[TriLUG] Linux intro book recommendation?

[Jon Carnes]

On Sat, 2003-10-18 at 05:20, al johnson wrote:
>      But just saying that you can give someone Mandrake and think that that's 
> all someone needs to learn the Linux desktop, is sadly a bad mistake.  

Not at all.  If the person in question has rudimentary knowledge of how
to get things done under Windows, then they will be able to function
using Mandrake, and eventually thrive.
>      
> Just today I've been trying to figure out how to backup up a  CD, without 
> accessing the Terminal, e.g. how can you do this without  becoming a 
> super-user. I can burn disks without becoming a superuser, but that doesn't 
> seem to be the case if I just want to copy a CD, because apparently you need 
> to be a super-user to merely access the CD you want to copy in the first 
> place!!  

Oddly enough, I can do this quite easily using my Mandrake. But then my
system is setup with the no security option (Although I do run as an
ordinary user).  That's as close to Windows-Like as I want to get for a
workstation installation.

> 
>     I'm also frustrated with another problem: Is it possible to access the 
> Man files without using the terminal?  
> 

You mean Pinfo?

>    It seems that whenever you click on a program's "Help" command, instead of 
> getting the Man file you get all this stuff about KDE, instead of useful 
> information about the program you need the "help" with.
>     A few of the programs do give you the proper help file, but others just 
> throw everything about KDE and the kitchen sink at you and expect you to sort 
> it all out. There a lots of other surprises as well with a Linux desktop, one 
> of my biggest peeves is that if you're sorting through a large quantity of 
> files that you've created, and you might be editing them one by one, once you 
> leave the list of files to access another program AND THEN COME BACK TO THE 
> LIST THE LAST FILE YOU WERE USING IS NOT INDICATED!!! This forces you to make 
> a written note of the file you edited so you can continue with the next one.

Gedit works fine for this - and shows you a list of the last files you
edited.  Also, Mandrake shows you all your most recently accessed files,
and most times guesses properly which app should be used to open/edit
the files

Jon Carnes