Since a Linux genius has joined, I would love to get the nector out of his brains lol.

Tell us ljuwaidah, or I will call u L, the steps on how to install a simple free Linux on a system from scratch. The things we need, the advantages it gives on Windows and MAC systems.

And also, how to uninstall Linux from a harddisk as Windows can't read the ext2 and ext3 filesystems. (I need to know this one!)

Just give me a few hours, I'll try to work on it in my college this evening ;)

Hey, sorry I couldn't work on it in class today, 'cause we had only one class, I was planning to do it in the second one :(

Therefore, I'll start with the advantages over Windows and Mac, I'll prepair the rest later :)

1. Linux is free (Free as in free speech, not free beer): Have you ever downloaded a software and wondered how it works? Well, you could have known that if you had the source code of the application -- The source code is the code written in whatever programming language the programmers used, ie: C++, python, Java, etc... --, but most companies don't give you the source code because they don't want others to copy them, on the other hand, Linux is free, which means that its source code is free (you can read it, modify it, redistribute it yourself, etc), you can do just about anything you want with it!

2. It's flexible: Linux is so customizable, you can change EVERYTHING in it, from the way it looks to the shortcuts to the inner workings of it, but, in Windows, you have to stick to the default kindergarten-toy-like theme, and stick to the default shortcuts.

3. No viruses: Yup, you've read it right, no viruses; viruses are Windows applications and Linux doesn't get affected by those, however, you can run windows applications if you want to, and still be away from viruses.

4. Linux is free (Free as in free beer, not free speech): Linux costs you nothing aside from the download cost and the blank CD to burn it on, it's totally free, besides, one of my jobs as an ambassador is to distribute Linux for free, so if ever you decide to try it, you can contact me and you'll get it absolutely free :)

5. Linux is cool: There are lots of cool things, but I'll just mention the things I can remember right now.
A. Just yesterday I wrote a file with a single line that downloaded a whole comic collection from the net, without that I would have had to read it online. (Which adds to Linux's usability).
B. Our system administrator in the college created a page to allow students to create their own accounts on the system, but, it takes one whole day to be activated (Simply, because he has to read the list of all the students who requested an account and add them manually), in Linux this could have been done very easily (Automatically).
C. It has some awesome effects that even http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrFz7IxXppU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2U0V0RvCLM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ImW0-MgR8I


I guess that's it for now, I'll try to answer the other questions tomorrow :)
Feel free to ask questions :)

ok another toughy for ya,

Difference between FreeBSD (or any BSD) and Linux please.

oh that download, you write to download a batch of files in the terminal., interesting.

They say Linux will replace in Windows in the future as the most used operating system.

I tried Fedora Core 6. It was an interesting experience but it was so darn hard to get it to recognize my wireless card and ethernet driver.

For now, I'm happy with my Mac but I'm always open to new developments ;)

Just one Q Juwaidah, what OS you using right now?

I am not a Microsoft guy, in fact ill love to switch to Mac today, but the switching costs are too high for me, specially since I use .Net extensively.

he's using Fedora, I think.

Riv: You got that right, I'm using Fedora 8 :)
I'm not sure about the difference, but AFAIK, both Linux and BSD are based on UNIX.
STING: You can shift to Linux and use mono, it's a free implementation of .NET http://www.mono-project.com/

ok....

are the terminal commands same for all Linux systems?

LOL......this sure is a nerdy thread

But very rich & informative :D thanx 4 that

All hail the nerds!!! :hyper:

Riv: Yes, they are all they same.
spirit: Ooh! Thanks :)

LOL......this sure is a nerdy thread

But very rich & informative :D thanx 4 that

All hail the nerds!!! :hyper:

Look look Kratos is talking again!!
y do ppl call ppl who specialize in IT "nerds"?

Very interesting, the whole mono thing is nice. I didn't hear of it before.

I was thinking to go for a Mac and run XP in parallel with OS X, but I changed my mind when they decided to give me a latest laptop from work :p. I will just install one of the Linux versions and hopefully I slowly shift to the world of open source, as a user, and a software developer :D

Which Linux version you recommend?

I recommend Ubuntu. It's the easiest to use plus has most of the cool features of Linux.

STING: It's a matter of personal taste, if you want a really really really easy to use one, they go for Ubuntu, but if you want just a few geeky-ness and some cool-ness then go for Fedora :)

Alright man thanks a lot. I just need one I can use for everything minus the windows security headache!

I will keep you guys updated. I can't believed I won't be buying a Mac after all this, I guess the price, plus the availability of other excellent Operating Systems like Linux, simply changed my mind.

Btw, where can I download Ubuntu or Fedora from? I used Mandrake and Red Hat sometime back, what happened to those versions?

They still exist, Mandrake is now known as Mandriva, but I wouldn't recommend that, it's too slow, and Fedora is based on Red Hat :)

Personally, I can burn you a Fedora CD and you can pick it from me any time, as for Ubuntu, you can order the CD but it takes some time to deliver, of course, you can download them both from the net.

Ubuntu can be downloaded from http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download

Riv: I would recommend Kubuntu, since KDE is more Windows-like

I already have a corrupted drive with Ubuntu on it lol. I need to format that somehow through windows.

Can you tell me how to do that?

For me, if the terminal commands are same, makes no difference on which Linux to use lol. We can install GUI's in any Linux right?

If you're planning to install Linux again, the Linux installation should take care of it. If not, go to Control Panel, Administrative tools, system something :P, and you'll see some disk management thing, you'll probably see "unknown device" or something, right click on that and reformat it. (excuse me for the lousy instructions, I would have given you exact instructions if I was on Windows).

Yes, but the GUI matters ;)
Yes, you can install any GUI but Ubuntu was designed to run GNOME, and it ships with GNOME packages, but Kubuntu ships with KDE and the related packages (actually, a customized version of KDE).
Fedora ships with both :D

ok, I need to get that Fedora from u!

Yay! :)

Where do you live? Maybe we could meet somewhere? Do you have a car?

Alright people, I shall install Linux, either Ubuntu to Fedora, within the coming couple of weeks. I shall be getting my laptop from work within this week. I hope they don't mind me installing Linux on it :p

Thanks a lot for your help, I always try to move to open source, and guys like you help a lot ;)

I think through Linux you can run MAC and Windows by using VMWare. It emulates a whole new PC environment within the operating system you're in. I have tried Windows Millenium on it through XP, it sure needs a powerful PC to run the other OS though!

To answer your first question about installing Linux, here's Fedora's official installation guide! :)
http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/f8/en_US/

I was once using linux but I thought it was a bit too taough so I left it. But after reading this, I wana go for linux again!!!

Yeah, baby, yeah! :D

Al Maawali: Do you think we should invite Riv too? ;)

Yes, we should. Do u have his number?

Yes, I do, I'll try to contact him :)

cool :)

Yay! He said he'll call me later to confirm it, he's not sure yet :)

Ok... looking forword. I wonder if any other members wana join?

Too bad we're not the moderators, I would have made it sticky :P

O well... We work with what we got

Anyways, see you later!

looks like i will make it, but wait for my call! lol

woohoo! The more the better :)

Awesome! I'm loving this :P

Difference between FreeBSD (or any BSD) and Linux please.


Linux is not an operating system. Linux is a the kernel or the core of an operating system, upon the core, the operating system is built, and hence, there are many distributions (or in other words, operating systems) that are based on linux core.

many people say linux operating system, no problem, as far as we understand that there are many distributions,

the distributions are for example, fedora, redhat,, and many others, I used ubuntu, both the 6.06 and 7.04. I can give the CD if anyone needs it,

^I got Ubuntu, duno where I kept it, but Fedora is on its way :D

samra: Great info... Today was a Linux day :P

im really intrested in it ..but why do most people say its complicated :s ? *didnt use it yet*

~cK~ Because they're used to Windows and they expect everything to be like Windows, their definition of "user friendly" is simply "something we're used to" instead of "something easy to use" and since Linux is a different OS and is not a version of Windows, it doesn't have to be exactly the same, however, it's not completely different.
Check this website http://linux.oneandoneis2.org/LNW.htm