I have Mint 17 as my main o/s (installed on sda) and Zorin as a test-bed (installed on sdb).
While updating Zorin, I was offered an Ubuntu upgrade to v14.04 LTS, which I accepted. The download seemed to go smoothly but on restart the login screen is wrong (half of the usual bits are missing and the password box is very faint) and when I enter my password, it won’t boot into desktop. I just get the default wallpaper, then after a couple of minutes, a pop-up appears saying ‘system program problem detected’ and do I want to report it? I can get a Terminal screen via Ctrl/Alt/T but don’t know the commands to run to get the system up.
(Zorin is only a test-bed and Mint boots as usual so I’m not desperate!! But, I’d prefer not to have to reinstall all over again if possible!)
Hi Graeme - It was v6 and there was no mention of upgrading Zorin, just Ubuntu to 14.04. Maybe Zorin is now v7? What command do I need to access the system info on my sdb drive? (I’m booted into Mint on sda at present)
Right! As I said, I’ve just been using Zorin to mess about with as a way of learning Linux without damaging my main o/s, Mint. I thought that an upgrade would have done the job ok, but seems not. I’ll have to download the latest version and burn to disc - my computer doesn’t ‘do’ usb installs, unfortunately! :
Distribution upgrades are notorious for breaking systems, you’d probably find yourself spending more time and effort trying to fix it than you would starting over and reinstalling
My set up isn’t exactly ‘normal’ dual-booting, each o/s is on a separate drive. Point noted about Arch - I’ve also been reading up on Slackware for the same reasons - any thoughts on that?
Not tried that Mark but taking on board Graeme’s comments, a reinstall would probably save time and effort! Actually, (see reply to CF above) I’m thinking of having a go at a different distro to actually ‘learn’ Linux properly. Any pointers to which or what would be good?
I need to find a winter project for when the golf season ends…if it looks like I’ve got any spare time, 'er indoors will soon be finding me DIY to do…she don’t half like a list, does my missus!! :
Slack has a GUI installer, it’s a bit more hand-holdy through the install, but post-install it’s a nightmare as it doesn’t resolve dependencies (i.e. it’ll let you install python-gobject without installing python…no idea why I picked that example!).
Gentoo is a lot like Arch, except the initial part of the install is a lot more fiddly, and as it’s source-based, takes an age to install your desktop environment (hours).
LFS is just S&M for nerds. It’ll make you rip your own toenails off.
That said, I’m not sure what “learn Linux properly” means (?) :o
There’s nothing stopping you learning Linux on Ubuntu (or any other distro) … the others mentioned above just force you to learn certain things.
If you mean “learn the CLI”, just try setting up and administering your own Ubuntu server without a GUI.
(at least there’s plenty of available help, and anything learned is all directly transferable to desktop Ubuntu and derivatives)
Yes, that’s probably more like what I mean! I’d like to become more comfortable with Terminal and the commands necessary to administer the chosen system.
Is there a particular tutorial out there that I might be pointed to?
To me, “learning Linux” is about learning what goes on under the GUI, which sub-systems do what and what they talk to, learn a bit about the kernel by configuring your own, that kinda stuff. You can do it under Ubuntu, but with everything pre-installed, it’s less obvious which bits are necessary and stuff like that. Example - when I ran Arch, I had an Xfce GUI. When I ran lsmod, I had about 8 things listed. When I did this in Xubuntu (before I went for Arch, I lost my Linux virginity to Xubuntu), there were so many things listed I had to scroll. I had little idea what the difference in end result was, because both systems were fully functional as far as I could see. But with Xubuntu, where it was pre-installed them all, I had no idea what the majority were, and why they were needed. This is where Ubuntu is the “operating system”, as opposed to just “Linux” (hard to explain that, hopefully you get what I mean)
I’m not saying you shouldn’t hack Ubuntu, go for it! I think it’ll be simpler to build Arch in a VM, as the tutorial is really good, and you’ve got no choice to complete it to get a working system. It’s too easy to give up hacking Ubuntu
I’m not convinced by the “if you wanna use Linux install Ubuntu/Mint, but if you wanna UNDERSTAND Linux install Arch/Gentoo” argument.
I consider myself to have a “fair” understanding of Linux, and ALL of it was learned trying to help others here, 99.99999% of that has been on Ubuntu (and derivatives).
If people want to get to my level (good or bad as that may be) there is ZERO need to mess with Arch or Gentoo … all depends on what you want, and how the individual learns best.
I can’t for the life of me see how Arch/Gentoo would further my knowledge about Linux in general … besides possibly some compiling practice, and teaching me some Arch/Gentoo specific habits ?
In fact they’d have been more likely to put me off Linux in the same way RedHat did back in 95 (first attempt at Linux) … I got serious about Linux with Ubuntu (10.04) and it hasn’t done me any harm (that I know of)
(for “got serious about” read “started with”)
Ubuntu is not an impediment to understanding Linux, it just doesn’t “force” it on you … I’d say it’s made Linux as accessible as YOU want it to be.
Is there a particular tutorial out there that I might be pointed to?
I’m never comfortable with these kind of questions … as I said I learned Linux through helping out here, someone would ask a question and I’d research it picking u bits of info along the way … so it was something I “liked” doing, which is always the best way to learn … you kinda have to figure out what’s best for you, following a “course” or “book” wouldn’t have worked for me and I’d have lost interest pretty quickly.
If books and courses work for you, there are plenty out there … but you’d first need to define what you want to learn or what your goals are, which is partly why it didn’t suite me.
Sure, I’m not saying it can’t be done, everyone has their own Linux journey - to some, making the transition from Windows to Linux is big enough for a lifetime! You’re right about “Arch-specific” habits, somethings don’t translate and that’s a pain. Especially when trying to use their AUR build scripts or Slackbuild scripts under Ubuntu (for that stuff that’s not in a repo or PPA), finding they don’t work because the distros are organised differently. Anyway, getting off the point here - I agree with you that you can learn about the “under the hood” stuff from Ubuntu just as well (after all, it’s still a Linux distro) as any other distro. But it does depend on what you want to learn about…i.e if you want to learn about networking, then read about that online and in the various man pages, if you want to learn about the kernel then compile your own from Ubuntu sources for the easiest ride, if you want to learn bash then it doesn’t matter what distro you like, just get stuck in! Good tutorials here:
There are also the multitude of “standard” Unix utilities like grep, sed, tee, and lots of other good stuff. I don’t have a great source on those, but there’s a whole bunch here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Unix_commands
Guys - thanks for all the advice/suggestions etc! Food for thought and I’ll certainly take time to digest all of it before decision time!
I’ve done some preparation with my pc (for the future) but have hit a snag which needs sorting first… :
Mark, would you prefer me to start another thread, or is it ok to continue with this one? It is related to the original subject but this thread has wandered somewhat!
If it’s related to the Zorin boot problem post it here … if not (or you think it would work as a stand-alone topic that may help someone else in the future), bung it in a new topic
Hi Mark - all sorted now! My motherboard has issues when trying to find the operating system so I followed the instructions you gave me when I installed Zorin 6 and then reinstalled Z9. Setting /boot and / partitions first, works a treat and all seems well at the moment.
Zorin is only there on standby, so to speak. If anything goes belly up with Mint I’ve got another way in to my files.
In regard to ‘learning Linux’ - I’ll do a deal of reading up in the meantime and see how I get on. I might not get as far as actually compiling but I would like to have a better understanding of how it works (especially Terminal) - I am a DIY’er after all! ;D
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