noob needs advice

[kbunt]

I'm new at Linux although I've had exposure to Debian and mostly debian-based distros. But, that's as far as it goes because when I'm on my own system, I'm totally lost.

To be honest, I was thinking of giving up but it's not because I am a fan of Windows or have any allegiance to Windows. I'm not very good at computers I guess or I'm not confident in fiddling in Linux. I have come across too many situations in which something is not working and cannot understand the error messages (although, one might not have to) and then I'm lost at what to do. I have to inquire on forums or ask my Linux expert. But, I don't like having to do this all the time and if no one wishes to help or there aren't enough replies to the post, I'm on my own. This would be fine if I was sufficiently skilled or adept at Linux but I'm not. I don't mind spending time on it but your typical task might take you two hours. I'd probably take days or more. I easily get frustrated although I've been told I'm sometimes good at figuring things out. But, that's with an expert helping and I only can 'get' fragments or parts of a problem (in solving).

Thus, I am wondering if Kubuntu is worth trying out. I have had many problems with Debian and I even think it is probably among the best distros, certainly in the top 3. It is not a complaint of that distro and I suspect Kubuntu is a very good one, too. I thought about Kubuntu because it is based on Ubuntu but I didn't like Gnome and although I don't like the way Ubuntu-based systems have changed the debian system (e.g. using sudo), I think it is probably easier than Debian since most Linux users recommend Ubuntu for noobs.

I am frustrated though and I am considering throwing in the towel unless I can be convinced to give it another try. Sorry if this sounds like whining. But, objectively speaking, is there anyone who has used both Debian and Kubuntu who can say whether Kubuntu is significantly easier at all?

Problems I have had is when an application doesn't work because of missing plugins and when I cannot figure out what dependencies are needed. The command line is another issue as I'm not too familiar with that but I think that is a situation I can work on by simply learning commands and when one is needed and what it does. Mounting/unmounting also confuses me as well as many other Unix/Linux-oriented tasks that I don't do every day. Is there any hope?

I thought about PCLinuxOS and other distros that are supposedly easier and noob-friendly out-of-the-box distros but they go on their own tangent and involve further complications based on unfamiliar systems. I'm not sure it would be that much better. I also thought that if I could improve and learn that eventually I could revisit Debian. Maybe, I cannot 'get it.' :-/

[musta ruhtinas]

Re: noob needs advice

I also am relatively new to Linux. I've been using Kubuntu for some 8 months now, having previously used, for short periods of time, Slackware and Vector Linux. Out of these three, Kubuntu seems to me the easiest to use and the most comfortable distro. Practically speaking, you have a GUI for almost anything and the software selection is massive.
It is worth a shot. Take the Live CD for a spin and see how it fares out-of-the-box. If you have more "exotic" hardware, like a winmodem, you may want to check its compatibility with linux. That goes for printers as well.
Installing proprietary video card drivers is no longer difficult with automated scripts such as envy. Mp3 support is installed with one click, and win32 codecs and dvd support are available by enabling some extra repositories. GUI package managers, such as Adept Manager (installed by default) or Synaptic (in repos) take care of the dependencies so that to install a program all you have to do is to select it from a list.
There are plenty of guides and howtos available, like psychocats , or UbuntuGuide , for instance.
And you can always find help in here or at the Ubuntu forums

[fleamailman]

Re: noob needs advice

kubuntu is everything windows isn't, but you must have a good forum, willingness to learn and accept that it is not perfect, I understand since I help out in a computer repair shop that however much I learn about windows I will never really know it and that it will always remain hidden between microsoft's programers, the hackers and the malware makers, the computer will become unsupported by microsoft and I will have nothing but to throw it away, if I think of what I have paid since the time of windows98 until now, how many computers I have had to moved up on, those programs like officeworks, and the yearly protection, etc., etc., anyway I started kubuntu last year, I still have not got the WIFI to work on this compaq presario 1200 laptop(yes ex windows98, 6gb 256ram) but I am not giving up, because there is nowhere else to go if you think about it, returning to windows only returns you here later

[DeathKitten]

Re: noob needs advice

I've been using Linux as the only OS (on my computer) for three years now. When I started, I had a friend who had agreed to be my primary tech support to help me learn. Once he got me installed with Mandrake, he promptly signed me up for their newbie list, and the next Christmas, he sent me the Linux in a Nutshell book from the O'Reilly people.

At first I was very confused, often having to ask for help. It was frustrating at first as it felt like I was never learning anything, but this turned out to be a problem with the person I was mostly getting my help from. He would never explain anything he was helping me do, he'd just spit out command after command for me to type or copy and paste into a console window. When I started getting more help from the mailing list, who was always courteous and happy to explain what they were telling me to do, and I started asking other friends who also were happy to explain what they were telling me to do, I started learning things.

When the friend who helped me start out stopped talking to me, and Mandrake was in the process of turning into Mandriva, a couple of my friends (two people who were both always willing to explain to me what they were helping me do, but hardly ever agreed on anything) recommended ubuntu to me. Having gotten used to KDE from my time with Mandrake, I decided to actually give Kubuntu a go instead. Once I figured out the sudo thing (having never used it before kubuntu), I was quickly able to resolve a permissions issue that arose from differences between mandrake and kubuntu since I didn't reformat my secondary drive (which I mount as /home). I've found kubuntu to be much easier to work with than Mandrake, and before *buntu came along and started creating waves, Mandrake was considered a good newbie distro.

I suppose the long and short of it is sometimes it takes a little time to get the hang of things, and it requires finding good people who will happily explain why they're telling you to use x command, or why y happened, instead of just giving you a string of things to do to. I would certainly rates kubuntu as a newbie friendly distro, but I haven't used debian before, so I can't directly compare it to that.

Whatever you decide to do, good luck. If you keep at it, the effort made to learn will be worth it when you start to realize things are sticking.

[dibl]

Re: noob needs advice

I'm not very good at computers I guess or I'm not confident in fiddling in Linux.

Trust me, you not even BEGUN to feel incompetent ...

"Windows is user-friendly, but Linux is expert-friendly." I wish that were my original statement, but it came from one of the 2 books I bought when I decided I HAD to get free of Microsoft's controlling ways.

Bottom line -- to manage your Linux computer effectively, you will simply have to learn more about its operation -- "point and click" solutions are fewer and farther between than in the Windows environment. Especially in the interfaces with whatever hardware you throw it onto, you can expect some things not to work right, at first, and if you can't stand the challenges of researching the internet for solutions, and maybe reading up on some technical details, you might save yourself some misery and just skip it.

On the other hand, if you'll dedicate yourself to the task of mastering your own personal Linux installation, you will be rewarded with a level of independence that Microsoft will never permit you to have.

[kbunt]

Re: noob needs advice

Thanks for all the replies! That's great! Well, could someone comment on how programs work after you install Feisty Fawn or Gutsy Gibbon? I like the later versions of any Linux distro as I like to keep up to date but I like something relatively stable because with more problems, it's more likely I won't know how to fix something.

From my experiences, 'howtos' are a crapshoot of whether it will help or not. I've had instances in which I thought I followed everything but it still didn't work. Also, I've had help from people who knew what they were doing and they pointed out mistakes in the howto. So much for a tutorial in those cases. If I didn't have the assistance of someone well versed in Linux, I would be at a standstill. That is so frustrating. Also, much of my experiences with a distro has been various programs NOT working 'out of the box' as you say. This is especially applicable to programs like Kaffeine. Xine would not load so many plugins and the error message would only leave me more confused. I like to understand why something is working or not working. But, many error messages are foreign to me. 'Might as well be in another language. I have had problems trying to install printers (using CUPS) to getting Kaffeine to work properly. I have had probs with k3b and in particular, Samba. One of the main processes or jobs that I absolutely need to work is networking and reading/writing to Windows (i.e. a Windows machine). I discovered NTFS-3g is fully supported or allegedly so but I had no clue to even access Samba. I think I can get help on this or at least, some help, but I can't bring my computer over every time there is confusion. I might as well as get a laptop in that case but then Linux is a hassle for wireless....

I applaud the advice and positive support so don't get me wrong, I might have complaints but I don't claim that Linux is not usable. I wish there would be more support or work towards fine-tuning programs rather than adding to the endless number of distros but that's just a newbie's opinion. I hope I can have a positive experience with Kubuntu but I must be honest and say that I am not confident that I'll find a distro that will won't cause the same problems.

[dibl]

Re: noob needs advice

Can you get your hands on a spare hard disk drive of any kind, that you could cable into your system, just to do experiments with? That's what I did, to relieve the anxiety concerning how well (or badly) Kubuntu would work with my hardware. If you can take that approach, then you'll have the real motherboard and video to deal with, but you won't care how many times you have to install it to get it configured correctly.

[Zimm the Elder]

Re: noob needs advice

I started with Ubuntu/Kubuntu at the beginning of the year and am running it on an old desktop machine that wasn't good for much with Windows software. Dapper was first, and then I migrated to Feisty. It basically runs pretty well out of the box, but it does take some tinkering with. This forum, and the Ubuntu one, have been invaluable and it usually doesn't take too much digging. I have successfully networked wirelessly to my Windows box and can print on a printer attached to it. The "How tos" were MOSTLY typing exercises, This isn't the plug and play software that you can produce with billions of dollars and 28 years in the business, but it's pretty good.

The advice of installing it on a separate drive so you can wean yourself is a good recommendation, unless like me you have a 5 year old computer lying around that isn't useful.

Good luck...it'll bruise ya, but it won't kill ya!

[kbunt]

Re: noob needs advice

Yeah, that sounds like a decent plan. I think hardware compatibility isn't a problem although I was planning on upgrading the video card. It's mostly operation of the software program and lack of general knowledge (of Linux). Although, I suggest one shouldn't need to be an expert to get a designated program to do simple tasks (e.g. play a DVD video). However, I suppose the various (free) open source program(ing) underneath or behind the scenes might need to be tweaked but this is not implied on any (Linux) page. If you go to distrowatch, none of the Linux pages mentions you might not get Kaffeine to work after it's installed.

[dibl]

Re: noob needs advice

You will have more choices of music players than you can wave a Windows CD at.



Seriously, there are 22,000 packages in the repositories, and that's before you add Medibuntu and get Google Earth. I don't think you're likely to run short of software applications, unless you're hoping to produce a professional video. That's where we seem to be just a little bit behind the Windows crowd.... :P

[beowulf]

Re: noob needs advice


You're telling my story again, keep going and I assure you that you wont regret at all.

Refer to http://www.ubuntuguide.org, there are many task to begin with.

welcome!

[kbunt]

Re: noob needs advice

Well, my story is that almost nothing works. Apps don't operate as they should for whatever reason and I can't figure out why. There's just too many issues so to research one is fine but when it's multiple problems, it is just too time-consuming.

I cannot get any video player to work and I also have other issues which have come up. This is with Debian but I have also had problems running Ubuntu previously. Thus, I am afraid my experience won't be any different with Kubuntu.

I also tried to install vlc with the following messages given:
could not mark all packages for installation or upgrade....
the following packages have unresolvable dependencies. Make sure that all required repositories are added and enabled in the preferences.
vlc:
Depends: vlc-nox but it is not going to be installed.
[closed]

This has happened before with other applications.

But, the video player problems totally confuse me. Aren't these supposed to work after being installed? Is it the upgrade of the kernel that screws these programs up or what? I did upgrade from Etch to Testing. Do they work with Feisty Fawn or Gutsy Gibbon? When they don't work, what do you do? The error states that various plugins are missing. This is what turns me off. I cannot figure out what you do next and when I come across these obstacles, I am at a loss of what it means and what to do. Even if I research, I cannot understand why these plugins are not installed or where to find them. I couldn't find them in synaptic. I just feel I will run into these problems no matter what version or distro.

Screen goes black and position bar moves with time frames and then gives error message:
Messages: 'couldn't find demux for... audio_decoder: no plugin available to handle 'MPEG layer 2/3'...video_decoder: no plugin available to handle DivX 5....XviD...

[kbunt]

Re: noob needs advice

Okay, I installed Kubuntu Feisty (desktop version) but I had lots of help. Anyway, I find there to be some bugs. There is one in particular that is troubling. It was 'hdc' bug or hdparm/hald-addon-stor (don't recall totally). Perhaps, I can find a log so that I can describe exactly? Perhaps, my helper can remember and I can be more specific.

The problem hasn't resurfaced yet, though. Other than that, there are a few other kinks but I'll describe later.

[jbaerbock]

Re: noob needs advice

I tried Linux a few times but got back on board with Kubuntu Dapper Drake. But I couldn't play DvDs either because of no codecs. However if you want most everything to work OOTB give Linux Mint a try. It comes with all DvD playback components as well as many other usefull features. People continue to say Linux is less point and click than Windows but personally I have had to use the cmd in WinXP more than the terminal in Linux.

[fleamailman]

Re: noob needs advice

no need to install another distro, no need for command lines either, just go to add/remove programs while connected to the Internet, open, give password, click the two boxes on the top right(their names escape me, something like propriety and one other), scroll down the Internet option, choose codexes for java, scroll down the media section and choose vlc player for viewing media, and one other(xxms I think) for mp3

sorry I am in the internet cafe so I can't be more exact,