Anyone run Linux on an ereader?

[Panchax]

Originally Posted by PeterT

There are so many websites / books on Linux. Just search and look for yourself. Go to a bookstore or library and browse; see what feels good to you.

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Yes, but I am not sure what I want/need to know. A lot of them have info promoting their version of linux, and there are a lot of people offering degrees in linux, but I am looking for a 'get started with linux' book or something that will start from the beginning and take me as far as I decide to go without a course.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Panchax

...I am looking for a 'get started with linux' book or something that will start from the beginning and take me as far as I decide to go without a course.

Try searching YouTube for 'getting started with Linux' or something like that. I've seen plenty of videos like that, but I'm out of town with only a tablet and searching them is a pain.

The amount of distros and their differences can be overwhelming. That's why I recommend just installing Linux and getting your feet wet. I'm guessing you didn't read books about Windows or Android before trying either of them.

I'd recommend starting with Ubuntu because there's just so much support available for it. Once you feel comfortable with Ubuntu, you can try other distros.

[varlog]

To learn linux just start using it.
The easy way would be to install Ubuntu, which is good all purpose operating system.
More difficult, but starting your learn process immediately, would be to install Arch. As a bonus you get a cutting edge Linux. Arch has also a very comprehensive guides on most problems you can get yourself into.
If you seek more general knowledge, you should start with Unix perhaps. Linux is just one of the many Unix flavors.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by varlog

To learn linux just start using it.
The easy way would be to install Ubuntu, which is good all purpose operating system.
More difficult, but starting your learn process immediately, would be to install Arch. As a bonus you get a cutting edge Linux. Arch has also a very comprehensive guides on most problems you can get yourself into.
If you seek more general knowledge, you should start with Unix perhaps. Linux is just one of the many Unix flavors.

I disagree with just about everything you said.
(Except for the idea of installing Linux to get started...it's certainly good to have ready access to the thing you're trying to learn, and getting familiar with how Linux works on a nice simple desktop first would probably make hacking an embedded system like an ereader quite a bit less daunting.)

Just using Linux is a HORRIBLE way to learn it. I'd saying an impossible way, unless by using it you mean "spend all your time studying man pages."
Find a decent book or tutorial site or two, and better yet, find some friends who know it.

I also disagree that there is any value learning on a true UNIX as opposed to Linux, and I'd say that for the OPs purposes, Linux is the far better choice for both general and specific knowledge, since it's what's used on all the systems the OP is seemingly interested in.
Plus, the free and open thing....

And Linux is NOT a "UNIX flavor." It's a different operating system. Just ask Linus' lawyers.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by ApK

Just using Linux is a HORRIBLE way to learn it. I'd saying an impossible way, unless by using it you mean "spend all your time studying man pages."
Find a decent book or tutorial site or two, and better yet, find some friends who know it.

I'd actually argue that "just using Linux" is the ONLY way to learn it. Just like DOS, Windows, or OSX. You learn by jumping in (and seeking help after you run into trouble). There is no preparation for learning a new OS (other than learning how to install it). Power-using can always come later.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'd actually argue that "just using Linux" is the ONLY way to learn it. Just like DOS, Windows, or OSX. You learn by jumping in (and seeking help after you run into trouble). There is no preparation for learning a new OS (other than learning how to install it). Power-using can always come later.

I suspect that philosophy is why Linux never killed Windows.

I also suspect that what you, and possibly varlog, really mean is:

"In order to learn Linux, you need to use it" rather than that using it is itself the way to learn.

I agree that you should not simply pick up 'Linux for Dummies' to read in bed, any more than you should read "Guitar for Dummies" without a guitar, and expect to learn to play, and I agree that you REALLY SHOULD be using Linux while you are learning it.

Using Linux might bring to the forefront the things that you need to learn, in a practical and meaningful way, but it will not teach you.

Linux is a dense and deep mass of arcane config files and command parameters.

"Just using it" is no more the best way to learn* than picking up an air tank and jumping in to the open ocean is the best way to learn to scuba dive.

(I assume by "using it" we are not just talking about navigating a desktop GUI and clicking icons, right?)

*for most people. I guess there are some wacky Sheldon-Cooper-esque savant types among Linux geeks who actually DID learn it best that way.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by ApK

I suspect that philosophy is why Linux never killed Windows.

I also suspect that what you, and possibly varlog, really mean is:

"In order to learn Linux, you need to use it" rather than that using it is itself the way to learn.

I agree that you should not simply pick up 'Linux for Dummies' to read in bed, any more than you should read "Guitar for Dummies" without a guitar, and expect to learn to play.

Using Linux might bring to the forefront the things that you need to learn, in a practical and meaningful way, but it will not teach you.

Linux is a dense and deep mass of arcane config files and command parameters.

"Just using it" is no more the best way to learn than picking up an air tank and jumping in to the open ocean is the best way to learn to scuba dive.

(I assume by "using it" we are not just talking about navigating a desktop GUI and clicking icons, right?)

I thought you just asked your baby brother for help.
Oh that only works if baby brother uses Linux.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by ApK

Linux is a dense and deep mass of arcane config files and command parameters.

Many of which a casual user will never have to know or use. And if they do need them, there's nothing to stop them from picking them up piecemeal as they go.

A big part of the reason people are afraid of Linux is because people have convinced them that there's deep, dark, juju surrounding it that they'll need to grok in order to make "proper" use of it. Well guess what?? There's deep, dark juju at the core of all operating systems. But do you ever hear of anyone teaching a new Windows user how to use msiexec from the command line to install programs? Must an Apple user be well-versed in bash-scripting to make use of OSX? Of course not. Because a user doesn't need to start out as a power-user of any OS.

You just use them. And ask/study when you run into something you don't understand. It's the same with all of them.

[ApK]

A few years back I was at a guitar festival. I was sitting listening at the outer edge of a song circle full of people who played much better than I did. When I say "much better" I don't mean a subjective "which is better, Mac or PC" I mean I was just learning to play, and they were gigging musicians.
One of the players prompted me to play a song when it got around to me.
I demurred, saying I couldn't even play and sing at the same time.
He said "That's OK, when you're singing, just strum the chords, and save the fancy stuff for the breaks."
He clearly did not understand that we were on totally different planets.
Strumming chords WAS my fancy stuff! Strumming while singing was the fanciest stuff I could imagine aspiring to!

I think many people who know Linux may have this same kind of disconnect with people who don't.

By the way, I "know" Windows (and I knew DOS, at least I've forgotten an awful lot of DOS) but I consider myself at a level of Linux knowledge akin to where I was with guitar at that festival. I know JUST enough to understand how hard it is to learn. I wonder if some of you guys have forgotten, and yet I also wonder if I'm assuming too much.

Forgetting GUI desktop stuff for the time being (cuz, c'mon, if we're participating on this forum, we can assume we all can handle that) I sometimes have to "use" Linux at work. I connect to shells, run scripts, copy files, check running processes, edit a prescribed app setting file here and there. That's about it. Is THAT knowing Linux? Is that using it? When am I power user? Are we assuming the OP would be satisfied to hack his reader just by following other people's explicit instructions without understanding, just being a keyboard monkey?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by ApK

Forgetting GUI desktop stuff for the time being (cuz, c'mon, if we're participating on this forum, we can assume we all can handle that) I sometimes have to "use" Linux at work. I connect to shells, run scripts, copy files, check running processes, edit a prescribed app setting file here and there. That's about it. Is THAT knowing Linux? Is that using it? When am I power user? Are we assuming the OP would be satisfied to hack his reader just by following other people's explicit instructions without understanding, just being a keyboard monkey?

Perhaps that's the disconnect, then. I see no reason to "forget the GUI desktop stuff for now." The GUI desktop is what the noob is going to use to learn the stuff they don't know.

"Just using it" may not teach them everything they want to learn, but it's certainly no hindrance to becoming an expert either. It still remains the best way to familiarize oneself with an OS. There's no need to take a course or read a book just to get started; and there's no way to begin becoming proficient without just getting started.

And no ... I haven't forgotten a bit of my long road with Linux: from cluelessness to proficiency. Every bit of what I ever learned about it came from a failure to successfully "wing it" the first time.

[Billi]

Originally Posted by Panchax

Yes, but I am not sure what I want/need to know. A lot of them have info promoting their version of linux, and there are a lot of people offering degrees in linux, but I am looking for a 'get started with linux' book or something that will start from the beginning and take me as far as I decide to go without a course.

Have a look at this site, it's a very good starting point:

https://itsfoss.com/learn-linux-for-free/

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by Billi

Have a look at this site, it's a very good starting point:

https://itsfoss.com/learn-linux-for-free/

I'm bookmarking that as a place to send people wanting to know about linux. You don't even need to find out what they are really asking for since the page takes care of that right at the beginning.

[PeterT]

The one thing to remember is that there will be a large difference between what a Linux install on a PC will look like and let you do, and a Linux install on an e-reader

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[varlog]

Originally Posted by ApK

I disagree with just about everything you said.

This sentiment is mutual .

I also disagree that there is any value learning on a true UNIX as opposed to Linux...

Are you aware of the fact that with generic Unix knowledge one is able to do not so basic things on Linux (Debian, Ubuntu, Arch, Fedora, Slackware, Gentoo, Kali, Red Hat... etc, etc) BSD, Solaris, Irix, Android (rooted, of course)... on Mac even.

Mac? Well...Apple, as Apple does, is cheating a bit on Unix: the top command is useless there for instance.

[JSWolf]

A nook STR is old and slow and good luck running Linux on that obsolete thing.