Beginners Documentation

[jayd512]

Greeting fellow Forum-Goers!

A couple of days ago, I was talking to one of my co-workers about which distro, which DE we prefer... things like that. We got on the discussion of how we first learned of Linux, and all the cool things about it. I got curious about where he went for good reading literature when he first started up on using Linux as an OS. I'll admit that my first book that I picked up (this doesn't count anything on the web) was actually 'Linux for Dummies'. It was informative, well written and easy to follow. Even though I am still fairly early on in the learning process, it helped me move on to bigger and better.

So I was wanting to know, especially after seeing some of the advanced knowledge and skill that some of you possess, where did you go to begin your learning? Any specific tomes of wisdom that you may want to recommend to a guy who wants to keep moving forward?

[elija]

The two main sources I use are Google and LinuxForums

Oh and stuff like

ls --h
man ls

Although the man pages tend to be very dry there are a couple
of good websites that format them a bit nicer for reading

Linky

[daark.child]

When I first started with Linux, I used to buy boxed sets of Red Hat, SUSE and Mandriva. I used the documentation provided in those boxed sets to learn about Linux. I also used to read a lot of articles on the web (still do) as well as man and info pages. One of my first Linux books (which I still have) is Linux Administration a Beginners guide.

[hazel]

I started with an unbootable system, no knowledge of Linux at all, and an O'Reilly book called 'Running Linux'. I got it to boot. Enough said.

[Freston]

I bought 'teach Yourself UNIX in 24 hours' in a second hand store. I still use it to this day, although I have to adjust a little bit because it assumes csh while I use bash.

My favorite command probably is 'apropos', first because I like the way that sounds (in my native language apropos is a very VERY posh loanword; you need to be a millionaire to use it), and second because it's very useful to search through +/- 2500 commands.

And then, there is always the Gentoo wiki

[ryokimball]

I have three Linux books that sit beside my bed (on top of a "teach yourself C++" book that I haven't used much lately...), which I usually read on at night and take notes of things that I want to try, or bookmark places that I need to go back to (because they are too big for my patience to write down). They are relatively old, but here is their names:
Red Hat Linux 9: Unleashed
Using Linux System Administration (Special Edition!)
The Complete Reference: Linux, Third Edition (but this links to the second edition)

They are each second-hand from my father, who most likely got them from the used section at Books-a-Million or something like that. But they're nice to have, either way.

Oh, and

I started with an unbootable system, no knowledge of Linux at all, and an O'Reilly book called 'Running Linux'. I got it to boot. Enough said.

Muchos Kudos!

[jayd512]

Red Hat Linux 9: Unleashed
Using Linux System Administration (Special Edition!)
The Complete Reference: Linux, Third Edition (but this links to the second edition)

While I haven't got them at home, I've thumbed through the first two, and found them quite informative. Right now I'm going through The Complete Linux Bible. And I think Books-A-Million is where I happened to pick it up
And I really appreciate all the info, guys!

Thanks a bunch,

Jay