Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Here is another one for the wolves to chew on. Right now I'm in the process of downloading Mandrake Linux 8.2. I work at a computer shop where 99% of all the machines that come through are Windows based, and I have several regular customers who use Linux based operating systems and I've decided to try to learn as much as I can (even if it is very little) about the *nix environment. I've been a user here for quite some time but prefer to read and learn instead of ask, but like all good things it must come to an end. So here are a few questions:

1. Since I am so used to the Windows environment how hard will the interface be to learn?
2. Has anyone tried the new release of Mandrake 8.2? If so am I in for trouble?
3. Which boot loader would you recommend for a dual boot system (Win XP/Mandrake)?
4. Will I be able to access the partitions from Mandrake that have Windows loaded on them?
5. (This is gonna be the killer) Will Windows based programs work in the Linux environment?

Any help the fine folks here at Antionline can provide will be awesome. I've already killed Google for every text document I can dig up so that's out of the way. Also, if anyone has any links that could prove to be useful (especially to a newbie to Linux) please include them. Thanks.

1. ermm yeah.. takes some time to get used to it.. considering linux is very different from windows..
2.nope havent tried the new mandrake.. i only used RedHat
3. Lilo would be my choice..
4. i dont think so..
5. depends.. there are some programs or apps that u can use on both windows and linux.. but if ur talking about MS softwares or apps.. not likely..

you are getting some greenies from me! you sound like you are actually getting into Linux to learn something, not to "HACK" or be 31337. but i have to say...

1. no, the envirnment is really easy, but you will most likely pick it up pretty quickly, plus the the GUI looks alot better than winblows.

2.I use 8.1 and it is perfect for the fellow newbies. it is very eeasy to install and is actualy a good flavor of Linux in my opinion.

3. i like System Commander.

4. yes you can. you can actually install linux by copying the information to the windows partition and just booting into linux and using the info from the windows partition. i dont know if it will work if you have seperate hard drives.

5. it does depend. some do , some dont

Quote:

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Originally posted here by Eversor

1. Since I am so used to the Windows environment how hard will the interface be to learn?
2. Has anyone tried the new release of Mandrake 8.2? If so am I in for trouble?
3. Which boot loader would you recommend for a dual boot system (Win XP/Mandrake)?
4. Will I be able to access the partitions from Mandrake that have Windows loaded on them?
5. (This is gonna be the killer) Will Windows based programs work in the Linux environment?

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1. Not hard at all with KDE. KDE 2.2 ships with Mandrake 8.2, just upgrade it to KDE 3.0.
http://www.kde.org/
2. Yes. It is a very robust system for noobs to *nix and old hands alike. You can set it up easy to run in modes 1-5.
3. LILO hands down. Run XP Pro and Mandrake 8.2. Just use Partition Magic. Set your NTFS partition and leave an unformated partition. Install XP first then Mandrake will do the rest from the boot disk or CD ISO image.
4. Yes. Back and forth with some difficulty. http://www.linuxworld.com/linuxworld...01-legacy.html
5. Some will with Wine. http://www.winehq.com/

Hope this helps......

PS. Here is a two page reference card with common commands for the shell. Also you don't have to boot into /root to do forbiddden file operations. You can use the shell or file manager in super user mode.

Quote:

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Originally posted here by s0nIc
1. ermm yeah.. takes some time to get used to it.. considering linux is very different from windows..
2.nope havent tried the new mandrake.. i only used RedHat
3. Lilo would be my choice..
4. i dont think so..
5. depends.. there are some programs or apps that u can use on both windows and linux.. but if ur talking about MS softwares or apps.. not likely..

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Further to point 4, it is possible.
If your running your Windows XP on FAT32, there will be no problem.

If your running it on NTFS, you may be able to access the partitions, but there are conditions.
I'm not familiar with Mandrake, so I don't know if it has any built in NTFS support, so you'd have to look into that. If it doesn't, then you would have to add support for the file system yourself. I have been told that NTFS support is in the latest kernel, but as I said, I'm not familiar with Mandrake, so I don't know if they are using the latest kernel.

Either way, last I checked, the support for NTFS was best left at Read Only, as while it is possible to write to the drives, Write Access is still in development and could completely murder the partition.

Awww Damnit... That's what sucks about posting when your at work... someone calls you and you have to talk to them, and by the time you finish and click Submit Reply, people have already replied.. but you can't see that coz your still on the old version of the page.... damnit....

Quote:

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Originally posted here by Matty_Cross
Either way, last I checked, the support for NTFS was best left at Read Only, as while it is possible to write to the drives, Write Access is still in development and could completely murder the partition.

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You are correct in this fact. At this point they have a NTFS Linux driver out. It only offers "read only" access at this time.

Look here:
http://linux-ntfs.sourceforge.net/
http://www.informatik.hu-berlin.de/~loewis/ntfs/

Thanks so far for the input. Special thanks to{P²P}Apocalypse for the file, I have a feeling it will come in handy. Another question being:

All my mp3's are on a secondary drive (slave), will *nix read a cd with mp3's I have burned in Windows and let me pull them onto that partition? I'll be damned if I can't learn while I'm not listening to music (hehe).

Quote:

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Originally posted here by Eversor
Thanks so far for the input. Special thanks to{P²P}Apocalypse for the file, I have a feeling it will come in handy. Another question being:

All my mp3's are on a secondary drive (slave), will *nix read a cd with mp3's I have burned in Windows and let me pull them onto that partition? I'll be damned if I can't learn while I'm not listening to music (hehe).

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Yes. It will read mp3's burned to CD in Windows. Mandrake has an auto supermount feature that allows you to have instant access to drives aka ala windows explorer style. Through your file manager. I manualy mount and dismount my cd drives in Linux. But for people new to Linux, Mandrakes auto supermount is great.