LNAG

Our Rewards and Testimonials

The Linux Newbie Administrator Guide (LNAG) has been on-line since February, 1999.  Our web pages were visited by (estimated) 0.7 million readers,  and linked to by more than 5000 www sites (most perishable though).  We write the "guide" for a joy of it, while we are learning Linux, which is reflected in the contents of the guide. Visit our page often, so we see the hits :))

We are proud that our Guide was:

o Awarded "Link van de dag" ("Link of the Day") by Dutch NL.linux.org in March 1999:   "Alles wat je als newbie zou moeten weten."   http://www.nl.linux.org/index/link_van_de_dag.html

o Mentioned twice by "Linux Today", the best source of Linux News: Apr 14th 1999:  http://linuxtoday.com/stories/4985.html,  and Oct 25, 1999:   http://linuxtoday.com/stories/11525.html.

o Mentioned twice by the prestigous Linux Weekly News:  http://lwn.net/1999/0422/announce.phtml and http://lwn.net/2000/0803/a/lnag.php3

o Mentioned by LinuxWord Czech digest, May, 1999: http://online.idg.cz:8080/cw_news.nsf/4f682153745289cdc12566b80055b9df/999e7c8725ec0848c1256767004ed0dc

"Pøíruèka administrátora pro zaèínající u¾ivatele.  Pro zaèínající u¾ivatele Linuxu pøibyl velice zajímavý dokument. Jedná se o pøíruèku "Linux Newbie Administrator", která je psána linuxovým zaèáteèníkem. Autor sám pí¹e, ¾e Linux pou¾ívá pouze devìt mìsícù, ale to je mo¾ná v tomto pøípadì výhoda - je jistì blí¾e potenciálnímu ètenáøi ne¾ nìkterý linuxový guru. Pøíruèka se nachází na webové serveru (http://sunsite.auc.dk/linux-newbie/) a obsahuje pomìrnì jednoduché návody na èinnosti, které jako správce va¹eho linuxového systému budete nucen dìlat. Související URL: sunsite.auc.dk/linux-newbie/"

o Awarded "Best of Linux Winner" by the popular portal "Dave Central" (subsidiary of Andover), August 20, 1999:  http://linux.davecentral.com/bol_19990820.html:

"There are two ways to approach Linux use. One is strictly as a user; you can work away, and leave it to a guru friend to fix problems and add new features to your system.

"The do-it-yourself types in the crowd may be satisfied with this for awhile, but eventually, they'll want to get under the hood themselves. The Newbie Administrator Guide is geared toward such folks, and provides a gentle introduction to the craft of maintaining a Linux system. There are other comprehensive works on the subject, such as The Linux System Administrators' Guide, but they're mostly geared toward professional sysadmins who deal with lots of machines with lots of users.

"The Newbie Admin Guide (NAG hereafter) is of more immediate use to the home user who has decided to take on the task of caring and nurturing for her machine herself. Like a lot of great tutorials, the NAG started with users, the Klimas family in this case, who went through the struggle to set things up and said, "Why should other people go through the same work when we've already done it?" So, they started making notes about what they'd done, and put them on the Web for everyone's benefit.

"The NAG assumes you're starting from ground zero, offering explanations of what Linux is, why you'd want to use it, and where to get it, but moves on to clear and detailed explanations of complex issues you'll face when you try to configure and troubleshoot your system. If you've flipped through book after book but found yourself out of your depth and longing for simple, direct explanations, give the NAG a try. "


o  Recommended by the popular http://www.linuxlinks.com/Beginners/:  "Linux Newbie Administrator Guide.  Simple answers to problems that Linux newbies frequently encounter while setting up/using/administrating their computer or home network."

o Linked by German http://www.linuxstart.de/einsteiger/index.html: "Linux Newbie Administrator Guide: Von der Installation, Wartung, Tastaturbefehle bis zur Kernel-Rekompilierung."

o Recommended by a Danish linuxer: http://www.sslug.dk/emailarkiv/novice/1999_04/msg00013.html  To: sslug-novice@sslug.dk  "Subject: Newbie site!   From: "Thomas Mørch" <thm@eci.dk>  Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 10:16:45 +0200  Delivered-To: mailing list sslug-novice@sslug.dk  Mailing-List: contact sslug-novice-help@sslug.dk; run by ezmlm.  Newsgroups: sslug.novice.  Organization: SSLUG.  Reply-to: sslug-novice@sslug.dk. Hejsa  Så lige denne site, der blev annonceret på njlug's liste.. Tænkte at den måske kunne gøre nytte her :)  http://sunsite.auc.dk/linux-newbie/  - Thomas."

o Recommended by Brasilian Dicas-L - Centro de Computação da UNICAMP, Rubens Queiroz de Almeida : http://www.dicas-l.unicamp.br/dicas-l/20000809.shtml: "[...]Eu já li e imprimi este manual e realmente é uma excelente fonte de consulta, inclusive já tendo sido divulgado anteriormente nesta lista.  O manual é gratuito e licenciado sob a GPL, ou seja, com total liberdade de uso, modificação e distribuição. Para os interessados, o endereço é http://sunsite.auc.dk/linux-newbie/". And again recommended http://www.dicas-l.unicamp.br/dicas-l/20010403.shtml: "Eu já anunciei nesta lista o livro "Linux Newbie Administrator Guide", que pode ser baixado no endereço http://sunsite.dk/linux-newbie/ . A novidade é que este guia foi consideravelmente expandido desde a primeira vez em que falei dele e certamente vale a pena conferir a nova versão. O manual está disponível em vários formatos: PDF, HTML, PS e alguns outros."

o Reviewed by Italian general interest portal "100-Links": http://www.100links.com/archivio/990322.html:
"Una guida per chi è proprio agli inizi: la primissima parte è dedicata agli indecisi (per vedere se conviene o meno passare al Linux), dopodiché si arriva alle istruzioni per l'installazione, all'elenco delle principali risorse presenti sulla Rete e ad una pratica lista dei comandi più diffusi, che almeno all'inizio rischiano di essere difficili da ricordare. http://sunsite.auc.dk/linux-newbie/"

o Pointed to by linux.com, the top Linux web portal: http://www.linux.com/firststep/

o Mentioned by Polish newssite "linuxnews.pl": http://linuxnews.pl/news.html?id=12247: "[...] jeden z najwiêkszych darmowych podrêczników Linuksa. [Jeden] z najpe³niejszych ¼róde³ informacji o Linuksie dla pocz±tkuj±cych. Dystrybuowany na zasadach licencji GPL, dwustustronicowy podrêcznik dostêpny jest w wielu jêzykach, w tym równie¿ po polsku [...]". Dziekujemy :).

o Pointed to by the "Linux Documentation Project" website, the mother of all Linux documentation: http://www.linuxdoc.org/links/links.html

o  Pointed to by the "Linux Rookies" site: http://216.121.249.151/main/index.htmll. "Another wonderful resource. This one is rather complete. It does very, very well in the undecided department with a section devoted to the Pros & Cons of Linux. It is also available for download in a wide variety of formats and there are Russian and ChineseTranslations as well."

o Used in class handouts: http://alamo.satlug.org/present/presentation-03.00.html.

o Selected by linux.com to their "top pick of beginners sites" http://linux.com/learn/newsitem.phtml?aid=12535&sid=130&page=2

"This site takes new users through a seven-step process from deciding whether Linux is right for their needs all the way to advanced commands for programming. Of special note is their "Linux Shortcuts and Commands" which is very useful and well-documented. A must-read for anyone looking to setup Linux at home and administer a home network."

o Recommended by hackers.com http://hackers.com/bulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=38962
"A Must Read For all Linux Newbies!!  Here is the Link: http://sunsite.dk/linux-newbie/index.html  This has to be one of the best guides I have come across regarding Linux. It covers alot of what you would want to know about such as Networking, Commands, installation, securtiy, etc. It even compares DOS commands to *nix commands. I recommend all of you go check it out. Not only does it have good content but it comes in other languages for those who cant read English good. They have it in a number of different formats for download (PDF which is great for printing....and it has a TOC in it too). Its updated frequently. Its newest release was just on April 18 so its not outdated. They mainly use Redhat and Mandrake but alot of it can be applied to all Distros of Linux. This will be alot of help to many of you out there. Lets keep this one bumped up so everyone can see it.  Adore: If you get the chance to check this out that would be great. I think this would be great for the Links page if its not on it already. (I dont think I saw it on there). Happy Reading.....   X_REDMAN_X, Senior Member, Last edited by X_REDMAN_X on 04-24-2002 at 08:19 PM

o Recommended by linuxdot.com:  http://www.linuxdot.org/cgi-bin/documentation.cgi

o Apparantly recommended by the Intel Linux User Group, http://ilug.intel.com/ . I cannot access the link, but we registered 995 hits on our title page.

Please let us know if you write a word on our pages or make a link or whatever--we will be happy to mention you here.

Major Changes

Nov.2002-version 0.191. Expanded section on OpenOffice (6.1.1).
Nov.2002-version 0.189. Minor updates: Mozilla is now considered a good Linux browser. Quick reference added for vi.  For generation of the postscript and pdf files, converted from the utility html2ps to htmldoc.
June 2002-version 0.188. Language cleanups in Part 0. Expanded 1.2.
May 2002 - version 0.187. Changed the filenames of all parts (except "index.html" to a more consistent scheme. Added a link to a French translation. Minor cleanups. Started an example of a Ruby program, and a longer example of C (7.2). Minor updates and cleanups.
Apr. 2002 - version  0.184.  Added an program example for assmebler (7.2). Corrected an error in exemple of config file for GRUB (section 4.1.0):  "hd0,2" means 1st hard drive, 3 partition. Countless smaller cleanups, improvements, and updates.
Jan. 2002 - version 0.168. Added "gnuplot" (6.7).
Dec. 2001-version 0.160 - 0.167.  Added "java" and "javac" (7.2). Updated the description of OpenOffice (6.1.1). Removed description of WordPerfect (former 6.1.3). Added and example of fortran code and improved a bit the example of guile (7.2). Added another code example for Perl (7.2). Mentioned the GPL for code in LNAG_LICENCE. Added a link to "changes" on the title page.  Mentioned whatis (2.2) anbd added a link to acronyms (2.3). Updated sections 4.3.1, 4.3.2 and 4.3.3 (on X Windowing). Updated the command to envoke the KDE help (5.2).  Updated the security scanning link (4.5.10). Added the command "nautilus" (section 5.5).  Updated the command "badblocks" (section 5.13). Added some keyboard shortcuts under "kword" (6.1.x). Updated info on RAID (section 7.4).  Added missing HTML targets for all subsections in part LEARNING (7). Included info on GSL (7.2, #libs). Added command "indent" (7.1). On the front page, removed the link to the inactive Portugese translation, added a link to a good translation, included a local mirror for this translation (on the request of the translator). Promised the translator to keep a detailed log of any substantial changes. Changed the Linux hardware requirements (1.2) to reflect the reality today. Mentioned Unicode in section 3.4.8.  Added KDE keyboard shortcuts to the part COMMANDS (5.1).
November 2001-version 0.158. Corrected an error in the naming of SCSI drives. Updated info on how to download Linux, and how to upgrade the system (sections 1.4 and 1.18).  Other minor updates and cleanups.
June 2001-version 0.145. Fixed "millions" of typos pointed out by Jo.
May 2001-version 0.141. Lots of small cleanups, updates and minor addtions.
March 2001 - version 0.126. Addressed a few important comments by Bill Staehle: mentioned Conectiva Linux, included comprehensive listing of places where to obtain Linux CDs, updated listing of Linux newsgroups, adjusted opinions expressed on some security issues, updated info on winmodems. Lots of typos corrected. Added parts: "How to crush linux", "Is Linux a cult", and listings of config files, devices, and daemons.
Feb. , 2001. Added: How to disable ping for security.  How to increase the max number of open files. How to use file redirection with using the licq fifo file. How to use kernel SysRq key combinations. How can the linux source code be useful for a newbie. How are directory permissions different from those for regular files.
Feb. 03, 2001 - version 0.105. This is the 105th increamental update. The zero in front means that the guide is still not finished, yet we already must have had 0.5M hits on our 3 "official" mirrors. The LNAG licence was changed from GPL to a modified Open Contents Licence (OCL) because there are many never-updated mirrors. Some commercial sites "customized" LNAG (with our email removed) and refuse to update, which is annoying. Minor extensions, updates, cosmetics all over the guide. "Changes" and the description of LNAG sources are now included (because we were repeatedly inquired).
Feb. 1999 - version 0.01. This was the first realease of LNAG, under the terms of the General Public Licence (GPL). At those ancient times, it was hosted at www.magma.ca/~bklimas (more than 100k hits on the title page over the following year).

LNAG Sources

The Linux Newbie Administrator Guide (LNAG) is written in HTML using a variety of Linux editors. Before posting, the heading is automatically inserted to the html files for consistency of the version and release date, and the postscript, pdf, and zip files are automatically re-created using a customized bash script with calls to the following Linux utilities: sed, htmlclean, htmldoc, html2ps, ps2pdf, ps2ps, psnup and zip.

Web Statistics

Extract from statistics for Sunsite.dk directory /linux-newbie:
 
Period :   pages: %pages:   reqs:  %reqs:  Gbytes: %bytes: directory
-------:--------: ------: ------: ------: -------: ------: --------------
2000-01:   17535:  2.44%:  22312:  1.03%:   0.684:  1.08%: /linux-newbie/
2000-02:   16641:  2.15%:  23443:  1.07%:   0.724:  1.02%: /linux-newbie/
2000-03:   21546:  2.39%:  31684:  1.29%:   0.931:  0.92%: /linux-newbie/
2000-04:   20951:  2.49%:  31330:  1.46%:   0.887:  0.90%: /linux-newbie/
2000-05:   27181:  3.35%:  42544:  1.97%:   1.113:  0.92%: /linux-newbie/
2000-06:   26844:  3.69%:  41971:  2.20%:   1.113:  0.86%: /linux-newbie/
2000-07:   27645:  3.17%:  43246:  1.92%:   1.214:  1.00%: /linux-newbie/
2000-08:   41131:  3.80%:  64101:  2.38%:   2.250:  1.27%: /linux-newbie/
2000-09:   35664:  3.69%:  52954:  1.99%:   1.919:  0.83%: /linux-newbie/
2000-10:   29493:  3.10%:  42636:  1.75%:   1.732:  0.73%: /linux-newbie/
2000-11:   23763:  3.15%:  36340:  1.76%:   1.266:  0.53%: /linux-newbie/
2000-12:   15854:  1.57%:  25082:  1.11%:   0.682:  0.35%: /linux-newbie/
2001-01:   20304:  2.66%:  61486:  2.79%:   1.015:  0.41%: /linux-newbie/
2001-02:   22184:  3.42%:  39459:  1.89%:   1.084:  0.43%: /linux-newbie/
2001-03:   39463:  5.00%:  59444:  2.49%:   2.068:  0.87%: /linux-newbie/
2001-04:   46423:  5.37%:  70129:  2.97%:   2.664:  0.51%: /linux-newbie/
2001-05:   31773:  3.33%:  45474:  1.66%:   1.768:  0.53%: /linux-newbie/
2001-06:   31373:  3.53%:  44872:  1.97%:   1.801:  0.81%: /linux-newbie/
2001-07:   41029:  8.37%:  53982:  3.93%:   2.264:  2.50%: /linux-newbie/
2001-08:   44229:  7.44%:  54065:  3.39%:   2.358:  1.97%: /linux-newbie/
2001-09:   36214:  4.31%:  44241:  2.23%:   1.866:  1.11%: /linux-newbie/
2001-10:   33305:  6.62%:  41556:  2.67%:   1.758:  1.03%: /linux-newbie/
2001-11:   25900:  6.46%:  32793:  2.54%:   1.378:  1.19%: /linux-newbie/
2001-12:   36152:  5.13%:  45787:  2.37%:   2.164:  1.76%: /linux-newbie/
2002-01:   44405:  5.10%:  55775:  2.43%:   2.744:  1.21%: /linux-newbie/
2002-02:   39105:  7.17%:  48789:  3.03%:   2.462:  1.27%: /linux-newbie/
2002-03:   48190: 10.05%:  59353:  3.15%:   2.804:  1.51%: /linux-newbie/
2002-04:   42522:  8.63%:  52988:  3.05%:   2.695:  1.53%: /linux-newbie/
2002-05:   44884:  9.42%:  55582:  3.44%:   2.695:  2.04%: /linux-newbie/
2002-06:   53300: 20.25%:  67162:  6.17%:   3.157:  1.35%: /linux-newbie/
2002-07:   50603: 13.30%:  63488:  4.31%:   4.326:  0.85%: /linux-newbie/
2002-08:   39627: 14.59%:  50199:  5.35%:   3.109:  2.16%: /linux-newbie/
2002-09:    9076: 13.30%:  11563:  4.86%:   0.807:  1.20%: /linux-newbie/
2002-10:   55658: 15.03%:  69419:  5.71%:   4.681:  0.80%: /linux-newbie/


   2000:  304248:  2.96%: 457643:  1.69%:  14.519:  0.81%: /linux-newbie/
   2001:  413755:  4.85%: 600097:  2.49%:  21.   :  0.85%: /linux-newbie/