Kitz Forum
Computer Software => Linux => Topic started by: snadge on February 16, 2019, 06:57:53 PM
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I ask because both me and my dad are going to make the jump to Linux, he is totally new to it and is going off WebUser advice to install Bodhi... I have used Linux a few times before but still quite new to it.
I will be setting mine up with dual-boot W10x64, Ive been told I can run any windows application under WINE is this correct..? this has been my main reason for never making the switch before, I have loads of applications that dont have a linux counterpart.
thanks in advance.
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How well wine can run any particular Windows program can vary substantially. Some programs might work fine, others very badly or not at all. If you are expecting every Windows program to work perfectly under wine then you are only going to be disappointed.
I don't really know about different distros because I've just been using the same one for years and I don't bother to try whatever new distro someone says is now the "best" one.
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How well wine can run any particular Windows program can vary substantially. Some programs might work fine, others very badly or not at all. If you are expecting every Windows program to work perfectly under wine then you are only going to be disappointed.
I don't really know about different distros because I've just been using the same one for years and I don't bother to try whatever new distro someone says is now the "best" one.
theres that many distros its hard to choose, still I would rather have it that way.
It will just be a few programs as most of them now DO have a linux counterpart (after checking), gunna get one of the new Samsung EVO PLUS range of SSD's and set it up, these SSD's perform better than the 970 Pro range....allegedly....
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It's hard to argue against Ubuntu for a first timer, I suppose? It's the one I've noticed most consistently configures everything for first login.
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I made the move to linux some years ago and converted my wife to it from windows and she did not really notice any significant difference.
As to distro any of the stable releases would be fine like openSUSE Leap and others, Ubuntu is popular but not my favourite ( personal preference). One thing I would suggest is using the KDE desktop as that is similar to windows in layout and operation, which means Kubuntu rather than Ubuntu which uses the Gnome desktop. Again KDE is my personal preference.
Stuart
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thanks for the suggestions and information guys...more welcome.
I have tried MINT under Oracle VM just so I can test distro's.. I went to install TOR (in order to help my dad with it, too slow for me) and the installer package would not run, then upon searching i come across a whole page of instructions just to install TOR, i thought it was a bit much, now I remember why i stayed on windows lol... anyway, must learn so heads down...
Option two: Tor on Ubuntu or Debian
Admin access: To install Tor you need root privileges. Below all commands that need to be run as root user like apt and dpkg are prepended with '#', while commands to be run as user with '$' resembling the standard prompt in a terminal. To open a root terminal you have several options: sudo su, or sudo -i, or su -i. Note that sudo asks for your user password, while su expects the root password of your system.
apt-transport-tor: To use source lines with https:// in /etc/apt/sources.list the apt-transport-https package is required. Install it with
# apt install apt-transport-https
to enable all package managers using the libapt-pkg library to access metadata and packages available in sources accessible over https (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure).
sources.list: You'll need to set up our package repository before you can fetch Tor. First, you need to figure out the name of your distribution. A quick command to run is lsb_release -c or cat /etc/debian_version. If in doubt about your Debian version, check the Debian website. For Ubuntu, ask Wikipedia.
I run and want
You need to add the following entries to /etc/apt/sources.list or a new file in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/:
deb https://deb.torproject.org/torproject.org stretch main
deb-src https://deb.torproject.org/torproject.org stretch main
Then add the gpg key used to sign the packages by running the following commands at your command prompt:
# curl https://deb.torproject.org/torproject.org/A3C4F0F979CAA22CDBA8F512EE8CBC9E886DDD89.asc | gpg --import
# gpg --export A3C4F0F979CAA22CDBA8F512EE8CBC9E886DDD89 | apt-key add -
We provide a Debian package to help you keep our signing key current. It is recommended you use it. Install it with the following commands:
# apt update
# apt install tor deb.torproject.org-keyring
Now Tor is installed and running. Move on to step two of the "Tor on Linux/Unix" instructions.
The DNS name deb.torproject.org is actually a set of independent servers in a DNS round robin configuration. If you for some reason cannot access it you might try to use the name of one of its part instead. Try deb-master.torproject.org, mirror.netcologne.de or tor.mirror.youam.de
.
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Well you have some good tutorials from 'Roseway' Eric above.
I used them years ago and installed PCLinuxOS
https://www.pclinuxos.com/get-pclinuxos/kde/
and still my best 'Distro' .
Join there forum for help, download and then 'Burn' a LiveCD, with that you can put in your computer DVD player and it will run a live session for you and your Dad to have a play about with and try lots of functions/programs.
If you like you can install it on your hard drive (if you want to keep Windows you make it 'Dual' boot).
I personally would not touch 'Ubuntu' or Mint or any of the other Ubuntu derived distro's.
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@ tickmike - whats wrong with Ubuntu or Mint...?
also, are their linux distros that allow you to download app installers to run like exe files in windows? it appears that some do and some dont?
thanks
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To be honest, you'll probably get as many different distros suggested as the number of replies on this thread. I would recommend searching for "best Linux distro" or similar then reading some guides comparing them. That way you can make a decision based on the features that are important to you, rather than the necessarily brief replies you'll get on a forum.
For what it's worth, I use Linux Mint as my only OS and recommend this to friends since this means I can provide local support if needed. If you know any Linux users local to you I'd recommend asking their advice for this reason.
With regard to installing software, essentially all Linux distributions come with a package manager which will, upon you searching for and making a selection of a piece of software you want, automatically download the software, install it and any other programs (so called dependencies) needed for the one you want to work. It will then easily allow keeping that program and its dependencies up to date.
It is nearly always possible (either natively or after adjusting the odd setting) to download a package file and then install it by double clicking, just like in windows. For a Debian based distribution (e.g. Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Debian) this would be with .deb files, for a Red Hat based distribution (e.g. openSUSE, fedora, RHEL) this would be .rpm files. However, it is recommended in the strongest possible terms that you do not do this. There are security concerns associated with installing software from untrusted sources (just like on windows), and by installing the wrong versions of programs you can end up with stuff not working due to also having the wrong dependency versions (so called dependency hell). The only reason to install packages outside the package manager is if the package you want isn't in your distributions repositories (i.e. doesn't show up in the package manager) / some other trusted repository which can be added. That page of instructions you found for Tor describes how to add an additional repository for Tor to a Debian-based installation.
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ahh right Im using MINT and like its GUI so may aswell stick with it, so a bit like an APP store, Linux uses Repositories where the software has been vetted...is that right? im familiar with repo's through KODI... so have some understanding how they work...thanks
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Yes, you could very much compare a package manager to an app store. In fact Linux Mint has the "Software Manager", which is very app store like in interface, in addition to a more traditional (and powerful) package manager called synaptic package manager and also the apt command line tools. For simple tasks they all achieve the same, so you should use whichever you feel most comfortable with.
Yes the contents of the repositories are (to an extent) vetted by the community, but are also "maintained" such that it is known that they will simply work once installed. It's a very good system. When it comes to programming (e.g. in C++) the package management system comes into its own when managing libraries etc, making tasks that are a complete nightmare on windows utterly trivial!
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thanks for your input I really appreciate it, its great knowing why everything is beneficial over windows.
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Kubuntu would also be my choice for a new user, I also prefer the interface to Vanilla Ubuntu and the great thing about Ubuntu is the user-base is so big and you can google any issue and almost always come up with an answer (or 5!)
Wine works reasonably well, I have also run Steam etc and played a few games with some success although if you are a serious gamer probably better to dual boot - I have found Ubuntu and W10 live alongside each other pretty well while you migrate.
Chunks
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ive been trying a few through a VM and I quite like Ubuntu Studio as it comes with tons of media production software (which is what Im into, MIDI and Photo editing).
whats the best coding to learn for networking/pen testing etc... I have a book on C# and JAVAscript, i know PHP is probably essential, whats recommended?
thanks
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An interesting project I recently came across is puppy linux
http://puppylinux.com/index.html
A live linux iso that allows you to install packages etc. save your work etc. so next time you boot its saved what you done. This in my view allows an easier way into the OS as you dont need to install it first to use it.
I think the only thing thats keeping windows as the big player on PC is its directX exclusivity. If someone ever figures out to get that working cleanly on linux or vulkan manages to take over I can see a massive shift.
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> what’s the best coding to learn
If you want to learn some really serious programming take a look at the D programming language. I had sixteen years of professional systems programming experience in various ASM and C. Now I’m retired D is my dream tool as I feel C++ is a real dogs’ breakfast, it’s just turned into a total mess and although a lot of sane professionals stick to C instead, we can do much much better, with D. D is general-purpose, a ‘system programming’ language, the fastest language there is and it’s extraordinarily powerful with three compilers two of which produce stunning quality code. You can write any kind of code in D without finding that you are running up against the limits of the language. D can be mixed with C freely too which is s huge benefit.
If you want to learn programming from the ground up, with no prior experience, there is a free D book written by Ali Çehreli - at http://ddili.org/ders/d.en/ Although it’s intended for complete beginners, new to programming in general, I found it to be quite accessible even as a professional who is converting from C.
If you are new to programming then you need to be aware that there are several different types of programming languages. There are domain-specific languages vs general-purpose programming languages. Domain-specific ones are only any good for writing certain types of restricted programs, for example php is only any use for writing programs that run inside web servers, as far as I know. And javascript is sometimes restricted to programs that live inside a webpage. (although I did once write a Microsoft jscript program which could be run separately on it own and whose execution could be started from the windows command line.) So watch out for one-trick ponies.
Secondly there are dog-slow languages and fast languages. Python programs tend to take a fortnight to run and unless performance doesn’t matter you simply stay well away. Some programs are ‘interpreted’ and some programs are generate by a ‘compiler’ and then run. Google these terms. If you want to learn professional programming and how to produce ultra-high-speed small efficient programs then you need a compiled programming language such as D, C or C++.
Thirdly there is systems programming and application programming. The latter is what it says on the tin, writing apps. Systems programming is everything else. Writing software libraries, modules - code that is for other programmers to use, and which will form a part of some larger unknown systems. Systems programming might involve writing (part of) an operating system, or a device driver - that software that is devoted to handling hardware - or very technical stuff which involves getting the best out of your processor in terms of exploiting speed or new features. It could involve writing communications protocols, code to talk to another system. Or it could involve writing code that will live inside some kind of device other than your own usual computer, say code that lives inside a printer or inside a modem. Only a few programming languages are suitable for systems’ programming. D, C, C++ and Ada are examples. Languages such as Python, PHP, Perl, Javascript and so on could not be used to write an operating system, or power a modem or a printer. Also they could not realistically be used as tools to allow you to write a spreadsheet because even if you could do it at all it would take about 17 years to do anything at all.
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There, above, you have a very welcome guide written by a professional.
What do I use? C. And if I can't do what I would like to do in C, then I will resort to native assembler. :D
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C is by far the best language, whenever I use a program written in C its fast, low memory footprint and snappy, then use coded in something like .net it feels like it needs a 16 core 10ghz cpu to be responsive. But I believe C is a pain to code in, dev's seem to all hate it, and prefer using frameworks like .net.
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Ah, my own code writing career spanned a mere 30 years though 10 years further on, I’m still addicted to code writing. :)
For those who wish to take absolute best advantage of hardware, assembler is imo unbeatable, with its direct correspondence to hardware. Trouble with assembler is, it is different for each processor family, with a big learning curve for each new architecture. In my own career I have written code of which I am rather proud, for certainly proprietary mainframes, for Motorola 68000, and for Microchip PIC. But I have never been able to justify the time to learn how to efficiently code Intel assemblers, so I’d not be a good person for an Intel assembler project.
Along came ‘C’, one goal of which was to provide a good chance of machine-independent correspondence to most processors’ assembly languages. It has for many years been the favourite for devs with whom I worked, simply because you can generally get a good idea, from looking at what you have written, how much code it will occupy, and with what memory footprint. In my own career, OS internals and protocol stacks, performance and efficiency was all-important, and with custom designed hardware performance was set in concrete, so nobody liked to get further from the hardware than ‘C’.
Object-oriented variations such as C++ and its variants, allow an amazing amount of functionality to be obtained from a single line of code, and are well suited to abstract problems. Trouble is, it can be very hard to envisage what machine code that line of code will generate, hence very difficult to know whether it is efficient enough. But if your goal is to must write something that works, in a short time, and you have the option to simply specify a faster CPU if your code runs too slow, OO languages can be very useful.
And then of course, there are the proliferation of other platform-independent interpreted languages, like Basic, Java, Python etc. All have their uses, but generally hugely inefficient, if your mission is to make every CPU cycle count.
In summary, I’d say that good (emphasise good) programming in ‘C’ should be a mandatory skill for anybody serious about programming as a career, even if not used on a daily basis. If you can write good ‘C’ you can probably learn any assembler. A bit like studying the Highway Code is mandatory for getting a driving licence, or when learning to cycle. :)
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Even though I have been a career full-time 100% asm programmer for four years, and I love it, and am still addicted, I have to say that asm is so incredibly unproductive and error-prone. Languages such as D and C++ and C (to a lesser extent) can be so powerfully intelligent in terms of code generation, both by the compiler itself and by compile-time function evaluation in D now and generics’ tricks in C++ with ugly template black magic, that they can generate efficient adaptive code that is so very hard for a human to create. You can basically view D/C++/C compilers as very sophisticated assemblers now and that’s the right way to think about it, especially as GDC, GCC and LDC / Clang can mix assembler macros right into the guts of the code inline and apply optimisation to it and generate optimised automatic interface code needed to wrap round the assembler fragments and get input and output parameters in and out safely. I basically now write machine code using an assembler called GDC (GCC D compiler).
So asm source as we knew it has in my view had its day because far better tools came along and we only gained lots of efficiency and intelligence, without having to sacrifice which we had to do thirty-plus years ago.
In my view asm is still around, but it’s just now right to let it contain a lot of curly brackets. And it has far fewer bugs.
Said with regret, in a way. Nostalgia, sweet memory, but that’s how things go.
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Thanks for that insight, Weaver/bcat/sevenlayermuddle :)
I know there's going to come a day when I have to teach myself systems coding. Quite looking forward to it, weirdly!