*Posted here with the Authors permission*

How To Use This Document

GNU/Linux is not difficult to learn if you have the right tools and know where to look for assistance. With that in mind, The Linux Learner's Guide, or TLLG for short, is designed to make learning GNU/Linux a little less frustrating to endure. This guide is a concise collection of commonly used tricks, tips, commands and programs that will serve to help you learn the basics of GNU/Linux without the sarcasm and derision of asking a frequently asked question on a community message forum or mailing list. In addition, this document may also help you avoid the tediousness of attempting to find the information you need in The Linux Documentation Project and then translating it into understandable terms. Best of all, The Linux Learner's Guide is relatively short and designed to be easy to understand.

Written by Jem Matzan, Michelle West, Jawad Niazi, RHCT, Linux+

What this document is not is a step-by-step walkthrough or an instruction manual. Our goal is to help you help yourself by giving you the knowledge you need in order to learn on your own.

The layout of TLLG is simple: there are normal chapter headings like in a real book, along with a table of contents to help guide you to the proper section. While we recommend reading the entire document from start to finish, it is also possible to use this guide as a reference only when you need it. Commands that you type in are marked with special formatting, as in this example:

cdrecord -scanbus

So you would type the words above into your terminal or shell window and press the enter key. Follow the capitalization and punctuation exactly - GNU/Linux is very specific about that. If you do not type in the exact words, you will not get the desired results. There is also a part of this document where we quote a configuration file to show you the proper section to change. The text in the configuration file is similarly formatted to better distinguish it from the normal document text.

Where to go for help

If you have questions that are not covered here, there are several avenues available for help. If you've purchased a retail box distribution such as Mandriva, SUSE, Linspire, or Xandros, the distribution company is obligated to provide you with installation support and a way to interact with the community either through message forums or email lists. Please attempt to solve the problem on your own (either by reading this guide, the Linux Documentation Project, the manual that came with your software distribution, or by searching the Internet) before posting a question to the community. If you do not know where to go for help, try the Linux.com forums as a starting point. Communities such as this tend to be young, vibrant, and most of all, extremely helpful in helping you find a solution to your problems.

What is Linux?

GNU/Linux is a Unix-like operating system invented jointly yet independently by Richard Stallman (who started the GNU project in 1984) and programmer Linus Torvalds (who designed the original Linux kernel in 1991). Linux is only a kernel (described below), but when we generally discuss ``Linux'' we are often referring to a GNU/Linux distribution. The term distribution includes the kernel, the GNU operating system that uses the kernel, and other programs and software like desktop environments, email clients, word processors, etc. that are bundled with the distribution.