I currently use Windows 10 and I’d like to try out Linux. My plan is to set up a dual boot with OpenSUSE tumbleweed and KDE Plasma. I’ve read so many different opinions about choosing a distro, compatibility with gaming and Nvidia drivers, and personal issues with the ethos of different companies like Canonical. I value privacy and I’d rather avoid a Linux distro that’s implementing something like ads or telemetry…if that’s even a thing that’s happening?
As a complete beginner, what sort of advice would you all have for me? Should I avoid OpenSUSE or KDE Plasma for some reason? Are there any ‘10 things to do first when installing Linux for the first time’ recommendations?
Despite all the ‘beginner friendly’ guides and tutorials around, I still feel a little lost and like I’m going into this blind.
EDIT: Thanks to everyone who’s offered advice, I really appreciate all the help and the patience with my dumb questions! There’s a lot to look through and it’s been a busy day for me, but I’ll get back to reading through everything and replying as soon as I can!
It’s a bit of an unpopular opinion, but if you pick a mainstream distro there isn’t a lot of difference between them. Especially to somebody who is new to linux.
With most any distro you can use KDE, gnome and other desktop environments. You can pick which one you want to use when you login. So don’t think you’re tying yourself to KDE if you install kubuntu or something.
If you want an easy way to switch to a new distro make sure you create a separate partition for /home. Then if/when you want to install something new you can have it overwrite everything except your home directory. So all your steam configs and games will be left untouched (for example). Alternatively just backup /home somewhere and restore as you need.
Is a home directory similar to the users folder in windows, or like the program files folder? Is it ‘everything but the OS’? I’m still trying to get a grasp on how the OS operates conceptually.
Yeah - the home directory in Linux pre-dates the windows Users directory by a long time. You’ll see the multi-user nature of your OS exposed much more in Linux than you will in Windows.
Every user will have a /home/username directory on Linux (often referenced by “~” or by the environment variable “$HOME”). By default this is the only directory that user will have any permissions to create things (with some exceptions like /tmp which is used for temporary file creation - but nothing long-term). So all of your configuration, user-created files, etc. will be created there.
Configurations are often stored in ‘dot-files’ or in directories that begin with a period. These are “hidden” by default with most file-browsing tools (it’s just a tradition - there’s nothing otherwise special about files or directories that begin with a period). So you’ll have a .bashrc which is the script that runs when you start a bash shell for example. Or .local which is where you will find a lot of application configurations these days.
So if you copy /home/username somewhere you will copy all of your configurations.
Some applications will install there as well. Steam, for example, will install your programs under $HOME/.steam.
Things you install “system-wide” will be installed to /usr/bin or /bin. This will typically be things that you use a package manager to install. So the steam application may be /usr/bin/steam but then all of its configurations, installed apps, etc. go in your home dir.
If you’re curious where a command lives you can use which cmd or type cmd from the command-line and it will show you (something I often wish Windows had).
NOTE: There are exceptions to everything I’ve said above. But those are the “general” guidelines. In short - if you installed it without needing root permissions it’s likely somewhere in $HOME.
Thanks, that’s a lot of really helpful info.
What do you mean by this though?
If you’re curious where a command lives you can use
which cmdortype cmdfrom the command-line and it will show you (something I often wish Windows had).
A command can ‘live’ in different places? And this might be a dumb question…but what is a command in this context?
Essentially, yeah. Most programs will install to your root directory, but all your personal configs and personal files will be in your home directory.
What I’d personally recommend is using Timeshift to automatically keep backups if your home directory on a separate partition, then if you want to switch distros or if you need to reinstall for whatever reason you can use Timeshift to restore your home directory pretty easily, as long as your new install uses the same file system.
