Linux System For Newbies

Could you tell please about the following -

1) How can you download files on a Linux - I know that Windows and Macs you can download on the desktop and you click and all is self-explanatory

2) Can you show the above via instructions for downloading Firefox

3) What are the Linux files types - rpm, taz? etc

4) What is the concept of root and / / / / etc hierarchy

5) Can you explain this through Suse Linux system

6) Why are there not any Linux systems in the shops (England)


Thanks

6) Why are there not any Linux systems in the shops (England)
[/b]

well linux is opensource and there its free so there is no need for shops you just download it for free

The first thing I would do seeing you are new to the forum.
Would be to check the forum out. Topics like...... Tips, Tricks & Tweaks
It might have some answers for you. If not then do a forum search most of your questions have been talked about.

If you still don't have all your questions answered post away and we will try to help.

Welcome to the forum

Hi

1) How can you download files on a Linux - I know that Windows and Macs you can download on the desktop and you click and all is self-explanatory
[/b]

It depends on the browser you use. Since main linux distros come with firefox preinstalled, you can download them as you do in windows (check edit -> preferences to see where are they being downloaded and if you want it to ask you each time.

2) Can you show the above via instructions for downloading Firefox
[/b]

If you are able to download any file as said above, you can download firefox (the newer version) from the www.getfirefox.com page. If you download an RPM, you can install it through yast (Install/Uninstall software) or with a command

sudo rpm -Uvh your_package_name_here.rpm

If you get in a .tar.gz file, you can extract it with

tar -xzvf my_compressed_file.tar.gz

That will create a folder from which you can run firefox (command line './firefox' without quotes). If it runs, you can later make a shortcut in a similar way to windows.

3) What are the Linux files types - rpm, taz? etc
[/b]

Linux can handle several file types, and it doesn't decide the file type by the extension, but by their header. Anyway, there are standard ways to name a file, so you see *.rpm (Redhat Package Manager, installer format for RedHat, Mandriva and SuSE, among others) *.tar (tarballs, lots of files into one, but not compressed) *.tar.gz (the same but compressed) and all of the extensions you are used to in windows. Linux decides if a file is executable by its permissions, not by any suffix, so forget about *.exe files.

4) What is the concept of root and / / / / etc hierarchy
[/b]

Well, lets try briefing a bit. Linux manages a directory tree, with an unique root '/'. Any other dir you can find on linux, is a child of the root dir or a child of any of its children... This dirs can also be 'mountpoints'. This means the points where linux can "paste" your partitions so it sees them as child of '/'. The root dir has some common known children, like /boot, where it stores files for booting your system (or for the bootloader), /etc which mainly stores config files, /home which has a subdir for every user's documents, /bin for executables available for every user, /sbin for executables of the super user (root), /usr to store common users files or libs, etc. This is only an overview.

5) Can you explain this through Suse Linux system
[/b]

The above is the same for SuSE and for any other distro. There may be some difference about some single file which is stored in different locations depending on the distro, but it is not very common.

6) Why are there not any Linux systems in the shops (England)
[/b]

I don't know. Here in Spain is not easy to find them. Maybe because there is much less demand for linux than for windows. I'm quite dissapointed of it too. If you want to get a linux system, you can download for free much of them from the web. Just googling a bit will give you the clue.

Cheers and welcome.

"6) Why are there not any Linux systems in the shops (England)"

Most people download them for free: http://distrowatch.com/ look at the list on the right.