An Introduction to Linux Mint 18.2 

Thank you! :)

Have fun man. I've used Linux for years and still am a fan of Mint, aka, the "newbie distro." Sure, it's friendly for beginners, which is a good thing, but it's also great for long time users like myself who just want a simple system I don't have to toy with 24/7.

Awesome. :)

a tip: you can watch series at flixzone. I've been using it for watching lots of of movies during the lockdown.

@Tyler Christian Definitely, have been using flixzone} for since december myself :D

@Tyler Christian Definitely, been using Flixzone} for since november myself =)

@Tyler Christian definitely, have been watching on Flixzone} for months myself :)

@Tyler Christian Definitely, have been using Flixzone} for since december myself =)

Then I found the driver and set it up with GPSD and tested with XGPS and all is good.

I might add that I was using Linux for 6 years and stopped when I went back to school. When the Windows10 keeps freezing up or upgrading and so bloated, I decided to switch to Linux for good. So far So good. I like being in control of my laptop and desktop.

What's wrong w/ Arch people? I purged my vanilla Arch drive and installed Fedora spin, so what? Stick w/ what makes your work done, it could be Windows or Mac or Even any BSD projects or GNU/+Linux and/or Linux based distro, just make it use of and KISS.

theres nothing wrong with arch but people get kennel blind to whatever distro is their fav. I like debian base systems myself but but I also have and use arch. but I think the bigger point here is newbs are NOT going to stay with linux if they get thrown into an arch install for their 1st go round on linux. they will RUN back to windows with a horror story to tell their friends. and as much as i HATE unity, id still point a newb to buntu flavor before id even tell them about arch.

I'm totally agreed w/ you Joe, I still have several drives of major distros but my daily driver is now Fedora spin, I always keep a Stable distro in case of my needs.

@Squidgy - Ah! Yes, about that... So I have tried this. About 50 or 60 times. So you find the item on the menu, and it asks what you want to import, so you name the HDD file, and it goes 'That's not a virtual machine, I need an XYZ file which defines the VM.' So you find that and you tell it to import and it goes No, I can't do that! That's not my VirtualMachine. That VirtualMachine was created by VBox [unique identifier] and I am VBox [different unique identifier] and that would be like peering over the urinal at some other man's tackle. So then you go looking for what you'd have to do, and there is an option to 'export' a VM so another machine can use it. But when you have 12 ~ 15 VMs which you play with and keep up to date, you don't want to go through the 37 step process to export that virtual machine so another VBox can use it, every time you want to back up, because that's 6 hours work. It's actually just as quick and easy to fire up a new VirtualBox and install the latest Debian from scratch. Less time, less energy, less trouble and fewer screen and menus. If you have a system crash and you still have the VM files, including the HDD file, then so what? Unless you knew you were about to have a system crash and exported all those VMs the day before, then... The only VM you can import, is one that has been exported. And exporting them is not a quick or simple or obvious process, just as importing them is not a quick or simple or easy process, and you'd then have to repeat the entire song & dance for each one of your VMs each time you want to back up... It's easier and quicker and simpler to just start again. I have tried to do this, a number of times, and it is slower and harder and more complicated and painful, than simply starting from scratch. [edit] Oh, and there's one more step. So the virtual drive file, you can stick off some place else, like on the spinning rust drive, which I do. I have a /vm/[name of distro] directory, and it goes there. But the default directory for this stuff is your / home/vm/ directory, and while you can stick the 100GB drive file on the HDD, the VM definition file it needs is on the SSD, in your home directory, and that's not something you can easily change. So when your SSD gets corrupted, you have the drive file on the HDD, but the file it needs to import, is on the SSD, which is screwed. You can't import the HDD file unless you have the definition file. And even if you have it, you can't do that unless it has been marked as EXPORTED. If you boot it up and use it, after it's been exported, then it's no longer exported. I suppose you could copy all of those files off some place else, but then I'd have 12 ~ 15 100GB files, and another 12 ~ 15 100GB files as working backup, and I don't quite have that much disk space... Oracle don't go out of their way to make this easy - they go a bit out of their way to make it difficult. I am guessing there are pretty good reasons why you'd want it this way in the data centre, but as a home user enthusiast, it's a complete schamozzle! [edit] Oh, and there's the other thing! Sometimes you get a fail, and there's a good simple explanation of what went wrong. But more often you fail and there's a thing which says "Fail - Click to get a definition." So you click and it goes "Take down this number and present it to the onsite technical adviser from Oracle when he gets to your premises - [418 char unique random identifier.]" You can try and search that string on the Oracle site, but all you get is a line about "See your Oracle representative." Have I had this happen? Yes, I've been down that path about a dozen times. It's a waste of time copying & saving that damn string, because you can't do anything with it. You're meant to show it to the man from Oracle. I really suspect all it is, is to say "Yep, he really does have a random number. It must be stuffed!"

... and now you've got me started, I can tell you something else. FlightGear (flight simulator) does not like VirtualBox and VBox does not like FlightGear. You can have several VBoxes running, and fire up FlightGear and go fly an aeroplane, but with some planes (I know about the Boeing 777 - 200) if you do stupid old man things in it, like try and do a loop at low altitude, not far from the control tower ("Aw, don't buzz the tower, Mav!") then you can lock up the sim, and it starts bleeding memory at about 1 MB/sec until you can shut it down. And sometimes it shuts down and sometimes it doesn't. And if it doesn't, you have the choice to wait until it's used all available RAM and all available virtual memory and see what happens next, or you can reach down and pull the plug. I've done that several times. The last time I did it, it corrupted the SSD, and I had to re-install the operating system. Experiments since have shown that doing it while VMs are running is not the real killer, but if you run a few, and then shut them down, but leave the VBox management ap open, that's when things go pear shaped. So now I use VBox, and when I want to fly I shut VBox down completely, then fly. Then I can fly like an absolute screaming maniac and nothing much goes wrong. In brief, use one program or use the other, but don't use both at the same time. And don't fly a big modern airliner like Manfred Von Richtoffen. The Red Barron doesn't like Penguins or something... ;-)

Kneedragon1962 you should check out qemu and kvm. Way more powerful than virtual box

Ta. I don't need more powerful, I'm pretty happy with this. It just has a few features I wish were different. But it's written for business and the data centre - not for silly old buggers to play with testing and peeking at other Linux installs. I've just got to stop getting into situations where I need to pull the plug out of the wall before I burn through all the virtual memory.... I got told many years ago, you power off an SSD at the wrong moment, and you can screw it. Well, now I've done it....

Hey there! I`ve been planning on installing Linux Mint on my laptop, because I want to learn more about it. And after that putting a Windows virtual machine on it, for the applications I like on Windows, but I see that I might have problems getting the right drivers (wifi, video, sound, camera etc.). Should I be concern about it or just go for it? My laptop is Medion P7648-MD99980

Not a fan of BSD for several reasons. First and foremost is the lack of software. :)

I use simplescreenrecorder. www.maartenbaert.be/simplescreenrecorder/

Enough to know that I don't recommend it to newbies. :)

Hardware selection, BIOS and drivers... Sysyetm76 builds laptops and desktop specifically designed to run Linux. www.system76.com

If you want to spend a few bucks, Ebay has collections of distros you can buy, and sometimes scads of them in a bundle you can get. When starting your computer, boot from the CD or flash drive (which ever one you purchased) by pushing the F2 or F12 or whatever key you have to press to change the boot order and run the programs "live" - meaning you have all the features of that distro without actually installing it. Of course your add-on programs won't be there, but you can check out what each one looks and acts like. When you are finished checking out the distro, just close it without installing. You would have to reboot your system using the next CD the same was above to see which ever other program you chose to preview. I did this once and have a whole pile of outdated Linux OS's.

If you intend to do manual in-place upgrades then separate partitions are a good idea. If you don't think you'll be doing that just letting the installer take care of it is fine. :)

No. Linux Mint takes care of your SSD automatically. It will run TRIM once a week in the background. You literally have to do nothing to set that up. :)

Oh okay thanks for the reply Joe.So all I really need to do is change t the Swapiness? and that it?

I don't have a Netgear router so I can't do a video about that. Your best bet is to read the router's documentation.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8 sudo apt update sudo apt install albert No compatibility problems,it works on any DE

i am afraid linux graphics drivers are not as good as their windows versions. if you decide to use linux i recommend nvidia, but be aware that even with nvidia, games will perform slower on linux compared to windows.

"I have been playing around with Linux bistros" I have never heard of linux bistros. what kind of dishes do they serve? were you there as a part of kitchen staff or as a waiter?

It won't auto upgrade, you must select that in the Update Manager or google the manual method.

Of course Linux Mint will run on bare metal. The reason VM's are used in videos is because it's the easiest way to show the entire install process.

Kitties... You gotta love 'em!

well if your a car guy, its like putting a kia motor in a 57 chevy and pulling off 2 plug wires

ROFL Good one, Joe. I love the analogy.

Mint is a great desktop. Server side I wouldn't rush.

It's not that huge a of a leap. It's just updated packages so the differences aren't that much. :)

Yep. If it's on the list, it's fine... Mirrors aren't web pages. The 'howdy' i there to let you know the mirror is up. :)

Joe Collins great thanks! the next question would be: If i selected the security setting for novices (this is my first dive into Linux and i saw your Mint 18 vid a day before this one) and i want to change it to the download and update everything setting how do i go about that?

Look in the Update Manager preferences. :)

You do not need a AV for Linux

Sometimes... It depends on the EFI setup on the hardware. :)

Well, I installed Linux Mint 18 on two laptops with secure boot on. It may be as Joe said - dependent on the specific implementation of EFI. But, whatever.

Well guess what? I've installed it into my dell inspiron 15" laptop, my desktop ( asrock z97mpro 4 motheboard + 4790k cpu) and my mother's asus deskmini 110 ( VERY small form factor pc that requires so dimm ram), and ALL allowed it to be installed flawless with secure boot turned on. So YES. It DOES depend on the individual hardware if nothing else. The end.

tpcs chip on the shoulder much?

I can confirm that it does not in all cases, I had to disable it to run mint on an XPS 13