How to get experience at Linux--to break the bottleneck of my career? [Help]

Forums › IT Pro and developers › How to get experience at Linux--to break the bottleneck of my career? [Help]

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Pikiora

3 posts

Wannabe Geek

#579459 9-Feb-2012 20:59

Don't forget to look at your local LUG (Linux Users Group) they may have some interesting projects you could help with, I have found them to be very skilled and incredibly supportive. There is also NZLUG listserv which is pretty active with a great group of people doing some really interesting things.

johnr

19282 posts

Uber Geek
Inactive user

#579483 9-Feb-2012 22:12

Pikiora: Don't forget to look at your local LUG (Linux Users Group) they may have some interesting projects you could help with, I have found them to be very skilled and incredibly supportive. There is also NZLUG listserv which is pretty active with a great group of people doing some really interesting things.

Never heard of this but sounds very interesting,

Glad you mentioned it :)

johnr

19282 posts

Uber Geek
Inactive user

#579484 9-Feb-2012 22:14

Google search LUG and I find this --> Lesbian until graduation

Glad I was on my home computer :-/

jbard

1377 posts

Uber Geek

#579486 9-Feb-2012 22:16

johnr: Google search LUG and I find this --> Lesbian until graduation

Glad I was on my home computer :-/

Just did the same thing ;)

johnr

19282 posts

Uber Geek
Inactive user

#579494 9-Feb-2012 22:26

jbard:
johnr: Google search LUG and I find this --> Lesbian until graduation

Glad I was on my home computer :-/

Just did the same thing ;)?

Might be worth a read

yorick

36 posts

Geek

#579631 10-Feb-2012 10:54

There is a reasonably active informal group in Christchurch that communicate via maillist.

http://lists.canterbury.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/linux-users

If you need to get face to face, head to the Uni, find the dingiest back room with the highest ozone content, with the server farm humming in the background and the pile of empty pizza boxes at the door with a sign that reads: "All your Servers are Belong to Us - You have been assimilated, but fear not resistance starts here!" :D

Or more reasonably, Dave Lane who is the president of the NZ Open Source Society is in Christchurch. His company is Egressive (http://egressive.com/) He is an Evolved American (he evolved into a NZer) but we don't hold that against him. If anyone knows about getting what you're after, he will.

For broader techie reading get "LPI Linux Certification in a nutshell" from O'Reilly. LPI certification is the best way if you like self study, then you only have to pay for the Assessment and it will give you a kick start into the Vendor specific certs.

I was talking to RedHat's man in NZ a couple months back and he said he would hire 20 RHCEs (Red Hat Certified Engineer) right now if he could find them. Now that Novell has moved out, RedHat is the only major Linux company in NZ, so RH certification is the probably the way to go

Cheers
Yo

northyb

9 posts

Wannabe Geek

#580187 11-Feb-2012 15:22

Thanks for all the info..
Certificate would be helpful in the career. But I need to figure out which part I should start from first.
So, basic Linux and practice is my current plan(seting up basic system on my old PCs and practise daily operations ).
Will reach for further destination after the first one.

Have a good weekend to all of you

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kyhwana2

2566 posts

Uber Geek

#580188 11-Feb-2012 15:27

muppet: Oh yes I forgot to mention - Make sure you pick a distribution you like and whenever there's a Linux thread, add a post that says "Don't forget about X Distribution"

Ubuntu server is good! ;)

Seriously though, get yourself a VPS (I'd say linode, though there are plenty of cheaper/crappier ones) that gives you full root access/remote console etc. Throw up a domain, learn how DNS works, host your own DNS/email/web server/etc.

Do it all via the CLI and use lots of google/IRC support channels and so on.

michaelmurfy

meow
13243 posts

Uber Geek

Moderator

ID Verified

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#580190 11-Feb-2012 15:40

kyhwana2:
muppet: Oh yes I forgot to mention - Make sure you pick a distribution you like and whenever there's a Linux thread, add a post that says "Don't forget about X Distribution"

Ubuntu server is good! ;)

Seriously though, get yourself a VPS (I'd say linode, though there are plenty of cheaper/crappier ones) that gives you full root access/remote console etc. Throw up a domain, learn how DNS works, host your own DNS/email/web server/etc.

Do it all via the CLI and use lots of google/IRC support channels and so on.

In fact, a Linode is a GREAT way to go.

Go for the $20US plan, keep it for a month or so and host your own site off it. With Linode you can do anything you want with them - plus you get full Root / SSH access.

Sign up using [This Link] - you will be helping me out ;)

Michael Murphy | https://murfy.nz
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ObidiahSlope

260 posts

Ultimate Geek

#580198 11-Feb-2012 16:26

A quick method of getting started in Linux is to boot your computer off a live CD or USB drive.

The live Cd does not affect the operating system that is installed on the computer or unless specifically instructed by you any of the contents of the hard drive.

To get up and running you will have to burn a live CD Linux version to a CD or transfer to a USB drive, and have a computer with a BIOS that will allow you to choose the boot medium.

I would recommend Saybayon as a distribution to get started and if you wanted to practice from the command line RescueCD. Most other Linux distributions have live versions as well

I endorse the others recommendations to learn the vi or vim text editors. They have steep learning curve but make you very productive when familiar with their methods.

You indicated that you leaned towards server applications. In Linux the command line is most often used to configure server applications. I therefore recommend that you become familiar with the Linux command line or shell.

Obsequious hypocrite

yorick

36 posts

Geek

#580335 12-Feb-2012 00:05

northyb: Thanks for all the info..
Certificate would be helpful in the career. But I need to figure out which part I should start from first.
So, basic Linux and practice is my current plan(seting up basic system on my old PCs and practise daily operations ).
Will reach for further destination after the first one.

On the money, it is good however to start how you mean to go on. If you intend to broaden your career path then it is best to stick to those distros that have the best recognised training systems. As others have said, CLI will be necessary. The LPI book covers all of that, you'll be doing bash scripts and so on in no time. The commands are the same across all distros with some minor native exceptions, there is even a reasonable commonality with UNIX and BSD.

GUIs are different and if you want to wean off GUI slowly then a distro with a good GUI Admin system is a good start. OpenSUSE or SUSE Linux Enterprise have the most complete GUI Admin. You don't have to go near a CLI if you don't want to, everything can be done from YAST (Yet Another Setup Tool). Mandriva / Mageia's MCC (...Control Centre)comes a close second.
SLES (SUSE Linux Enterprise Server) and SLED (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop) are the Enterprise versions and are the versions that SUSE Certifications are based on. In the education space for instance the most widespread distros in use are SLES and RedHat Enterprise, with Debian and Ubuntu making significant inroads. RHE isn't free but CentOS is and is pretty much identical to RedHat Enterprise Server and so you can use that to get to Red Hat certification stage. OpenSuSE/SLES is the easiest install with Ubuntu a close second along with Mageia/Mandriva. The CentOS/Fedora family can be a bit of a pain to install because it sometimes does stuff that is nonintuitive and annoying when it comes to partitioning.

SUSE is also good in that it is desktop agnostic, Ubuntu and Redhat are pretty much Gnome centric, SuSE doesn't give a toss as it's installation media comes with the all the major Desktops; Gnome, KDE, LXDE, XFCE and even Windowmaker..

All have good support forums, all have good communities. The best thing about them all, and one you thing never get with windows is choice. Doesn't matter a lot which one you choose, they're all pretty darn good and you'll have a blast.

Cheers
Yo

northyb

9 posts

Wannabe Geek

#582981 17-Feb-2012 21:16

yorick:
northyb: Thanks for all the info..
Certificate would be helpful in the career. But I need to figure out which part I should start from first.
So, basic Linux and practice is my current plan(seting up basic system on my old PCs and practise daily operations ).
Will reach for further destination after the first one.

On the money, it is good however to start how you mean to go on. If you intend to broaden your career path then it is best to stick to those distros that have the best recognised training systems. As others have said, CLI will be necessary. The LPI book covers all of that, you'll be doing bash scripts and so on in no time. The commands are the same across all distros with some minor native exceptions, there is even a reasonable commonality with UNIX and BSD.

GUIs are different and if you want to wean off GUI slowly then a distro with a good GUI Admin system is a good start. OpenSUSE or SUSE Linux Enterprise have the most complete GUI Admin. You don't have to go near a CLI if you don't want to, everything can be done from YAST (Yet Another Setup Tool). Mandriva / Mageia's MCC (...Control Centre)comes a close second.
SLES (SUSE Linux Enterprise Server) and SLED (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop) are the Enterprise versions and are the versions that SUSE Certifications are based on. In the education space for instance the most widespread distros in use are SLES and RedHat Enterprise, with Debian and Ubuntu making significant inroads. RHE isn't free but CentOS is and is pretty much identical to RedHat Enterprise Server and so you can use that to get to Red Hat certification stage. OpenSuSE/SLES is the easiest install with Ubuntu a close second along with Mageia/Mandriva. The CentOS/Fedora family can be a bit of a pain to install because it sometimes does stuff that is nonintuitive and annoying when it comes to partitioning.

SUSE is also good in that it is desktop agnostic, Ubuntu and Redhat are pretty much Gnome centric, SuSE doesn't give a toss as it's installation media comes with the all the major Desktops; Gnome, KDE, LXDE, XFCE and even Windowmaker..

All have good support forums, all have good communities. The best thing about them all, and one you thing never get with windows is choice. Doesn't matter a lot which one you choose, they're all pretty darn good and you'll have a blast.

Cheers
Yo

Yorick, thanks for so much detailed introduction. Together with other suggestion, It's really helpful to a beginner like me.
Seems I have lots of options and I'm so excited to the thought that installing a local linux server with most of the functions and I'm the administrator..

Many thanks to all geekzoners for your keen and helpful suggestion.

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