On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, John Heim wrote: > At 08:25 AM 11/23/2002 +0000, Michael Weaver wrote: > >Hi! > >I know different people prefer different distributions when it comes to > >Linux but what would people recommend for someone who will be completely new > >to Linux? > > There are constant arguments among linux nerds over which distro is really > the easiest to use. > > If you read the linux newsgroups on Usenet, I think you'll see that the > generally accepted answer to this question is that you should go with > whatever distro you can get the best support for. If you know somebody who > uses Red Hat, go with that. > > >I seem to be the person who knows most about Linux in my family and dad > >recommends that perhaps I should go for some computer system which has Linux > >pre-installed but the downside with a pre-installed setup is that the seller > >is not likely to know about the accessability. > > It seems to me that another big drawback would be that you wouldn't know > about the details of the installation. You wouldn't know where stuff is and > why it was installed a particular way and that might make it harder to use First, I'm not blind. I've been using Red Hat for years - I counted up 15 releases the other day. I've been looking round since the introduction of RHL 8.0 because I dont like it. The bits I like least aren't going to bother a lot of people here, but one of the changes is the use of UTF. Now I'm sure that is the right direction, but at the moment there are some display problems with text output - I see it when reading man pages - and I imagine a few odd boxes where there should be spaces will cause you people merry hell - it's bad enough when you can actually see it. So, I suggest you give it a miss. A shame really as it includes tts stuff. I've been looking at Debian. According to the Debian folk you only install it once, thereafter you simply upgrade. That, it seems to me, is a good philosophy to adopt, especially for those who want to _use_ the computer to do real computer work rather than to just play with the computer. In Debian, I can type the command apt-get -y install sendmail and it will get sendmail off CD (tells you which one), or off a local or official mirror, as it's configured to do, and install it. It always installs the latest. It then launches the configuration dialogue. In contrast, on RHL I've had to locate the package myself, check whether there is a later one and then install it. Then I have to know whether I need to configure it. And I think the latest Debian has all the tts stuff RHL 8.0 has. I just haven't got far into Debian yet. > down the road. > > For example, it seems to me that it would be really hard to upgrade to the > next version of linux if you didn't install linux in the first place > > >Hope someone could give me some advice. > > I've caused some controversy on this list in the past by stating my opinion > on this but I think there's no getting around the steep learning curve with > linux. My opinion is that you should be prepared to put a considerable > amount of work into learning how to use linux. You have to have a "do it > yourself" attitude. You have to be willing to study the documentation and > then give it a try. And when it doesn't work, study the documentation some > more and try something else. > > My opinion is that if you don't start out with that attitude, you're doomed > to failure. I concur. _______________________________________________ Blinux-list@redhat.com https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list