How Did You Learn To...

[soundchaser59]

Install a dual-boot? Force Linux to make users log on? Implement minimal security in Linux to control access to certain folders? Create and manage multiple users on your Linux box?

For example, I may still need to boot back to Windows several more times before I can finally wipe it out of existence; I want to be compelled to enter a user id and pwd when Linux starts; I want to have 3 or 4 different users so I can let house guests use the machine, but without giving them access to my own folders and files;

Do you have a favorite site that you recall was the most help to you when you were first getting started and taking control of your Linux machine? I'm using Mint to get to know my way around, but I'd like to know about things that might be common to any distro, not necessarily specific to just Mint. I've already downloaded 3 or 4 pdf books on the basics, but that seems like the slow boat to Linux Heaven. {)

Am I even asking the right questions?

I can start with the link Qqmike posted from my other thread....
https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showth...sole-Beginners

[woodsmoke]

Nice question

Install a dual-boot?

Followed some instructions at Xandros forums.

Force Linux to make users log on?

Didn't have to force it when I created another user i provided a password and then they had to change it.

Implement minimal security in Linux to control access to certain folders?

Most of my stuff is very plain vanilla, although I did a lot of work in internet security for others, I don't use it much myself except for encrypting a wireless router, AND having to log into each and every machine, AND changing my passwords regularly, with things such as 10CheSter201 ( notice that it has mutiple "catches" and also is EASY TO TYPE...so you won't get irritated at it. including those at the college and my home machines. My former wife was somewhat paranoid and thought I was doing something nefarious, especially when the two men in black showed up on our doorstep because so many Chinese downloads were done of my menu system. My main "security" thing at home is that I make physical backups on DVDs.

I don't worry about a "firewall" and "anti-virus" for two very simple reasons:

A) I don't go anywhere on the net where my mother would want me to go, ( unless I'm doing "stuff" and I have always used Knoppix with various.... applications on it. I had opined a few days ago that I might do Kali but then the great gray wise one indicated that Knoppix now has a KDE version.

B) I don't open e-mails or attachments from people that I don't know.

BTW I actually ran across my first Steganography exploit a year or so ago, all you have to do is just slide your mouse over an image and the piece of dreck automatically downloads.

My main use of it "externally" is setting all of my Presentations to "read only" so that Microsith won't be able to do much to them at the college.

ALL FILES in Linux and also Microsith and Apple can be "encrypted" but, it becomes tedious to deal with a lot of them, it is a simple tick of a box in properties / permissions. And, of course, you can encrypt your home folder, etc.

Create and manage multiple users on your Linux box?

Use the create user function, HOWEVER, there are some distros and some previous versions of Kubuntu that lock up when so doing. I, personally, when I newly install a distro put a couple of extra users on when I am first installing it. Yeah, almost no time are they used, but when the kids come to visit I have a way to let the grandkids play on the thing safely.

For example, I may still need to boot back to Windows several more times before I can finally wipe it out of existence; I want to be compelled to enter a user id and pwd when Linux starts;

Just follow the instructions during the install, it will ask if you want to use a password or not and the other person won't be able to log into your "part" of it, of course if one of them is really a Lower Slobbovian hacker and they use some kind of penetration app or a simple password hacker then you are toast, but then I wouldn't have them for an inlaw anyway! lol

I want to have 3 or 4 different users so I can let house guests use the machine, but without giving them access to my own folders and files;

see my answer above about grandkids

Do you have a favorite site that you recall was the most help to you when you were first getting started and taking control of your Linux machine?

The very first was Xandros and the second was Castle Cops where I volunteered but it is defunct now.

I'm using Mint to get to know my way around, but I'd like to know about things that might be common to any distro, not necessarily specific to just Mint. I've already downloaded 3 or 4 pdf books on the basics, but that seems like the slow boat to Linux Heaven.

I am not dissing Mint, but I downloaded and ran the thing for a while, there are still a lot of things that the KDE desktop does without a hitch that Mint won't do very well, the main draw of Mint, and many others, is that it "looks kinda like Win 98 and so it oughta be easy to learn"

I totally disagree, start with Kubuntu and never look back, the only "thing" is "activities", they are just another form of the virtual desktop but have a LOT more capabilities.

The books are good, but the best thing is just reading things like ALL of the posts in Help the New Guy and as I was told SO MANY TIMES


by the "Old Grignards".



...the internet is your friend.

especially in the last couple of years, just about everything that can be asked has been asked at least several times.

You will find in the MORE FORMAL forums that a lot of moderators will close a question thread with a STERN STATEMENT that ....this question has been asked and answered BEFORE YOU STUPID NEWBIE!! - and notice, didn't give a linky. After all, their time is valuable, and that is their turf, and you....are a...NEWBIE!!

I detest the terms newbie and noob btw.

hey, again great question.

woodsmoke

[GreyGeek]

How Did You Learn To...

Install a dual-boot? Force Linux to make users log on? Implement minimal security in Linux to control access to certain folders? Create and manage multiple users on your Linux box?

For example, I may still need to boot back to Windows several more times before I can finally wipe it out of existence; I want to be compelled to enter a user id and pwd when Linux starts; I want to have 3 or 4 different users so I can let house guests use the machine, but without giving them access to my own folders and files;

Do you have a favorite site that you recall was the most help to you when you were first getting started and taking control of your Linux machine? I'm using Mint to get to know my way around, but I'd like to know about things that might be common to any distro, not necessarily specific to just Mint. I've already downloaded 3 or 4 pdf books on the basics, but that seems like the slow boat to Linux Heaven. {)

Am I even asking the right questions?

I can start with the link Qqmike posted from my other thread....
https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showth...sole-Beginners

You are asking good questions and Mint is a good distro to learn on. More later when I turn on my laptop.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[whatthefunk]

This is a pretty good course. Its free and self paced.
https://courses.edx.org/courses/Linu...1cc3d8233bed16

I learned most stuff just by using my computer for things outside of normal computer usage. If you just use your computer for watching videos and browsing the internet, youll likely never have to do any of the things you mentioned. If you develop, over-customize your installation, try to automate tasks, try to break it, install weird distros, or try to do anything not "normal" youll learn pretty fast.

[Qqmike]

A course is not a bad idea, but you also need something directly relevant to the distro(s) you are considering using NOW. The how-to's here at Kubuntu are one resource. A good general course is this:

https://linuxjourney.com/

[GreyGeek]

Those posting above gave two great links to recent tutorial material. There is SO much Linux "help" floating around the Internet one has to be careful, because a LOT of it is old and outdated. Some of it is downright wrong or misleading.

One example of an old, outdated Linux tutorial is the "Linux Rute User Tutorial", by Paul Sheer, which you can download from the Internet by clicking this link. However, when I say it is old and outdated, that only applies to the fact that it talks about LILO (the old LInuxLOader), which was replaced by Grub, and it many ways is easier to use than Grub. It also is outdated in the file hierarchy used today in modern distros. It talks about XFree86 and other Xserver manual configuration tools prominent at the time it was written, 2001. A LOT of it is still applicable today. It explains the basics of the hardware, address bus, big and little indian addresss mapping, the ASCII code table, sockets, ports, how EVERYTHING in Linux is a file, all of the common GLI commands so useful yet today. While it covers the old inittab and runlevels, the meanings of fstab and mtab, what it does NOT cover is how LiveCD's and LiveUSB are made, the current live installation procedures, Grub, sysVinit, Upstart or systemd, obviously. To it's advantage it is STILL a good tutorial on most of the major CLI commands and utilities, regular expressions, grep, sed, etc... I gave the link because Sheer made a book which sells on Amazon for $39US, and in Asia it sells for 2,767 Huan.

I believe you'll find yourself absorbing much of it, especially the early chapters which give you a background in computer hardware and software that will make understanding why a lot of things about computers are done the way they are. What you won't find in it are Morgan's laws of Boolean Logic, discussions of half-adders, operational amplifiers, etc.

Now, about your first question: Security
Linux, like Unix, was created with security in mind. It wasn't kludged on as an after thought. A good tutorial is here. Basically, if you run Dolphin and click on the header column in the detail display panel you'll see, in addition to size, date and type, the "Other" option which leads adding permission, owner and group columns. Add them so they will display. Here is a snapshot of my home folder:

Notice the hidden file ".tor". It has root as it's owner and group. Tor created that when I installed it (but didn't remove it when I uninstalled it.). Since I don't run as root I can't do anything with that entry as "jerry". I would have to run "sudo rm ~/.tor" and enter my password to remove it. Notice the permission column. It has three sets of dashes. A set for world, group and user. Each group has at least three or more permission sets: read, write and execute, rwx. There are others but focus on those for now. An "x" in the world ("others") group gives any user permission to execute a file IF it is of an executable type (ELF binary or bash shell script) because everyone is in the world ("others") group. An "x" in the group set listed under the group column gives anyone who is a member of that group (as indicated by the "user group" column) execute permission. NOTE, however, that the "user", the one who owns the file, is the only one who can read or write or delete that file, if the permissions are so set. Right mouse on any file row and choose the "properties" option. Then left click the "Advanced" button. That leads to this dialog:



When your account was created your account name was also used to create a group. You can install kuser and run it to see all the users and groups that come default on a Linux installation. You can create a groups yourself, either using kuser or the appropriate CLI utility. You can assign permissions to that group. When you add someone to that group they acquire the permissions of that group. IF that group was made the "owning group" of that file any member of that group acquires the permissions of that group. Of course, the owner usually has rwx permissions, but the owner can remove the "w" permission to prevent even the owner from deleting the file. As I hope I have made clear enough that you can see. the group and user permissions capability in Linux creates a fine tuned granularity that is unmatched.

With the groups already created by default a lot of permission designing has already been done.

[soundchaser59]

Thank You all for the links and the info. This is very encouraging. It crossed my mind that if more people would pay attention in school and learn about this deceptively awesome technology we have called computers, instead of mastering video games and pokemon and the tv remote, then it is conceivable that linux could easily put Microsoft out.......of.......business.

I remember the very first time I heard about a free OS called Linux. I had been in school (for the second time, getting my AAS in Electronics and Computer Servicing) circa 1996-99. They had just started offering classes for Linux. I was having a spirited discussion over a brew with my brother about the future of computer technology, and bemoaning the fact that Microsoft seemed to have such a far reaching strangle hold on the lion's share of the pc world. I mentioned that there was now a free "open source" OS out there, and we both agreed that no profit-oriented company would ever really challenege the MS behemoth. The only way to bring MS down would be to do everything they were doing, but do it for free. Give it away. Any profit motivated competitor would simply be bought and buried by the Bill Gates Goliath, but an open source offering that could rival MS software might be the ticket to cutting the Microshaft Shackles!

Well.......here we are......Linux, you've come a long way, baby!