Linux Noob Looking to Test Out Linux

[Oses]

Hi all,

I'm looking at giving Linux a try, and was wondering what distro to use. I only really need Word, Outlook, Chrome, Spotify, Authy, and LastPass, other than that I don't really need any other apps. I do game occasionally but not a whole lot. 

[Oses]

P.S. I would like to Dual Boot 

[one-riff]

I would go for ubuntu or a variant of ubuntu depending on you visual likings, Install Chrome using this guide. Word and Outlook are avalible in a online version by using Chrome. Or install Wine by following this guide. After installing Wine you should be able to yust run the Word / Outlook / Office installer exe. Authy may be the only worrying thing because it's a beta, your mileage may vary. Follow this blog post.

 

For dual boot, make sure you have already some unpartitioned space on your hard drive. It's a bit more complicated but doable. Follow the folling guide  Make sure you have a backup!

[YoungBlade]

Luckily, all of those things are doable in-browser. Chrome has native Linux support. The only ones that might give you some trouble are Word and Outlook if you need the desktop versions of those apps specifically. You can use Office Live via the browser, and you have LibreOffice and Thunderbird if you just want a Word-compatible word processor and an email client offline, but installing Microsoft Office can get tricky on Linux, as Wine and MS Office have never played nice together.

[ExperiencersInternational]

38 minutes ago, Oses said:

Hi all,

I'm looking at giving Linux a try, and was wondering what distro to use. I only really need Word, Outlook, Chrome, Spotify, Authy, and LastPass, other than that I don't really need any other apps. I do game occasionally but not a whole lot. 

I'd recommend trying Linux Mint out, it is probably the easiest to learn as the developers have designed it to make it easy to use from people coming from operating systems such as Windows 7.

[Giganthrax]

My personal favorites are Linux Mint Mate and ZorinOS Core. They both look very windows-like out of the box, while Zorin can easily be made to look like MacOS or standard Gnome. I've found both to be quite solid and easy to get into.

 

The easiest way to get a preliminary look at what the different distros look like in action is via this website:

 

https://distrotest.net/index.php

 

Once you've found some distros you like, download VirtualBox and run the ISOs in a virtual machine. Use them in there for a few days before installing anything onto your computer. If you use the full screen mode it'll basically feel like using a real machine.

 

 

 

[Dr_badwolf]

Linux Distro = Ubuntu.
- Reasoning: Large support base of devs and users. Use IRC Freenode Ubuntu Channel (my preference) or Stack Exchange.
Non-3d/Gaming apps = Use Wine.

Here's what i do to set up Ubuntu Linux to run "All the basics" ill do this in steps.

 

1.) boot an ubuntu disk, created with Rufus USB. (easiest USB creator)
2.) install to an Extra disk. (a spare SSD works nice)
- If you boot in UEFI: It will take over the Bootloader and show your windows boot in a list on boot.
3.) Installation is pretty "normal" you will understand each step pretty well.
- just make sure when you select "erase disk and install" you dont accidentally erase your windows drive.
- You can tell it to "install next to windows" it will resize your windows partition.
________post install__________
4.) you booted normal and at the desktop: open the "terminal" (ctrl+alt+t) or use the "windows like: Start Search" with your win-keyboard-key (aka: Meta)
- win key --> Search "terminal"
- it will always prompt for password when you install something (the equiv of windows "admin popup screen dim UAC"
5.) the command "sudo apt-get"
- a.) apt-get is an app in Ubuntu/Debian
- b.) this app installs apps from an "App Store"(ish) 
- c.) sudo means "Do something as Root/admin" thus "Do as admin" + "apt-get"
- d.) thus ["sudo apt-get install ____"] means install a thing.
6.) what to install with apt-get
copy the following into terminal window
sudo apt-get update && install synaptic preload vlc wine playonlinux winetricks 

 

 

That will install synaptic, a more advanced way to search the "store" which youll want later.
wine is the app that will let you run EXE... "normally"
playonlinux is a helper for wine.
VLC just because a media player is something i always install.
preload because it makes everything load faster.
and winetricks is a thing that makes wine do more things (you will need to look up how it works. but its actually quite easy.)

Youll find that anything thats "Not Games" will run flawlessly on linux.
Youll find that "most games" run flawlessly on linux.
Very few things require "hacking*" to run correctly.
When you get curious, you will break linux

-------- AFTER YOUR FRESH INSTALL --------
I recommend backing up the linux partition with PARAGON Disk Manager.
You can save the partition to img.

and just overwrite it.

[cretsiah]

best way to help someone looking into linux is to know their hardware set first.

[Dr_badwolf]

Just now, cretsiah said:

best way to help someone looking into linux is to know their hardware set first.

... huh?

[cretsiah]

@Dr_badwolf ive found if i know what kind of hardware they have, can usually steer them to a linux distro with less hassles.

 

for instance in my case Mangero, POP!_OS and Ubuntu dont work to well on my gear.... but linux mint and debian does

[Dr_badwolf]

2 minutes ago, cretsiah said:

@Dr_badwolf ive found if i know what kind of hardware they have, can usually steer them to a linux distro with less hassles.

 

for instance in my case Mangero, POP!_OS and Ubuntu dont work to well on my gear.... but linux mint and debian does

thats... not relevant here.

[xeoknight]

Contrary to some of the things that others have been saying, I would possibly stay away from Mint if you plan on using the software manager. I haven't had success with it; some apps haven't worked for me from there, and there are several apps I've wanted that have reviews stating that the version on the manager is either incompatible with the current version of Mint or somewhat old.

[dennito]

I like Pop_OS!
It's pretty barebones, but comes with enough to get you up and running. It's snappy and the interface looks nice enough. Plus it allows the installation of downloaded .deb packages, as well as using apt to install the pop shop f.e.. I'm not a fan of the pop shop but it's great for beginners. As for the office applications that you want, well, you could try it with wine, or go with an open source office package like libreoffice. Ubuntu, and its flavours, are great too (did I mention Pop is based on Ubuntu?).

 

Download a few live images, boot into them, and see which ones you find nice to work with. This way you can try it without commiting to installing it.

[sladewatkins]

On 11/11/2021 at 7:09 AM, dennito said:

I like Pop_OS!
It's pretty barebones, but comes with enough to get you up and running. It's snappy and the interface looks nice enough. Plus it allows the installation of downloaded .deb packages, as well as using apt to install the pop shop f.e.. I'm not a fan of the pop shop but it's great for beginners. As for the office applications that you want, well, you could try it with wine, or go with an open source office package like libreoffice. Ubuntu, and its flavours, are great too (did I mention Pop is based on Ubuntu?).

 

Download a few live images, boot into them, and see which ones you find nice to work with. This way you can try it without commiting to installing it.

Same. I run Pop!_OS on my old tower now and have had nothing but great things to say about it coming from Windows 7 on it, and 10 on my laptop. I learned to use a computer on Ubuntu, which Pop is based on. (I also have a Mac mini, which I also use, so I am already pretty well-versed in Unix-like OS environments.)

 

Like @dennito said, boot into the live environments and give some Linux distributions a shot to see which one(s) click!

[Xiee]

1 hour ago, sladewatkins said:

Same. I run Pop!_OS on my old tower now and have had nothing but great things to say about it coming from Windows 7 on it, and 10 on my laptop. I learned to use a computer on Ubuntu, which Pop is based on. (I also have a Mac mini, which I also use, so I am already pretty well-versed in Unix-like OS environments.)

 

Like @dennito said, boot into the live environments and give some Linux distributions a shot to see which one(s) click!

Pop!_OS user here as well. Been using it as my daily driver for 5 months now. I use it both as my work from home setup and my gaming setup. It's been pretty much working out of the box for me with the few instances of me borking the DE (that was my fault since I was messing with config files to theme my Gnome theme). I have mine running with the Xanmod kernel and it's been amazing with games and it even has better FPS on games that I used to play on Windows. I mostly game on Steam but I've used Lutris more since I need it to play Genshin Impact.

[AkIonSight]

Maybe if you are giving linux a try, how about you also try out an alternative office suite like libreoffice