Six Things You Don't Know About LinuxSix Things You Don't Know About Linux

6) You've given me lots of facts, but not much advice. How do I get started?

One pain-free way to go (OK, it'll set you back $19, plus shipping) is by reading Test Driving Linux. The book, by David Brickner, includes a CD that allows you to boot Linux on a Windows computer without destroying the Windows install. On the downside, the book's Linux is, like the title says, a "test drive" that runs only off the CD; it won't permanently install the OS to your hard drive. (A further caveat is the CD is a bit fussy; it won't run if you can't get your PC to boot first from the CD drive. It didn't like my old Compaq desktop, for reasons unexplained, but it ran like a champ on an HP Pavilion laptop.)

If you're ready to give Linux a more permanent whirl, go back to Question 1, above, or to this list of distros.

Alas, picking a distribution is easy compared to getting hold of the actual install. Parsing even the simplest Web page offering a free download of Linux is a major pain. The most effective way to download is to grab an ISO image, which is a file that you can burn directly onto a CD-ROM; most disk-authoring programs have an option to handle this. Scroll down almost to the bottom of this page and you can get an ISO image of an OpenSUSE boot CD.

You can download an evaluation copy of Novell Linux Desktop 9 here.

If you want to avoid the download dance entirely, you can always spring for hard media, though disks are surprisingly difficult to find. A Debian distro is on CD for $12.95, here. The easiest route is to stop in at LinuxWorld Expo, where a spin through the show floor will net you dozens of free CD-ROMs.

When you're ready to do your install, the most important piece of advice I can provide -- and one that you're unlikely to read upfront in most tutorials -- is DON'T install Linux on the same hard drive on which your copy of Windows XP resides. Why? Because Windows is notoriously fussy about living alongside another OS. It might decide not to work. Plus, you risk erasing Windows entirely if your Linux CD engages in a session of drive formatting gone wild.

Better to dig up a second hard drive, and unplug the drive containing Windows for the duration of your Linux experiment (and, conversely, unplug the Linux drive when you're ready to return to Windows). Of course, if you're firing up Linux on an old machine that comes to you without an OS, this warning doesn't apply.

The other suggestion for prospective new users is to connect with others who are in the process of dipping their toes in the Linux waters. That's not as easy as it sounds. For some reason, Linux experts often can't seem to help themselves from adopting a schoolmarmish tone.

Of course, if you knew which darn distro to use, you wouldn't be trolling a newbie forum, would you?

This is an updated version of a story that appeared on TechWeb.com in June, 2006.