I suck at linux.

But I bought the Sybex LPIC-1 book from Amazon tonight (after a couple drinks). Before long I'll be worthy. Maybe.

I have no idea If I'll ever take the exam, but I've been playing with Ubuntu for 4 years and after trying to uninstall some wifi drivers on one of my desktops and failing miserably I realized I suck.

I realisex in my half soberness that there are two types of people in this world.. Those who can bash, and those who can't..

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jamesleecoleman

I suck at linux too. I don't use it alot and writing bash scripts in class was very tough for me.

If you suck at something then practice and get better. You can do it!!!

the_Grinch

Couldn't agree more, the more you use it the better you will get at it. I've been using linux for a while now (not fulltime, but enough to be pretty comfortable with it) and I'll find myself hating not getting to use the command line as much in Windows. Practice makes perfect!

Forsaken_GA

driver support under linux has always been a little flaky, sound and wireless in particular. That's mostly the fault of the manufacturers making it difficult to actually write linux based drivers without having to reverse engineer everything. It's getting better though.

With that being said, yes, getting software to work under linux can often involve a bit more than just clicking i accept to the eula and clicking next a whole lot

chrisone

well being drunk and trying to study is probably your first mistake. You probably wont understand much of anything you read while you are drunk.

UnixGuy

What do you want to do, do you want to use linux as your desktop? or do you want to learn Linux Systems Administration ? I suggest you focus on Linux systems administration - that can help you getting jobs in Linux.

LPIC is a good start, Linux+ study guides is a good start too, practice everything in the books, you will learn don't worry

rogue2shadow

+1 with what everyone's saying above. A year ago, I was scared out of my mind when it came to doing ANYTHING GNU/Linux related. After a little practice everyday in VMs and now working with it constantly, I've come to love it. It really comes down to practice and dedication.

seekrit

Sorry, I post random **** when I've been drinking. I just want to learn linux well enough to use it whenever/however I like. I'd been thinking about studying the LPI for for some time, I just never had the courage to start by clicking the 'buy' button.

I don't study when I've been drinking. That's just a perfectly good waist of time and potential..

Linux00800

rogue2shadow wrote: »

+1 with what everyone's saying above. A year ago, I was scared out of my mind when it came to doing ANYTHING GNU/Linux related. After a little practice everyday in VMs and now working with it constantly, I've come to love it. It really comes down to practice and dedication.

100% agree.. I was in the same boat. I just took classes, installed Linux VM's with Vbox, took CompTIA L+ and I finally got a position as an Assoc. Linux Systems Engineer at my company. It's very challenging but I love it and I'm learning much much more on the job.

Don't give it, Just keep it moving!

You'll get it and will start having fun.

mistervince

i will say as someone who used to be in the same boat as you and now relies on my knowledge of the unix os to pay my bills and put food in my gut, you really need to make a couple small changes in your thinking.

when looking at linux, you have to approach the entire os/file system with a different point of view. microsoft is all about what happens after you login. linux in a lot of ways is about what happens BEFORE you login. once you get the core understanding of how both the file systems and the services work on a low level, it makes using it on a daily basis much more plausible.

i highly recommend building a seperate computer (or VM) just to fiddle with it. you can learn more in a weekend of trying to get a wireless driver installed than reading the entire cookbook at BnN.

message me if you want specifics on anything, more than willing to help out.

ehnde

As a long time linux user, I must say that any problem you're likely to encounter has already been addressed by someone else that is an expert....additionally the documentation is very, very good. Knowing how to search for a solution is more valuable than your ability to write bash scripts.

Take your command line error message, paste it into google, get an answer. Voila!

varelg

Then ehnde, why bother reading books, documentation and lab howto's, when the only step towards solving a problem is a copy-paste into a search engine?
I strongly disagree about the quality of online documentation on linux. It can only take you so far. And in order to use any particular technology on a level higher than regular user, requires understanding of the subject. Administering any system without understanding it devalues the system, your job and sysadmin job in general.

N2IT

rogue2shadow wrote: »

+1 with what everyone's saying above. A year ago, I was scared out of my mind when it came to doing ANYTHING GNU/Linux related. After a little practice everyday in VMs and now working with it constantly, I've come to love it. It really comes down to practice and dedication.

Always love the positive attitude!

xirtlook

linux is like cisco, once you pop, you cant stop.

i actually prefer my ubuntu over my win7.... i love using terminal and command lines.

its overwhelming at first... especially when I registered for redhat, but I soaked it up like a sponge.

the more you use it, the easier it gets.

infact, i found it easier when you're trying to do something exciting and cool, and use linux do it.

example.. how cool is it to hack a box (ethically), or pentest it...
well learn linux, and you can use backtrack to do it!

want to encrypt your traffic or hide your ip address (web proxy)...
well use linux to do a ssh tunnel.

its lil nerd stuff like this that helps me learn linux better.

my recent project... wanting to learn how to setup a web server (apache) so I can do my own phpBB (forums).... LINUX!!!

stay thirsty my friends...

kerx

seekrit wrote: »

But I bought the Sybex LPIC-1 book from Amazon tonight (after a couple drinks). Before long I'll be worthy. Maybe.

I have no idea If I'll ever take the exam, but I've been playing with Ubuntu for 4 years and after trying to uninstall some wifi drivers on one of my desktops and failing miserably I realized I suck.

I realisex in my half soberness that there are two types of people in this world.. Those who can bash, and those who can't..

I would recommend to anyone that is learning a *NIX based operating system to avoid using certification material to do so.

Use books like these:

+ Amazon.com: Ubuntu Unleashed 2011 Edition: Covering 10.10 and 11.04 (6th Edition) (9780672333446): Matthew Helmke, Andrew Hudson, Paul Hudson: Books

+ Amazon.com: Beginning Ubuntu Linux (9781430219996): Keir Thomas, Andy Channelle, Jamie Sicam: Books

+ Amazon.com: Official Ubuntu Book, The (6th Edition) (9780132748506): Benjamin Hill, Matthew Helmke, Amber Graner, Corey Burger: Books

+ Amazon.com: Learning Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Fedora (9780596005894): Bill McCarty: Books

+ Amazon.com: Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux, A (6th Edition) (9780132757270): Mark G. Sobell: Books

Also, I would recommend not to use a image for your first time. Find a cheap box laying around with a cheap monitor. The older the box, the better, because you will deal with issues that will be covered in the certification tracks. Having a older monitor, keyboard, and mouse is a good idea as well.

Have a notebook and pen laying around, a Windows laptop or desktop next to you, and Google.com open. Every issue you run into, use Google.com. Read the configuration files, try updating the OS, get your box online (wired, then wireless), install a port scanner, then port scan your windows box, then go ahead and install Metasploit and try to break into your Windows laptop sitting next to you, customize your window manager, etc. etc. etc.

All these fun things will then set you up to read a more mechanical and boring Certification based book.

Have fun!!!

ehnde

varelg wrote: »

Then ehnde, why bother reading books, documentation and lab howto's, when the only step towards solving a problem is a copy-paste into a search engine?
I strongly disagree about the quality of online documentation on linux. It can only take you so far. And in order to use any particular technology on a level higher than regular user, requires understanding of the subject. Administering any system without understanding it devalues the system, your job and sysadmin job in general.

You took my post out of context - the ability to know how to search and find the right answer is more valuable than writing bash scripts. I would also rank the ability to compile from source higher than bash scripting.

You're free to disagree with me, but the documentation and user community I see in commercial OS's pales in comparison to what I've found with Free/Open/NetBSD, CentOS, Fedora, Gentoo, Debian, Ubuntu, and OpenSolaris and also the open source projects that go along with them.

varelg wrote: »

And in order to use any particular technology on a level higher than regular user, requires understanding of the subject.

How would you recommend gaining a "higher level" of knowledge? Reading an LPI textbook? LPI certification didn't exist when I began using Linux 10 years ago, and at this point it would be all review. The reason I'm using "I" and describing my personal experience right now is that when you said the above mentioned quote it felt to me like a personal attack (you are implying that I don't understand unix based operating systems and am incapable of administering them).

varelg wrote: »

Administering any system without understanding it devalues the system, your job and sysadmin job in general.

Ok, you really struck a nerve there...why don't you come down off the high horse?

N2IT

Day 2 learning CLI Bash and boy it's really opening a lot of doors.

WGU is lined up in November 1st so until then I decided to take a break from ITIL and transition into another technology, more for fun than anything. I decided to run a VM of CENTOS and start to script on this version.

Of course I still play around with Ubuntu and Suse.

A lot to learn, but it's fun and that's the way I want to keep it. To be honest this is the first technology where I decided to just have fun and not worry about the credentials.

badrottie

If you want to learn Linux, I would recommend reading the following books:

UNIX and Linux System Administration Handbook (4th Edition)

Essential System Administration, Third Edition (A little dated, but amazingly enough, Unix has changed very little with the exception of the GUI)

If you really want to understand Unix, avoid the GUI and use the command line interface (CLI) wherever possible.

For some variation, spend some time in a few BSD environments, such as OpenBSD or FreeBSD.

You never know. You may like it more than Windows (I know I do).

rogue2shadow

Extra resource (I believe Dynamik referred me to this one a while back):

Welcome to Linux From Scratch!

After working through it you'll find yourself closer to a Linux than ever before. From what some friends have told me, it is definitely a humbling experience. Will you have to actually do this on a normal basis? probably not but saying you can is pretty awesome

.

I hope to run through this myself at some point in the next 2 years.