Linux Workshop

Welcome
Agenda:
• What Linux is (5 minutes)
• The basic things (10 minutes)
• What Linux can do for you (45 minutes, maybe?)
What Linux Is
• An operating system, like Windows and Mac OS X
• Primarily used for server and desktop computers (as
opposed to embedded processors on space shuttles)
• Started in the late 1980's, a derivative of UNIX, like
Mac OS X, Solaris, BSD
• It's more than just command-line, srsly
Windows
• Microsoft makes it and markets it
• You buy it, cause you don't like Macs
• You use the de facto programs like Office, Windows
Live Messenger, Internet Explorer/Firefox/Chrome
because that's what everyone else uses and that's all
you've heard of
Mac OS X
• Apple makes it and markets it (heavily)
• You buy it, cause you don't like Windows
• You use the de facto programs like Office,
iChat/Adium, Safari/Firefox/Chrome because that's
what everyone else uses and that's all you've heard of
Linux
• People on the intertubes make it, nobody markets it
• You come to a workshop to see why Linux matters at
all

(To be honest, it really doesn't, not to your average Joe.)

Ecosystem
Volunteers code Linux, spearheaded by an egotistical jerk
called Linus Torvalds that everyone sucks up to. They also
make application programs that suit their need.
Notice how "their need" is the needs of the volunteer
programmers. This is so relevant it's not even funny.
Choice
Everything is (supposed to be) open source, because these
guys believe in choice - the choice to choose and know what
a program is doing on your computer exactly. (What happens
if that new program you downloaded stole your password?
How do you even know?)
This philosophy alone manifested the culture of Linux.
Distributions
Due to the many choice of Linux, there have been many
flavours that have been adapted for users. Without these
flavours, or so called Linux distros (distributions), you would
have to do the following to run Linux:
• Compile your own Linux kernel, with all the modules
you want/need
• Find your drivers
• Configure all the base system components from
scratch, compile them all, and test to see if the whole
system works together
• Post way too many noob questions online
A Linux Distro is composed of:
• a community that dislike all the other distros for
whatever reason. Usually this is in the form of a mailing
list, online forum, IRC, blogs.
• a package manager, a program that manages
programs on the OS. Probably the most important thing
on a distro, besides the fancy wallpapers.
E.g. apt-get on Ubuntu
• maintainers, who are update all applications in the
distro. Essentially, maintainers periodically update the
URLs pointed to by package manager to the updated
links in the upstream, which are the people that
actually code the programs.
In summary, your Linux distro is controlled by a bunch of
strangers on the Internet.
The Basic Things
Firstly, SSH into the department Linux server:
Windows:
Enter ssh-linux.ece.ubc.ca for the hostname, and
press Open. Login.
Mac:
Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal. You don't even have
to SSH since you already have a Linux-ish environment.
Linux:
Open a terminal and you are set.
The Really Basic Commands
The command line is your friend. Over time, friendship may
become love.
• cd - change directory
• ls - list files
• echo - print all arguments given on the command line
• cat - display file contents
• less - scroll things given to its input
• wget - download any file
• find - find a file matching a filename
• grep - find a file or a line given something to match
against
• Pipes redirect the output one program 1 as the input of
program 2:
find | grep name
• Redirectors is like a pipe, but operates with files
echo testtest > testfile.txt
Vim
• It is not meant to be scary, but efficient
• Everything (EVERYTHING!!11eleven) is and can be
mapped to a key
• Your hand should never leave the home-row keys (that
is, asdf and jkl;)
• You probably have to use it in future courses in ECE,
so embrace it now and prosper later
Basic Vim
2 modes of operation (for now): normal, insert
Insert Mode:
• Press i to enter this mode
• Type as you would in a normal editor. Everything is the
same.
Normal Mode:
• The default mode when opening vim.
• Press <ESC> to enter this mode.
• Each key does something different
• save your file: :w<ENTER>
• quit vim :( :q<ENTER>, or save and quit in one go:
:wq<ENTER>, or quit without saving: :q!<ENTER>
• move around: j,``k``,``l``,``m`` = left, right, up, and
down arrow keys
• delete: x deletes one letter, dd deletes the whole line,
3dd deletes the next 3 lines
• copy: yy copies the current line, 3yy copies the next
3 lines
• paste: p pastes whatever you copied
• do whatever you just did: . to redo your last action
• record macros: qq start recording a macro, q again to
stop recording, @q to play the macro, 100@q to play
the macro 100 times
• undo: u
• browse directories: :Ex<ENTER> shows you the
directory, use movement keys to find your file
• Cheatsheet:
http://www.tuxfiles.org/linuxhelp/vimcheat.html
Useful Things
Here is some stuff useful on the ECE server.
Screen
A terminal multiplexer, also saves across SSH sessions (in
case of bad WiFi connections).
• screen to start a screen session
• Inside screen, <CTRL>c to create a new terminal
• Inside screen, <CTRL>a-# to jump to the # terminal
• Inside screen, <CTRL>a-a to jump to the previous
terminal
• Inside screen, <CTRL>a-d to "detach" the session.
• screen -r to reattach the session
Git
A version control that requires no server setup. Great for
quick backups, and collaboration.
• git init to start a Git repository
• git add . to add all files to the repository
• git commit -m 'Commit Message' to commit the
previous add

Each commit is saved as a separate version and can be

retrieved in the future any time.
• git log to see the commit history - note the hash
• git checkout <HASH-HERE> to revert to that
commit

For collaboration on your team projects, http://github.com/

Things That Are Kind of
Awesome... IMO Anyway
Not necessary applicable to the ECE servers, but here's
some cool stuff.
AKA, showoff time.
Mutt
Vim-like email client.
rssdler & rtorrent
rssdler - automatically download items from RSS feeds
rtorrent - command-line Bittorrent
Combination - automatic background BT downloader for all
your TV shows
mplayer
A minimally intrusive version of VLC (which exists on Linux
as well).
Elinks
Command-line browser.
Why? :/
slimrat
Automatic downloader for Rapidshare, Megaupload,
DepositFiles, MediaFire, Youtube, blah blah blah.
Command-line and GUI options available.
Vimperator
Firefox extension to make your Firefox act like Vim, get rid of
your mouse entirely.
Tiling Window Managers
Automatic management of your windows, so you don't have
to drag stuff around all the time.
Python
A general purpose programming language. Easy to pick up,
and has lots of possibilities, especially in combination with
other tools:
• Sync Gmail contacts to local email contacts (since
Google uses Python and provides libraries for Python)
• Automatically transcode music to lower bit-rate with
ffmpeg and copy when iPod/MP3 player is plugged in.
Yes, iPods work on Linux. Surprise!
• Generate 200 name tags for the IEEE Think
Engineering event with imagemagick, a
command-line based Photoshop-ish kind of thing.
• Automatically dial to Pizza Hut with Skype, and use
festival to convert text to voice and order pizza to
your house... for whatever reason.
In Summary
The benefit of using Linux as a desktop computer:
• Get to know the workings of your computer better,
since every component of the OS is exposed to you
• Be more efficient at everything
• Gain some competitive edge compared to using just
Windows/Mac
To make the best of Linux, you need to
• Pick a distro. Ubuntu isn't as god awful as I claim it to
be.
• Pick a development environment. GNOME, KDE, tiling
window manager, just a raw terminal, whatever
• Pick your editor: Vim or Emacs, there really is no other
choice if you want to be efficient.
• Pick your primary scripting language and learn it well. I
suggest Python, but there's Bash, Perl (please do not
pick this), Ruby, Tcl, PHP (not this one either please),
Lua, Lisp, Scheme, Haskell.
• Discover new and useful programs on Linux.

It's all about choice.