Getting Started

From Linux 101, The beginner's guide to all things Linux.

Contents 1 Introduction 2 The Basics 2.1 Terminal 2.2 Files 3 Hardware and Software Devices 4 System 5 Troubleshooting 6 Open Source History

Introduction

These documents aim to guide you through your Linux learning journey. These articles are just a subset of what is available on the Main Page. If you are brand new to Linux, it is a good idea to follow the articles here in order as they have been strategically ordered to build on your knowledge.

Try out the different commands as you go to get a good feel for them. Here we just scratch the surface of what these tools can do. To see how else they work, type:

<program> --help or

man <program> for its manual page.

The Basics

Terminal

The terminal is entrance to the heart of the system. Understanding how it works and can save time when performing monotonous tasks.

1. Getting Around
2. Running Programs
3. Using the Terminal I
4. Using the Terminal II
5. Shell Scripting
6. Advanced Bash Scripting

Files

Files are a very important concept in Linux. As the saying goes, "everything is a file". This includes your sound card, hard drive, and many other things. We never claimed it was a cool saying. Here we learn the basics about how to use files.

1. File and Directory Layout
2. Permissions & Symlinks
3. Compression

Hardware and Software Devices

1. Devices
2. Mounting drives & Filesystem Configuration
3. Mounting files
4. Filesystems

System

1. GRUB Bootloader
2. Processes and signals
3. Basic system configuration files

Troubleshooting

1. Troubleshooting
2. System logger & Log files

Open Source History

1. GNU, Free Software, and Open Source Software
2. Open Source Software Licenses