Grokking Linux - A very brief intro to some terms for Linux Newbies

We've been working on some Linux for Beginners videos lately, and have had some questions about the terms.

This video is meant for newbies, and will hopefully give you an idea of what some of the words mean when working with a Linux-based operating system on a desktop or laptop computer.

It will also give you a very basic overview of how your system is organized, and you can learn what to search for when you want to customize your system.

Be sure to check out our other videos at teksyndicate.com

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Closed Caption:

even drop the vernacular
No
we're doing videos just heard me that
out of habit you know i'm using a lot of
words that you may not be familiar with
or you may know things
my name's other than the names that i'm
using so I thought we do a real quick
video on linux terminology or unix
terminology more properly but start
bleeds over into linux so
this is mainly for beginners so let's
let's dive in so on screen computer
boots up if you get home you'll see this
this kind of a screen this is your
display manager in this case is gdm for
the canal display manager using KDE a
different desktop environment that would
be KTM but before you log on the thing
that logs you want is your display
manager so we got this login know my
password wonder that before we get there
let's show you the console ctrl f 1 so
this is the terminal and this or console
sometimes this is called and this shows
you that you know when you're running
linux it's really it's text mode first
and then is going on top of it and so
ctrl f11 trawl if to Carla's 330 lat 40
lat five ER all f6f 13 f6r sort of your
texts terminals if you had control f7
changes your back your graphical term
ctrl f11 your text normal this is real
handy for fixing things i'm going to log
in to our login LS hyphen al there's a
list of stuff this is a command LS you
know I'm a command prompt this works
just the same as it does at the command
prompt inside of you know inside of
Linux you can manage your packages and
list things and do all you know list
whatever it doesn't even matter most of
the time with linux you know on Windows
how you'll download a program and you'll
run the installer or you'll purchase a
program and it will send you an email
and you'll download a program and run
installer linux by and large not like
this there are a few exceptions but and
I think we covered that it's over links
videos but you can do a lot of things
from the command prompt so you can run
the ass to an open season or aptitude
you may have the apt-get install
aptitude to manage packages
check it out it's a text mode thing you
can use to install stuff
amazing but I her back to the terminal
you can do w.e show you who's logged
into the system vs to show you running
processes PS aux to show you all of the
running processes not just your own
processes the eye is an editor actually
them as once installed by default this
is my review could also use Emacs
although you have to install it or if
you don't know what you're doing
you could run a no or pico you don't
have either of those on one open so uses
for a simple editor little it's probably
good idea to learn beyond these are text
mode commands
it's ok if you don't know what these
things are I'm just trying to use some
terminology and context so that you can
pick it up
so where the terminal the w command it
shows you a cool little thing here
saying TTYL the TTYL is short for
terminal basically and so this is
showing you so console pts 0 and so on
colon zero mean different things
colon zero means we get from the ex
session the accession is the control f7
graphical environment currently the X
session I don't really have an accession
because gdm is presenting me with the
login thingy and so I'm going to use it
gdm is just one of many login managers
there's a ton of them beyond just gdm
and KTM and xwm if you're really
esoteric and you know over the years on
linux there been many different versions
of X Windows that gives you this sort of
graphical environment so I mean there's
x86 and explored and x11 originally and
now we're looking at moving to wayland
away from x11 because it's a x11 is a
protocol that goes back to the nineteen
seventies so if all looks like to hang
onto things for a long time
x11 is actually a protocol it turns a
client-server on its head
so if you are running programs from a
remote server you are the server and the
client is the remote machine that
sending your programs i can't talk and
think at the same time that's pretty
much true of any
one alright so i'm logged in i happen to
have a web browser open just go ahead
and close that
yeah okay alright so this is your
desktop environment this particular
desktop environment is gonna known the
gnome KDE as if it is another desktop
environment i'm gonna owe me is a suite
of things to manage your graphical
windows basically it's the widgets it's
the way that the windows are drawn and
placed it's the way that you know sort
of the design philosophy and the
implementation of the user experience of
the graphical part of your machine there
are different window managers that are
available other than this window manager
window managers defined as a program
that manages the arrangement and
placement of windows on your particular
computer so just as there are many
different window managers there are
different window managers that behave
differently to different things so you
like--on os10 you'll have you know three
little widgets up here in the corner for
manipulating the size of the window on
Windows it will be in this corner you'll
have closed minimize and maximize Paul
on linux different window managers have
completely different behaviors their
window managers that will allow you to
have something that's exactly like
windows so their window managers that
give you something exactly like iOS 10
and some of these different distribution
of linux will bundle things with those
those sort of things configured now
known breaks it down and Sokka known
gives you widgets that function sort of
independently of one another so if you
like you know like a Mac os10 has this
little dock thing at the bottom of the
screen os10 will give you that and as a
separate widget as a separate component
and so we can we just google here can
own them themselves called the call
those widgets shell extensions but as
you can see i can google it and it's
gets me to where I need to be
these are things that can be installed
on your kinome desktop environment to
give the Machine more behavior so like
I've got a firefox open and you can see
the Firefox is open here at the top and
so if I open another program
going to open files you switch the files
at the top and I'm going to menu here
but there's no real indication that i'm
running firefox now if I had all tab you
know i can see that i'm running firefox
or if i click on activities is going to
rearrange on windows so that i can see
everything that i have opened but if you
used to know Mac that has the spotlight
thing that showed the spotlight the
visual thing that spotlight the
functionality on Mac that shows you that
you've got a program open at the bottom
in the middle tray thing or on windows
where you got a taskbar and shows you
the absolute and this can be a little
off-putting because it's different than
that and so the gnome shell extension
katie has similar shell extensions if
using the i3 will talk about the other
different window managers in just a
minute and so here's the bottom dock
this is very similar to the OS 10 doc
and so you can go install this component
of this shell extension this widget for
genome and then you'll have a dock at
the bottom of your screen where you can
put applications if that's what you
prefer you linux is all about glut of
choice you have a choice about
everything and honestly that's probably
why linux is not further along than it
is is because there is so much choice
and so many people working on so many
different versions of everything that
when linux is on the desktop linux will
be on the desktop and infinite possible
combinations so that's a shell extension
for chrome that will allow you to
enhance and change the behavior of your
window manager another good old shell
extension that I really like is a
drop-down terminal there's another one
called wake GA ke and so basically with
this you just hit tilled and you get a
terminal and so this is really handy
again because linux is really about the
command line in the GUI runs on top when
things go wrong you got to use the
command line and so being able to
quickly get to the command line really
helps me in my workflow and productivity
I've gotten most of my systems
let's talk about window managers for a
second another popular window manager
right now is called i3 and likewise wise
you know what i don't understand so I've
got this window open why would you know
it seems like it's perfectly functional
why would I three be a thing
well I three automatically arranged
windows and so if you really wanted to
be pedantic about this look how much
space on my desktop is wasted you've got
the cool pretty background but I got all
the space at the top and the sides and
the bottom and I don't know that I
necessarily it's doing me any good we
got two windows open and there one on
top of another and it's like I could
drag the corners and rearrange you know
that's probably what you're used to but
I mean honestly that's a waste of time
the computer could just do this for me
that's what the i3 window managers about
so on the gnome i have keyboard
shortcuts setup just the windows key
window left window right because i just
have the windows are they the logo key
on the Windows key or the the made a key
or whatever you want to call it the key
on your keyboard between ctrl + alt on
the left side if you do window left
window right you can sort of automated
window placement well with our three it
would do this for you automatically we
just place the windows if i open the
third window
the thing that I three does that this
does not do is like if this were my
octave window this list of files and i
were to open a new window would actually
split this window in half vertically
that I have a window up here and window
down here it's pretty neat
that's that's what that window managers
claim to fame is let's take a look at
your package manager now I said that
probably about a million times what does
that actually mean that is the app store
for your distribution and honestly there
are a whole bunch of more experienced
people in the audience that probably
want to murder me for calling it an app
store because an app store is like an
apple term it's just a package manager
managing the packages on your linux
machine one of the reasons why this is
so great is because you don't just
randomly download programs from the
internet I mean it's open source like
sharing free love you know it's the
hippies all the sixties know this is
very bad you do not want to run code on
your machine is just randomly from the
internet you want to get your code from
a reputable source now you know windows
and mac you you know you go to the
search engine and you search for what
you want and you find a program and you
download it and you run it by putting a
lot of trust into that program to not
screw up your computer with linux it's a
little different
most of the time you want your packages
to come from
a repository which is a collection of
programs that of one or more programs
that someone had set up specifically for
your distribution of linux and so right
now i happen to be on opensuse it's a
pretty good distribution the
repositories for opensuse are different
and generally then the repositories for
sale 12 or debian or red hat or centos
or arch or you know whatever and so
that's something that you sort of have
to get in your mind that this is how
this works and why is that well the
people that curate these software
repositories generally make sure that
the software is not gonna screw up your
machine now will you still screw up your
machine
yeah totally could totally could still
screw up your machine and it's going to
happen from time to time and you're
gonna have to fix it as part of the fun
running linux but generally malware and
other bad stuff does not come from these
repositories because it's trusted it's
like it's like social computing it's
like you know his Highness Lord DSLR
hands-down the gps Damon and then we
have the gps statement and our computers
my frolic and go forth and do GPS but
it's not quite directly that way you
know PSR will do gps and then some very
skilled developers will look at that and
make sure that it's appropriate for you
know android or debian or ubuntu or
whatever and then it all the work that's
been done will be packaged up and is
distributed the linux kernel and chrome
google chrome are some of the few
exceptions because you can totally just
download the linux kernel internal that
R&B running you know not from your
distribution if you do that you've got
to take steps to make sure that the
colonel integrates with your
distribution because your distribution
probably has patches for the linux
kernel the makes it run better with your
particular distribution so you don't
have to worry about that part of it when
you go into your software manager on
your computer and you go to software
management on opensuse it's going to
bring up the ass to on ubuntu it's
probably going to bring up synaptic the
synaptic package manager that's the
graph the one you can also run aptitude
from the command line as i mentioned
before I forgot that I was on opensuse
earlier and Iran
aptitude opensuse was like kinda cute
yeah i'll just give you yes because you
asked is the name of the thing that's
the package manager for opensuse and so
what that means is that the people that
opens the developers have taken the
open-source software that's available on
the internet that enough people are
interested in
sometimes you get a new project on
github and it's not there are sometimes
you get a project like chrome because
current kind of spies on you know really
won't be supported for philosophical
reasons and sometimes you have software
like an mp3 decoder and mp3's are may be
protected by software patents and so
sometimes that software is not included
in a repository and so there are some
exceptions for popular software but by
and large somebody's looking at the cool
open-source software making sure it's
not got anything wrong with it and they
sort of packaging it up for distribution
so if you install software through your
package manager generally not gonna have
a bad time and so in that sense it's a
lot like the apple app store where you
install crap from the Apple App Store
theoretically apples looked at it and a
little less like that with you know
google play or you know anybody can
upload anything to google play things
come from google play and here's the
difference is a big difference your
computer it will be perfectly happy
having multiple repositories and so what
does that mean it's like let's say let's
say oh I was a maintainer for a game
called dwarf fortress and the door
fortress was just ridiculous amounts of
fun
well I could create a repository for
drawer fortress and so my program being
really popular i could create versions
of it for ubuntu and debian and open
soon whatever the other distributions
are and I could set it up so that the
people that are interested in my game
could add the repository to their
computers and so I still have the main
repository that has all of the stuff in
it but I've got this other little side
repository that is you know from a small
indie developer and so whenever I check
for new software it will check you know
the big list that you know the that
comes with my distribution of linux but
also check the small list from you know
the smaller guy there's another program
that you'll see in the next video is
called open screen
open screen recorder is a great screen
capture program at least until open
broadcaster gets a little bit more
stable and this simple screen recorder
has deposited has instructions for
adding it it to debian ubuntu opensuse
and so on and so forth and so you can
still install those packages through
your distribution's package manager
rather than just downloading programs in
the internet and running willy-nilly and
as you well know that is how you get a
virus on Windows and OS 10 so with linux
it works a little differently and this
is a better ecosystem honestly and
there's a lot of stuff going on
underneath the hood like this
cryptographic signing and follow it is
it it can still actually install
malicious software oh yeah absolutely
totally came but these things this
process this methodology helps protect
you a little bit so that's nice
no that's a quick-and-dirty introduction
to some of the really common language
that you're going to hear in the video
tutorials
there's a whole bunch more and honestly
there's even more esoteric vocabulary
that you can learn that has to do with
things at the command line and so things
that the command line it's like when
you're searching for text you you know
grab and regular expressions are a
really great way to search for things
just to search for particular pattern in
text and people to use regular
expressions with HTML are terrible
because HTML is not a regular language
so i mentioned rock but there's also
said and all and the things that you can
do from the command line with set a
knock and unix pipes and those kinds of
things there's some really great
tutorials on using bash like a pro now
bashes a command interpreter that is
running for the terminal there are
different command interpreters but
bashes the thing that is interpreting
the commands that i'm typing in here
there's also seashell see sh t SCH I
think Mac uses a seashell by default but
I wouldn't swear to that is probably
wrong somebody's probably already
corrected me but a bash is definitely
the more more popular command
interpreter across-the-board the info
various universes and freebsd
so learning how to do scripting in bash
and things like that once you've got
your water wings is really powerful
because you can automate it if you're
coming from the windows world like
powershell powershell aspires to be this
powerful and mac OS horse has units
running underneath so there's kind of a
command line there although apple
doesn't make it easy to do their stuff
through the command line there like
maybe we were done noble or that's Apple
so it's like I want to edit that
configuration through the command line
well there might be a way that you can
edit a file inside the application
folder or that can just wreck everything
5050 shot that that's pretty much it
it's been a quick overview of you know
some some terminology to get here throw
around I'm sure that I'm gonna watch
this video and say oh my god I can't
believe I didn't talk about X it'll
probably be updates this is to this
video about left out anything that
people really need to know about or if
you were a linux new but something
really tripped you up you put in there
we had a thread in the forum or ask
users like hey I don't remember when I
was a newbie because it's been too long
ago
what trip you guys up on your newbies
and so that's where i got some of the
ideas for something to put in so you
want to shape the content from Jonas on
the forms of Texas intercom