is a version of the UNIX operating system which can be installed on a PC in place of MS Windows or side by side. A Macintosh version is also available but we have not tested it. Computer science students will find Linux to be of a much higher quality than MS Windows95. Linux is stable (reliable), has a good support for networking and graphics, offers unlimited possibilities of tailoring the system to user's needs. There is an abundance of high quality free software which will run under Linux.
Useful web links:
Linux is free and can be downloaded from the Internet. Several companies, including
RedHat and Caldera, sell Linux on CD's adding to the CD their installation programs and
other licensed components. (The version numbers such as Redhat's v.4.3 ... v. 5.0, v.5.1
refer rather to the version of these additional components than the version of Linux
itself.) Installing Linux from a CD is easier and faster than doing that over the network.
Once a version of Linux is installed, it can be upgraded using the downloads from the
Internet.
Although Linux can be installed in 100MB, to use it comfortably and to allow for
additional software I recommend that you reserve 300MB or more of disk space.
While installing Linux, install also the following components.
If you cannot install Linux, you can start by experimenting with the following software.
Once Linux is installed on your computer you can start performing customizations.