Okay, I'll weigh in. I'm finishing up my master's degree in electrical engineering. My lab is solely Linux and Solaris machines, but used Linux exclusively for a couple of years during my undergrad, too. Everybody used to wonder why my reports looked so much better than everybody else and I was sharing PDF files rather than .DOCs. We all know, of course, that LaTeX and pdfLaTeX are the answers to those questions.
I was a latecomer to the "computer owner" scene, even though they always used to make me drool when I was growing up. I got my first machine in '97, but I was a regular computer user since '94. My friend introduced me to Linux during my undergrad and I eventually converted. My first install was RH 5.2. Man, that was an ugly distribution! Not a single pretty tool in the whole mess. No wonder I made such fast friends with the command line. I eventually converted to Mandrake, since it was easier to maintain (they had that rudimentary up2date-like system a couple of years before RH). I then met another friend who basically called me a little girl for running Mandrake, and he introduced me to the beauty of 'apt'. Nedless to say, it didn't take long before I was installing potato on my own system. So I use Linux (but not Debian) at work, and then I obviously can't get enough because I come home and continue hacking on my Debian box (much to the consternation of my wife). I remember being a helplessly clueless newbie. But if you're diligent about reading docs and using google, you'll soon find yourself to be a capable sysadmin. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Stephen W. Juranich [EMAIL PROTECTED] Electrical Engineering http://students.washington.edu/sjuranic University of Washington http://ssli.ee.washington.edu/ssli -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
