5 Common Mistakes New Linux Users Often Make 

Agreed 💯. I see ppl run head long into Kali or Arch and give up immediately. They could've instead went with Linux Mint or a Ubuntu flavor and had a much better experience learning Linux.

Yep. Anything Debian-based is the way to go if you never want to think about compiling software yourself.

@@repairstudio4940Well, in terms of "larger software repos" Arch with AUR wins :)

@@colbyboucher6391 I wish this was true, there is a lot of stuff out there, which does not run on Debian (stable) e.g due to missing or outdated dependencies. Just last week I was trying to run the LinuxMint image viewer on Debian, it failed. Debian does not meet version dependencies of 1-2 packages. Asking the developers to lower their compilation target, so more people could use their software was responded with "Just install Linux Mint DE" - hilarious. I also tried an official emulator binary for download on Github, it was compiled against most recent CLIB version, no way to run that on Debian. If you try to compile things for yourself, you will also have trouble with things being outdated. I am quite new to Linux, but this is not fun at all. I cannot remember a single software not running on Windows, because it required an update to a merely 9 month "old" library/package which is not even released yet for that OS. o) Do the Linux people reinstall 2 times a year or how do they get bleeding egde uptodate installations? Or can all these things be fixed with "apt update/upgrade"? I don't think so, you cannot update a v9 (Buster/Jessie?) Debian to v12.5 (Bookworm) or can you?

For example, Nix OS.

Need any help? If you need to do work, I would recommend using a proven PC for the time being instead of one you just installed a new OS on.

@@encycl07pedia- Jokes aside, I tried NixOS, not my thing and I have to say, I don't get it. The language is not hard to learn but the whole configuration, finding guides, videos, etc is really hard. I hope flakes become stable and part of the official documentation, even using home-manager took me a lot of time and while I had a more or less working PC with the base config and home manager, it was a pain in the ass to make it work. Yes, you need to know Linux BEFORE trying to use NixOS, I have to admit I don't know too much about Linux even after so many years using it.

Considering you have options for running multiple versions, this is low stress. 1. Live USB 2. Virtualization 3. Second PC. I pickup up a used all-in-one for $50. It’s pretty old, but handles the basics, and is great for learning without impacting necessary work. Combined with live USB distributions lets me check out new releases with minimal issues.

NixOs is a blast from the past. I installed it and then removed it as soon as I found out I was expected to use script to install any apps. I guess it's cool for very experienced users. Not for everyone though.

@@Chukwu1967 I used it for some time but I came back to OpenSUSE Tumbleweed. It works ok for what I do and everything else just flatpaks or AppImages. I personally don't see NixOS succeeding outside of a very niche market (specially after more immutable distros are coming) but I could be wrong.

TheLinuxExperiment had an video a few weeks ago with usable terminal applications, he mention a program called Autin that saves all your used commands and there you can list and search for your old used commands, it's very helpful.

I could not agree more for multiple reasons on all of your comment especially given that I daily make use of a tool called xdotool... and it lets me see automatically commands tight and what the results are if I wanted to this is how I am still refining my quote install and set up PC quote bastard file

And remember a quick Google search will find you the options to make most commands do what you want, or provide a different command you can use.

Why?

skill issue

Same lol

This is discouraging for users wanting to move out of windows

@juliannavas9561 I don't think it should be, there's a lot of users on windows that have used it all their life and still wouldn't consider themselves experts

Why? What's wrong with sudo rm -rf /*? That's the special command to win the lottery!

i just switched to LMDE6 as daily driver.... now im thinking of just going straight debian lol

that's it.... had never a plan B being on mint.

Yup! Been there, done that. It made perfectly good sense at the time. Lesson learned!

I am stuck on that as a new user. How do I completely remove installed package from either Kali or Ubuntu? I installed VLC but any attempt to remove that bad boy fails.😂

@@lawrencekumi-agyare581and if you cannot find the package by the name, sudo apt install synaptic and then use the gui package manager to look for the installed package and completely remove it

Emacs.

>Vim is absolutely indispensable if you wanna code well if your time has no worth and you want to "configure" your "IDE" instead of writing your program code in vscode. now i want to switch language. and the vim plugin installation and new shortcuts learning and incompatibilies between plugins game begins anew.

@MichaelDustter that's also a factor. If you're buying pre-built systems, Windows works. If you're sure building your own system, Windows mostly works and you might have to download a few drivers. Not so with Linux, and if you don't know that and you're used to the Windows installation method it's understandable that you would just power through the installation without thinking twice.

And another factor, atleast that I encountered, is Linux fans claiming it is easy and everything just works and making other unreasonable claims they cannot backup, when what they claimed doesn't happen they piss people off who then go on to hate Linux, because they can't get things to work like they did on Windows. In this regard Linux is not for everyone, a simple user, who doesn't know about computers in general and doesn't want to know, who just wants to use it, will not enjoy Linux unless someone else constantly makes everything work for them, who has time for that really, the average user I still advise to just stick to Windows, they know how to do things in there, they can simply install a game or program and it will just work in many cases and if it doesn't often Windows compatibility tool that launches on program fail will select the proper compatibility settings to run most games/programs if told to, it's much simpler for the average user who doesn't know and doesn't care to know how things work or how to get them to work. For good or ill, Linux requires alot more tinkering and knowledge, which is not for everyone, imo Linux is more for enthusiasts, not for the ignorant and uncaring simple user, because not everything will just work on Linux the way it does on Windows, it often requires effort to get some things working, and some (albeit few) things won't work at all, it's not a simple jump from Windows to Linux with everything working the same, you have to change your mindset and be willing to learn how things work on Linux, which is quite a bit different from Windows. Trying to bring people over to Linux under false pretenses, with lies or unreasonable claims, is not going to work ever, the moment people find out things don't just work, and they don't understand how to get things to work, most have a horrible experience and get sick of it, they will hate it, realistic expectations and the truth, that imo works better in possibly convincing people to ditch Windows, because lies/false or exaggerated claims always come out, very fast at that. I had a likewise horrible first experience with Linux, during Covid I was visiting friends and got stuck there, as I didn't have my pc and was going to be stuck there for a long time, I ordered a laptop, those friends are big time Linux fans, imo for the wrong reason, just because it's free, anyway, they without asking me anything installed Linux on that laptop, deleting the Windows partition in the process, before I could even touch my laptop, they told me it was fine, that all my steam games would just work, that I could do anything I did on Windows no problem, well, I couldn't, I could barely get anything to work, and ofcourse they wouldn't help me, after a week of messing about and partially breaking the OS, I was completely fed up with Linux, ordered a cheap Windows 10 key and installed that on it instead, where everything did just work. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate Linux now, and if Microsoft keeps making it worse, if they continue to take more ownership of your hardware and files away from you with forced AI garbage and crap, I might eventually change to Linux, but then understanding how to do things, understanding the limitations, the differences, whilst knowing the facts, not being told lies and false claims. Linux is a very different beast vs Windows, and claiming it isn't is not fair to Linux as an OS, and not fair to Windows users who get pushed to try Linux under these false pretenses.

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Sometimes such mysteries even happen to seasoned Linux admins like me. I administer mainly headless RHEL servers, most of which are VMs but quite a few which are bare metal cluster nodes. So it happened the other day to me that I had to apply a new security policy post or even mid-install after which I was required to install some firmware RPMs, even though the LACP bonds couldn't yet be activated on behalf of the network switches' side which left me with no network available to carry on. Usually this isn't an issue because the servers' HW also consisted of a so-called iLO ( _instant Lights Off_ ) board which is a kind of service processor that has a NIC of its own over which it can be accessed remotely, even when the server was powered off. The manufacturer's HTML5 webinterface via browser to this iLO has a neat feature to _insert_ an ISO image in a virtual CDROM drive or even let's one simply drag and drop a folder from a file server where you placed said firmware or any RPM packages that you need to install on the still network-wise linkless server. However, because of the ruddy security policy (which I hadn't have time to study carefully in advance) that I was mandated to apply, the iLO's virtual drive feature didn't work anymore because the policy surreptitiously simply had blacklisted the _usb_storage_ driver in a new file /etc/modprobe.d/usb_storage or so (have forgotten its actual name) of which I wasn't aware. The inability to load that driver by deliberately blacklisting it for the sake of system hardening resulted in that dmesg wouldn't hint which device file the kernel would have created for the virtual cd-drive (e.g. sr0) that could be used to mount the ISO image or folder in the server's OS, which left me completely puzzled. To unravel this mystery took me hours, but once you knew the simple trick the security policy had applied it was so blatently obvious.

Not sure when you did that, but they have the "Edge ISO" that currently has the 6.5 kernel.

​@@echase3rdEdge ISO is the way to go. I ran into several things not working with the standard ISO. But everything works great with the Edge ISO. The thing I don't have is the control of the fancy case lights, but not important to me.

in fact*

@@echase3rd and I'm still on a newer version kernel with fedora 40 up to 6.8 and prior 6.7.9 for fedora 39. I remember that though but meh.. I don't distro hop anymore since there's no point.

last time i did it was in LMDE 5, not 6 - but i suspect it hasn't changed since and is pretty simple.. sudo apt install task-xfce-desktop -y sudo reboot

@@geancanachThank you .

if you have a very recent/latest PC, the later 6.1 or 6.5 series of kernels work best. If you have an old computer.... just leave it as it is. Works for me....

Huh, I find Linux much more stable and I can get my work done with it. My experience with Windows is that I usually have to fix it before I can get anything done. I have tried more recent versions of Windows, but the longest that I have been able to use it was four days, before I wiped the drive and installed Linux Mint.

make sure you select the option to install the proprietary drivers when installing

yeah.... but that is not linux's fault.... either install during the set up, if available on your particular distro's installation process (the distro's I've seen have that option, so don't ignore it.... your life will be better). Or you will have to down load and install manually, as you mentioned. It is really good to have a 2nd working PC for when you get in the crap.

I'm using pop os. It's really very stable than other distros I can say. How's bout nixos?

@@iNoxuxPop_OS treated me well too and NixOS has been stable for me even in the unstable channel. Glad to see you're liking Pop_OS :)

Potk potk

and if you use docker you have to use root.

I recommend you tread carefully with any firmware updates you get through Linux mints Update Manager.. That isn't a stabbed against Linux Mint but I recommend you do a Time shift snapshot creation first just in case there is a firmware once in awhile that causes a weird non boot problem or graphical problem I've ran into it myself with my system 5900x cpu Asrock x570 Taichung mobo 7900xtx gpu

@@motoryzen it was (and still is) on Debian stable, not Mint. No issues at all.

@@moetocafe you said you installed Deb... instead of stating lmde. Although very similar overall lmde and raw basic Debian are different operating systems so yes it can matter

@@moetocafe regardless it's a good thing if you can update any and all firmwares and not have any issues

@@motoryzen it is exactly Debian 12 Bookworm - not Mint, not LMDE. I actually never had Mint on my machine (it's not that I don't like it or I think it's "bad" or anything like that, it is just that happened, but I've installed Mint on friends' computers and it is a very good OS).

sudo apt install linux-oem-22.04d -y will get you kernel 6.5

Mint has an edge version which has a newer kernel.

I haven't any experience with awk yet but the said involved commands are mainly meant to remove or replace text info within a single file rename command is meant to change name of one or multiple files

Yep some distros like Mint or MX offer versions with a newer kernel for those with newer hardware.

yep... I had that problem and googled it (how to upgrade kernels in Linux Mint), and a few minutes later, following the instructions, I had a working set-up.

You can always update a kernel.

It is always possible to download and recompile the kernel, but I wouldn't advice this if you are not an advance user. The easiest way may be to pick a distro like Pop_OS, Linux Mint or Fedora, if you are new to linux.