Screenlets booting up causing some kinda conflict with emerald but I don't know.
 
Well after several days of trying to get the wifi to work on Mint and failing completely I went to install Ubuntu (I feel such a failure giving in like that!) install went smoothely, however my mouse (touchpad) didn't work :( tried Ubuntu live CD and that worked.
Back to the drawingboard I think!
 
I'm very surprised about your Mint wifi woes, I've installed Mint on loads of PC's and laptops and never had a problem. Mint always detects and connects to networks no problem. :/
 
From what I've been reading it does seem strange that even if it wont work 'out the box' it is still relativly easy to get working...

I'm going to have another go and do a fresh install as soon as I get chance (tonight hopefully) and see if I can fathom it out
 
i too have installed mint on several laptops and its always picked up wifi straight away. Mandriva is a good one for trying if you are new to linux, its been my prefered one after testing a few. although i might give the new ubuntu another bash.
 
SUCCESS! :) After much faffing about I now have Mint 11 installed and it has detected the million and one wireless networks around as soon as it was installed. Just got to find my house mate now for the password so I can test it properly but at least it can see the network now.

So far I've run 'sudo apt-get update' & 'sudo apt-get upgrade' (Wired connection for the minute)

Is there anything else I should do or just sit back and enjoy?
 
Nah that's it now. Just have a good old dig around your system settings and see if there's any configuration you want to do, like the desktop theme and so on. Then fire up your package manager, browse the enormous list, install a ton of obscure software and poke at it. ;)
 
yup, total success (at least for now) posting from Mint 11, over the old wireless and the mouse is working again :)
I am now a happy Crazy Climber. Tho no doubt I'll go and break it again soon...
 
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