General Beginner's Questions

[Sacred117]

Can anyone direct me to a good beginner's guide to Debian? Or explain some things briefly. Where can I learn how to use the Terminal Command Line? How do you add programs to Debian and what all is supported? What are packages in Debian and what can they do? Installing programs is different as expected. I tried installing Firefox, I downloaded it and extracted it into my home directory. I can run it with the Terminal Command: ~/firefox/firefox [When in the home directory] and it works. Is that how it is intended to work? Just random thing there. I guess in a sense, I just really want to learn about every aspect of Debian Linux in a user-friendly type environment. I just hope I can get some help, I really want to learn all I can.

Thanks, all help is greatly appreciated,
~Sacred117

[Bro.Tiag]

Can anyone direct me to a good beginner's guide to Debian? Or explain some things briefly. Where can I learn how to use the Terminal Command Line? How do you add programs to Debian and what all is supported? What are packages in Debian and what can they do? Installing programs is different as expected. I tried installing Firefox, I downloaded it and extracted it into my home directory. I can run it with the Terminal Command: ~/firefox/firefox [When in the home directory] and it works. Is that how it is intended to work? Just random thing there. I guess in a sense, I just really want to learn about every aspect of Debian Linux in a user-friendly type environment. I just hope I can get some help, I really want to learn all I can.

Thanks, all help is greatly appreciated,
~Sacred117

What we expect you have already Done.
A Beginners guide to Debian
Tips from our Members
Ever wonder why your post isn't getting answered?

[llivv]

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[nadir]

The links given are very good. That said:

1)What packages are installed and what do they do?
Synaptic is a graphical front-end for the debian-package-management. I would start with that. Searching for software is easy and you get a bit of info. If you find a package search the www or this board for further info (or just install it)

2) Is that how it is intend to work?
No. The Debian packages are offered in the Debian repositories. They are getting installed by the debian-package-management.
There are several tools to install software from the repos, the most important ones are synaptic, aptitude and apt-get and dpkg.
(Nontheless lots of people install firefox, so you didn't do it wrong. In that case)

3) Learning the command-line?
Start with learning how to move around.

Code: Select all

user$ pwd  #prints which directory you are at the moment
/home/user_fritz
user_fritz$ ls     #lists what is to be found in the actual directory
music documents pictures this_that
user_fritz$ cd music #change directory to music
user_fritz$ ls #lists content
Bach Beethoven Napalm_Death
user_fritz$ cd #cd changes to your /home/user directory
user_fritz$ pwd
/home/user_fritz
user_fritz$ ls / #you don't need to be in the directory you want to list
etc var home usr .... 
user_fritz$ cd ..  # cd .. is one directory above the actual one
user_fritz$ pwd
/home/
user_fritz$ su #with su you become root
passwd: #enter your password, you don't get visual feedback for the passwd
root# 
# as you see the prompt for root is indicated by a #, the prompt for the user by a $, and a # also is in front of a comment. you only have to type the command before the comment

And so on...just move around a bit. The rest is, like llivv said, simply a question of time. But i think that is a good starting point.

In the beginners guide linked to by Bro.Tiag are further commands. You may also try the newer version of the beginners guide (you need to follow the link for that).
All i said is as far i know and just a starting point. More experienced users will find lots of errors in my post. Take it that way.