[sf-lug] Newbie asking a dumb question...

[Rick Moen]

Quoting vincent polite (vpolitewebsiteguy at yahoo.com):

> Mind if I keep asking you questions?

Nah, but, at some point, you really have to just stop dipping your toe
and take a dive.  It's ultimately the only real way to find out.

> What distro would you recommend? About how long would
> you estimate this would take? 

I've already posted my standard, generic answer to the "which distro"
question:  It's one of the mini-essays on the "Linux Tire-Kicking" 
portion of my personal rants page:

http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/faq/index.php?page=kicking#distro

It recommends several _desktop_ Linux variants widely believed to be
good for newcomers, plus referring you for more information to Karsten's
Diestribution Guide, DistroWatch's Major Distributions page, and the
Linux Distribution Chooser survey.

Basic installation of any Linux distribution tends to take about 1/2
hour to an hour.  (As I mentioned yesterday, there area also plenty of
"live CD" distributions you can kick around without installing them at
all.)  Further configuring your installed Linux distribution to do
particuar thins rather than remain in a generic state requires anywhere
from minutes to a lifetime, depending on how much you're doing and how
complex it is.  ;->

One defensible answer to your question is "You should use whatever
distribution you can get effective local help with, if necessary."
But personally, I prefer "Just pick one.  If you don't like it, pick
another."

-- 
Cheers,                   I have yet to see any problem, however complicated, 
Rick Moen                 which, when you looked at it in the right way, did 
rick at linuxmafia.com       not become still more complicated. -- Poul Anderson