[Watford] Lug Update

[Mark Stewart]

HI Walter, welcome to the LUG.

Training is an interesting topic ....

How I learned / picked up Linux.
The secret was to never to give up and master google searching! Using google
properly will always solve/give an indication of what you need to do in
99.9999 of any issues your have (more so than with Windows issues). With
this I didn't just learn about Linux/BSD I also developed a high level of
problem solving skills - this has now become instinctive when working on my
Linux servers. Its not easy and takes many hours (mostly in the am :D) to
work things through.

It often helps if you have a task - goal when installing your Linux system
and not just installing for the sake of. E.g. Setting up a web server. This
helps motivate you and usually you solve lots of common issues on the way to
getting your box setup.

Hardware Issues
Dreaded hardware issues, we have all experienced these and with linux this
is usually to do with X and your graphics card not being supported. There
aren't that many of us that go and try to write a new driver to
support unsupported, personally if I hit problems with a graphics card or
other hardware I just go and buy one that is compatible. Lifes too short and
usually I want to get things working quickly. (i do prefer only the command
line though and seldom use X)

Training
Not sure about this, if your a Solaris guy I guess you could go on some Sun
training courses. Maybe you should consider becomeing a Red Hat Systems
Administrator, google "redhat qualifications" and see what course are
available. I'm not advocating redhat as distribution but you would learn a
lot of basix Linux skills that would be very beneficial. As for online
courses, I would recommend as already stated google and
the Linux distributions web site and the man command line utility on how to
recompile the Kernel. I use VMWare for most my development work nowadays and
highly recommend its using for playing/learning the linux trade.

Remember you can always post questions to this group where we will do our
best to help you out.

Mark









On 30/03/06, Walter <walter at helvatron.co.uk> wrote:
>
> Hi Mark,
>
> I recently signed up with LUG Watford having found some entries on the
> web.
>
> I have spent the last 10 years installing and maintaining Windows Systems
> and I am getting very bored with it now.  As I am about to semi retire my
> project is to get the hang of Unix/Linux.
>
> Can you recommend any courses, preferably via internet/email so I can get
> instructions and advise on building Kernels and hardware troubleshooting.
> What I have found on the Web is good but it never quite goes deep enough
> or
> I often just don't understand the instructions / jargon.  I have looked at
> LFS but even that throw up a lot of questions.
>
> I have managed to install several versions of Linux, from Red Hat to
> Debian
> but something almost always wont work correctly, usually to do with a
> hardware device and when I get the driver and try compile it I usually
> come
> unstuck.
>
> Many thanks,  Walter Jaggli
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Watford mailing list
> Watford at mailman.lug.org.uk
> https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/watford
>
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