Tag: Introduction

Here is the video version, if you prefer it:

Hello guys,

in the post series about to follow I will try to explain the fundamentals of Linux to you. What do I mean by “the fundamentals”? I mean explaining:

• how Linux works as an operating system
• commands you will use in your day-to-day

I won’t go into too much detail because when I was learning Linux, I was also focused on the big-picture, “what are the fundamentals” view. I can Google the details if needed. But if I lack the fundamentals, I will have a hard time using Linux in my day-to-day life.

But before we begin, you may ask yourself: “OK, but who are you anyway?”. Fair question. Now it’s time for me to take a trip back down to memory lane and tell you about me and my story with Linux so far.

Who am I?

My name is Mislav Jurić. I am a 23 year old Croatian, currently a Computer science master’s degree student. I worked as a software engineer on autonomous driving. I have started experimenting with web development since I was 14 and I went further into computer science from there. The reason why I am studying computer science is because my huge interest is artificial intelligence (AI). I have written a paper on AI safety, which is currently under review.

As I said, my primary interests include artificial intelligence and computer science. Why the heck am I talking about Linux? Because I use it in my day-to-day and I used it in my software engineering job as my operating system. Which brings us to …

My Linux story so far

I switched from Windows to Linux in 2017. if I recall correctly. Before that, I experimented with some versions of Ubuntu, but I would be using them for a couple of weeks, then switch back to Windows. When I switched to Linux for good, I switched to Debian 9. I used Debian 9 over the graphical user interface (GUI), almost never touching the command line. I understood some basic commands, but I kept delegating my to-do task “Learn Linux” into the future.

This was all fine and good until Debian 10 came out. When I was installing Debian 10, I had trouble configuring my touchpad and I remember looking for and blindly following the solutions to enabling my touchpad I found on Google. But I didn’t understand what I was doing. Someone could tell me to change something very vital to my operating system and I would maybe do it, because I had no idea about how Linux worked and what the commands were changing within the ecosystem of Linux.

When I finally fixed my touchpad (it turned out I just had to enable it by pressing Fn + F7 on my keyboard), I told myself that it was time to get serious with Linux and to read books about it to understand its workings. Another reason was that I was using Linux on my software engineering job.

I have learned about Linux by reading 3 books on Linux; namely (Ward, 2014)⁠, (Shotts, 2019)⁠ and (Barrett, 2016)⁠. I think those books gave me a very good perspective on how Linux works (that is literally the title of (Ward, 2014)⁠) and what commands are essential. A side note: (Shotts, 2019)⁠ is available for free online (check the link in the References section). Also, when I reference (Shotts, 2019)⁠, I use page numbers that you have to type into your PDF reader.

I also worked as a software engineer and I used Linux daily on my job, as well as coming back home to my Debian laptop. So, I have experience using Linux both at home and in a professional environment.

Why this post series is different from other Linux courses/posts/tutorials?

I will list five reasons why this post series is different from other Linux courses/posts/tutorials. Here are they, alongside their explanation:

• Paints the bigger picture – There are a lot of Linux tutorials, but I failed to find one that paints a bigger picture about Linux. By “bigger picture about Linux” I mean what are the various Linux pieces of the Linux operating system and how do they fit together. This is really important to understand so that you know what you are changing when you are changing something some tutorial is telling you to change. For this reason, in this post series I will talk about operating system related topics in a few places because they are the context you need to understand certain parts of Linux.
• Focus on the fundamentals – There are a lot of Linux tutorials that go super deep into a topic. While using Linux in my day-to-day, I found that I don’t actually need the level of depth a usual tutorial or a book chapter provides. That’s why in this post series I will focus on the fundamentals you will use in your day to day – no more, no less.
• Saves time – while reading the aforementioned books on Linux would be great, as I stated in the point above, you won’t be using a lot of the material you read. In this post series, I tried to “trim the fat” – to remove all of the things that are not relevant for your day-to-day use and general Linux understanding, but to still provide you with the entire puzzle piece which comprises Linux. This post series will save you time. You can always read more in-depth if you want or are interested in a particular part of Linux.
• References (citations) – I provide references for almost all of my claims. That means that you can actually take the book (or the website link) in the references and follow it and see where I got my knowledge from. I feel that this is missing from a lot of tutorials and can lead to misinformation. This way, you can rest assured that what you are learning has been taken from a credible source and you know which source it is exactly. If you want to double-check something, refer to the references and see for yourself.
• Computer science theory which deepens your understanding – I know, I know. Probably right now you are thinking: “Theory? No, thank you.”. But theory is important. Since Linux is an operating system, understanding how operating systems work helps a lot! Also, understanding why and how certain other things work is important. In this post series, I will go into the relevant theory when the need arises. Do not skimp on these parts – they will most likely be the parts that will cause the “Aha” or “Oh, I get it now” moments later on.

Who is this post series for?

This post series is for a broad audience – including, but not limited to:

• someone wanting to switch from Windows to Linux for everyday use
• a software developer who lacks solid Linux understanding
• a wanna-be system administrator
• a wanna-be hacker (information security expert)
• someone wanting to learn more about Linux and actually understand what is going on under the hood

I think all of these groups will massively benefit from the posts coming down your way, because you will learn the fundamentals of the Linux operating system. Then you can expand into particular topics on your own, if you wish. The groups that will benefit the most are the Windows-Linux switchers and software developers. If you read the posts in this series, you will know that you are capable of using Linux in your day-to-day efficiently and you will understand what is going on “under the hood”.

Note: As was pointed out to me in a reddit post I made about this tutorial series, the material of this tutorial series doesn’t go in too much depth (at least at the beginning). Therefore, I think this tutorial series will be most useful for someone wanting to switch from Windows to Linux for everyday use. As this tutorial series progresses, the material discussed is more technical in nature, so if you’re a software engineer, a good strategy to watch this tutorial series would be to use checkpoints to determine whether you want to watch a particular part of the tutorial series and/or to skim or skip the parts you already know. As for the system administrators and information security experts, notice that I put the word “wanna-be” in front of it. What I meant by that was that anyone who is just starting their sysadmin or hacker journey is most likely going to benefit from this tutorial series. In short, if you already feel comfortable with the basics of the Linux operating system, this tutorial series will most likely not be of a lot of use to you. However, you can still skip or skim certain parts of it or use it as review material.

How this post series will be structured

This post series will be structured around introducing you to Linux fundamentals. After some meaningful segments of Linux have been covered, there will be so-called Recaps, where we review what we have learned and then there will be the so-called Checkpoints, where we motivate the topic we are going to talk about. I think both Recaps and Checkpoints are really important to make sure you got the main points and to get you motivated for the upcoming material, as well as to point out the most important parts of the upcoming material. Just to note: Recaps are not a substitute for not reading the posts. Read the posts as they are in the sequence and you are in for a joyful Linux-learning journey!

Ending notes

I am by no means a Linux master and in my opinion, my computer science career hasn’t even started (as I am still a computer science master’s degree student at the time of writing this). I still have so much to learn about all things computer-related. However, I am confident that this post series will paint a wholesome picture of Linux. If I ever need to use a particular piece of Linux in more depth (due to my job or curiosity), my working knowledge will expand and I could write another series of posts related to that part of Linux.

I encourage you to give me feedback and engage with me. I would like to know if you like the material, if you like the way the material is presented etc. Just remember – your feedback is more than welcome.

Hope you will enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing this!

Talk soon!

References

Barrett, D. J. (2016). Linux pocket guide (3rd ed.). O’Reilly Media.

Shotts, W. (2019). The Linux Command Line, Fifth Internet Edition. Retrieved from http://linuxcommand.org/tlcl.php

Ward, B. (2014). How Linux Works: What Every Superuser Should Know (2nd ed.). No Starch Press.