As someone who grew up using windows, is there a series of tutorials or videos y’all recommend to learn Linux? I find myself running into issues, trying to find solutions online, and not even understanding the instructions. I’m sure most of this comes from not knowing bash (which I’ve started to learn using https://labex.io/linuxjourney).
Background: I’m a very competent windows user. I’ve built my own PC, etc. I mostly use it for gaming and Internet now but want to start self hosting some things. Oh, and I’m running bazzite.
Anyway, just trying to get out from Microsoft’s thumb.
Cheers.
Edit: thanks for the replies everyone. I haven’t had a chance to read through them all yet; the whole family is suddenly sick.
This is one of many great playlists from LLTV. I cannot recommend this guy enough.
Did you read tutorials or videos when you started using Windows? Probably not, you wanted to game or write or be social on the internet and you learned “on the job”.
It’s the same thing with Linux. Don’t take it too serious. Some nerds started that rumour that Linux is “hard” and only for the techi folks. That’s not true at all, it never was.
Yes, there are things that just work different and you have to find a new way to fix them. But it will come when you encounter them and we will be here to help.
Just start with Mint or Bazzite and you will be fine.
Linux was hard and that was true at some point though. I remember having to build kernels for Debian in order to have support for my motherboard, not sure what was the main issue there, but I had a hard time compiling them until they worked, this could be a couple days worth of trial and error…
That’s history. Still, it is not some rumour as you put it.
as top comment has already mentioned - try wikis. think arch wiki or gentoo. you dont have to use those distros to know about linux, just read them. and even better, spin up virtual machine, and install arch/gentoo there. since you already use bazzite, you don’t have to redo stuff already done (like playing game or something), so you use the sandbox playground to just learn. if it breaks, redo, or make checkpoints.
what distro are you using. I have not really had to do anything with my laptops except install.
I’m using bazzite because I heard it is gaming focused. It runs fine but I keep running into little things. For instance, I couldn’t get a game that was supposedly steam deck verified to run. I eventually got it working. Just had to tinker for a few hours.
ah ok. that explains it. I just do regular things and pretty much just game on my steamdeck now.
Probably not a helpful suggestion, but CachyOS might be a better fit for you.
Bazzite is an immutable distribution. This means that most things on the system are static between major Bazzite versions, at which time everything updates at once. This can be great; for someone who doesn’t want to tinker, or for someone who’s worried about breaking things—it’s very hard to break.
On the other hand, it also means that everything is running on an older version, with bugs that have been fixed in newer builds.
CachyOS is Arch-based. You can configure everything in the system, and can update all your packages to the most recent versions as soon as updates are compiled in the CachyOS repo. The CachyOS repos are fairly extensive, but you can also install most other things from the Arch User Repository (AUR). The AUR is a bit of a “Wild West” where packages may not install or work dependably, but in most cases they work great… albeit sometimes with a bit of tinkering required.
Your example of getting a “Deck Verified” game to run is what prompted this for me; CachyOS comes pre-installed with 2 versions of Steam (native and non-native), a bunch of versions of Proton (Valve’s stable/experimental, GE, and I think more?), Heroic launcher, and Lutris launcher. So, you have like 8 different configurations to try just from toggling things that are pre-installed, lol. I haven’t had a game not work for me yet.
You also mention self hosting; in CachyOS you can install Docker or Podman from the CachyOS repos and then run a Docker image. They almost always “just work” without any tinkering needed, so you can jump right into setting up your configuration/settings. Or, if your prefer a more integrated solution, just about everything will be in the CachyOS repos or the AUR (but expect to put more work into it.)
Bazzite might be holding you back a bit, and it sounds like you might not need the “safety” of an immutable distro, while its limitations might be getting in your way.
That’s literally why Bazzite is a better choice for a beginner: because it’s harder to really break it. I’m sure CachyOS is great but not for someone coming straight from Windows, unless they’re happy to reformat every other week.
Sure, but OP was specifically running into issues with Bazzite and needed to tinker to get things working. Ironically, CachyOS likely would not have needed any tinkering in OP’s case because updates in CachyOS but absent from Bazzite likely contained the fixes.
OP also mentioned elsewhere wanting to self-host some services—also a task likely to be easier in CachyOS than in Bazzite. Wanting to self-host also implies that OP can likely handle the light configuration that’s needed in CachyOS.
I think “unless they’re happy to reformat every other week” is unnecessarily pessimistic, too. With brtfs (the CachyOS default), recovery is quick and relatively easy. It’s also very unlikely to ever be an issue; CachyOS is very unlikely to break, unless OP really messes things up. Updates almost always “just work” in Arch Linux.
what helped me when I first started using Linux was the Arch Wiki. Even though I wasn’t using Arch the information in that wiki is invaluable. Even now that i’m on NixOS I still use the Arch Wiki as a tool when I need answers. everything is there. even man pages.
Another resource is IRC and Discord. I’m not sure if Bazzite as an IRC channel but the quickest answers to issues I was having has been via whatever distro channel on Libera. Discord also for specific distros. But I’ve found many of the maintainers and devs will hang out in their respective distros IRC channel all day so what better resource for help than directly from the source.
Finally either peertube or youtube channels. There are some fantastic channels that help learning this stuff. Primary of which is Veronica Explains. By far the most easy to understand and follow videos for linux. She reminds me of watching old episodes of The Screen Savers and Call for Help. Another that is great that is more specific to workflows and command line stuff is Bread on Penguins. Very easy to follow, she provides git repos and links to EVERYTHING she talks about and even writes most of it herself. For customizing your build There’s The Black Don. he’s great too. builds out a lot of stuff himself and provides repos for everything he’s working on. He’s built an awesome tool for Arch that allows reproducability similar to NixOS.
I am also self taught. I really started where you are: installing it and trying to troubleshoot. The more I wanted to personalize my system, the more I saw frequent terms and had to learn commands etc. just on the fly. It’s like full immersion learning. Do what the steps say when you look up how to fix something and you’ll get it. Learning a whole language isn’t necessary until you have to apply it.
You can instead try a distro that just works on most hardware, like Linux Mint or other easy-to-use distros suggested in this thread. That way you can slowly learn how to use Linux if you want, while using Linux, so you can later use a more finicky distro more suited to what you want.
For years I used Ubuntu, but when GNOME 3 came out I changed to Xubuntu, and then when Snap came out I changed to Mint Xfce. I’ve used several 2nd-hand desktops and laptops over the decades, so brand-new hardware might be more problem-prone.
I started off trying Slackware, SUSE, and Mandrake; but struggled too much with them so I stayed with Windows. Ubuntu just worked for me, so it allowed me to easily ditch Windows. Years later, I had update problems when I tested MX Linux and Debian, but instead of trying to fix it, I personally found it easier to just look for a distro better suited to the way I want to use my computer.
I see that OP has already gone off to do other things, but I agree with this. Ubuntu is fine for bare functionality like running a server, but as a beginner (or a very tired expert) Mint or Pop! is where you want to go for the long-term. Literally damn near straight out of the box functionality.
Kids these days have it easy. Back in my day, we had to git clone source code from random github pages we stumbled across in chatrooms. It was like delving into the darkest part of the hidden library, knocking thrice upon the door, and pleading for mercy and wisdom from the Greybeards.
It has been a long time since my transition. I remember the journey well. I used to watch nixie does linux and a specific queries for different problems I had in both youtube and google to get what I needed.
I did a search on YT and came up with this video that was derived from the linux foundation. Only watched a few minutes bit might be a good place to start.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWbUDq4S6Y8
Welcome to linux! Lemmy is very accepting and helpful for your questions as well.
There’s a free, 30 day program for learning Linux that may help, The Linux Upskill Challenge.
I like that it walks you through doing stuff, step by step, starting with foundations and building on it.
Your link just reloads this exact lemmy page
That’s the first challenge to get through
Hahaha, wtf?
I just loaded it, goes to the website linuxupskillchallenge.org
I found Shotts to be very helpful back in the day.
I was in the same boat about 12 years ago. Linux was much more difficult to get working well back then, but now, it’s just slightly more work than windows.
I learned by trial and error and I don’t keep any sensitive files on my OS hard drive, so if I screw up, I don’t lose anything.
For instance, someone recommended Endeavor OS a few weeks back and I had never heard of it. After using it for a week, I realized the arch community and OS isn’t for me and I’m more of a beginner. So I switched over to mint Cinnamon which I use on my Plex server. Got everything setup and working within and hour and I don’t have any issues like I did on my past Linux distros.
It’s super easy to use these days and I love it!
Second Mint here. I made the switch on my new PC and on my old one when I handed it down to my son. We’re both doing great.
Bazzite is going to be a little different from normal distros since it’s immutable but what issues do you have? If you’re truly a beginner it might not be a bad idea to pick up a linux beginners book and just read it.
IMO I feel like what you’re doing is the best way to learn.
Best teacher I had was breaking things by installing everything under the sun then trying to fix it. But its time consuming.
I would say go at it yourself, you’ll learn along the way, same as you did with windows. For tips, its hard to say, see if you can get your hands on Sander van Vugt - linux fundamentals. I watched it a few years into my linux journey and it schooled my ass still.
Honestly, the way I learned Linux best after a numerous failed tries over the years was switching to Arch. It gets a lot of crap from the online community, especially regarding its users, but I think it’s an excellent distro especially for people at a moderate to advanced level.
First off, the
archinstallscript makes the actual installation process - notoriously one of the hardest parts of using the distro - much easier. It comes with a barebones set of components installed to get you up and running.From there, you just start to think of the things you want to do with your system and begin building it out piece by piece. Consult the Arch wiki for a number of application options and then pick one. Usually there’s some additional configuration involved, not much, just a config file that needs tweaking or something, but this helps you learn things slowly. It also guarantees that if that particular thing breaks in the future, you have a better idea of what might have gone wrong and where to start looking because you previously set it up (somewhat) manually yourself.
Occasionally you’ll stumble across something on your system that’s not working the way you thought it would and it’s because you needed to manually install some additional component or dependency yourself. So again you consult the wiki and just do that. It’s about slowly building the knowledge.
When you’re finished you have a highly customized system with only the components you wanted and a better knowledge of it all.
deleted by creator
