Is there a Fedora newbie list?

[Tony Nelson]

At 6:42 PM +0000 11/13/05, Kevin Lippiatt wrote:

>My current questions involve software RPMs especially those that come on
>the Fedora CDs.

Read the Release Notes.  Read them often; there's lots to absorb.  The
current release notes are the ones called "errata" on the web site.  Also
look at the list archives, as most people's questions have been answered
many times, often that very day.  Searching the list archive does not work
(though they're working on that); until then here's a list mirror to search:

    http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=fedora-list&r=1&w=2

or use Google, but Google isn't totally current:

    <search terms> site:www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-list

If there's too much traffic on this list, look into reading it as news on
gmane:

    <http://gmane.org/>

The initial installation of packages (and /only/ initial installation) can
be done by system-config-packages (Applications menu System Settings
submenu Add/Remove Applications item).

There is a book on the subject of RPM (slightly out of date):

    <http://www.rpm.org/max-rpm/>

On Fedora, one generally uses yum to intstall RPMs from "repositories",
update installed RPMs, and remove installed RPMs.  Yum keeps track of
dependencies between RPMs and can save lots of trouble.  See "man yum" and
"man yum.conf" (note the use of /etc/yum.repos.d).

The man command is very useful.  So are whereis, whatis, and file (man
whereis, man whatis, man file).  The apropos command can help you find a
command-line command that does something you're looking for (man apropos).
(The official apropos, part of the man package, behaves badly if you give
it two words; see my web site for an improved version).  The gnome-open
command can usually figure out what application should open a file you give
it.

Also see <http://www.fedorafaq.org/>.
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