There are a growing number of folks where I work who are getting on
the linux bandwagon. Most of them are coming from a commercial UNIX
background and have questions about how Linux is different, wondering
where to get information, news and software.
Here is my short list of Linux websites for commercial UNIX refugees:
Free Software Foundation -- This
organization, started by Richard
M. Stallman (better know simply as RMS) and where the acronym GNU
(GNU is Not UNUX and is pronounced Guh-News) comes from.
- The GNU General
Public Licence (aka GPL) and
Questions about the GNU GPL are two very important pages you
should read and understand. When people talk about 'free software' in
this context, they are refering to the freedoms the software is
licensed under, not the lack of a pricetag. The GPL is the prime
reason why Microsoft is having a hard time competing with
GNU/Linux/Open Source software.
The Linux Documentation Project has
a number of
excellent HOWTO
documents, longer and
FAQs on quite a
number of topics.
Slashdot (also known as
/.) --News for
. This is a great place to
Nerds, Stuff that Matters
get a feel for what the hot topics of discussion is in the
open source/free software world. You can join their daily
mailing list of news items.
freshmeat.net -- when you
need to look for open source software. This is an package
announcement repository. This is very useful if you sort of
know what you need (say "web log analysis") but don't know
which packages are available. You can join their daily mailing
list of new/updated packages.
sourceforge.net -- This
is a site that provides all the web tools needed to manage an
open source project -- mailing list, CVS code repositories,
bug tracking, download servers, etc. Their search engine is
also very useful for finding particular open source packages.
Not everyone informs
projects.
Linux.com -- A good general
purpose starting point for information.
openprojects.net --
While not really a usefull website, they host the very useful
openprojects IRC chat network. Point a IRC client to
irc.openprojects.net.
Useful/interesting channels are #linuxhelp and
#linpeople
- Major Linux Distributions:
Red Hat -- North America,
worldwide, primary commercial vendor.- SuSE -- Strong European
presence, known for high quality and very complete distribution
.
First distribution to ship six(!) CDs. - debian -- non-commercia
l
distribution; has a strong university and world wide following.
Very
nice package manager. One simple command to find, download and
install software for example apt-get install apache.
To keep
a system updated to the latest versions, simply apt-get upd
ate;
apt-get -u upgrade - Mandrake
-- North America, worldwide, focuses more on the
desktop and ease-of-install. A good alternative to
Red Hat for the novice user.
- linuxiso.org --
"Fresh ISOs like Mom used to Burn". If you are looking to
download linux installation CDs, this is the one place to go.
If you don't have broadband, just buy some cheap cds (under
$5) from one of the many sponsors. Also check out some of the
niche, but interesting, linux distributions like
diskless workstations from an applications server and is
perfect for a K - 12 education environment. - Linux Weekly News -- Nice
roll up of the week's news for the Linux community.
- newsforge.net --
more news from the open source/Linux/BSD/GNU/etc world with a
more journalistic slant. - thelinuxshow.com
-- Listen to the weekly Tuesday night webcasts of various open
source/Linux/BSD/GNU/etc pundits talk about the weeks news.
- Of course the best server hardware to run Linux on can be
found here: HP and
technical white papers on
0-225-1">Linux
solutions.
