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This tutorial was written by former CS15 TAs several years ago, and it has been "borrowed" and modified over the years to cater to various other intro CS courses (e.g. CS4 and now CS9-2). In CS 9-2, almost all of your work will be done in a UNIX environment. UNIX is an old (but widely used) operating system with a textual user interface (UI). Mac users can use OS X (which is built on top of UNIX); Windows users can install Cygwin, a UNIX-like environment for Windows. The CS Department's new high-end PCs run under Linux, an operating system that is a modern dialect of UNIX. While the interface will feel a bit different from typical Windows and Mac operating environments at first, you will soon see that Linux and other UNIX-like environments allow you to do everything other operating systems do, and more. The CS department uses a version of Linux called Debian.
This guide is intended to give you a basic overview of the system and how to use it. It is by no means comprehensive, but it will hopefully give you the big picture, and then serve as a helpful reference for you to come back to.
We have made every effort to make this a useful, intuitive guide. That said, nobody's perfect, and trying to explain the use of an entire operating system in an hour and a half is really hard, so bear with us.
We have broken this document into two pieces: a Tutorial, which will guide you through the main features of the system, and an Appendix, which contains a wealth of goodies like Linux commands, useful programs, and how-to's. Don't sweat it if you don't remember every, single detail when you're done. The point of this tutorial is to help you get your bearings. You can always reference the appendix for the things you forget, or to find out how to do things that weren't covered.
The goal of this tutorial is to give you an understanding of Linux and how you will use it. With that in mind, we have provided some background and explanatory information at times. However, we also realize that this won't interest everyone. So, in an effort to make sure that you get through the important things (some of which are necessary to make your account work properly), we have relegated interesting but [sigh] skip-able information to the text boxes with little light bulbs. However, we recommend that you read it anyway.
If you haven't already, you will soon learn that you should never assume. When you do, you ...* That said, bad role models that we are, we have made some assumptions while creating this guide. The level of detail is based on the assumption that you have had some experience using computers, including browsing the Internet, moving and resizing windows, using scrollbars to view different parts of a window, etc. If you haven't used a computer before, or if you are unsure of your prowess with the activities listed above, please see a TA right now to get a quick rundown. Don't worry, it's not a big deal, and it will only take about 5 minutes. We just want to make sure that everyone's on the same page and that you are completely comfortable with the environment.
* make an ASS out of U and ME
Important!Throughout the tutorial, there will be times when we tell you to input something into the computer. Instructions will always be written in this form:
Text that refers to what you will actually see on a computer screen will be in typewriter-style font like this:
We implore you to actually read every paragraph and execute every instruction given to you in this tutorial. We have done everything possible to not give you busy work. This is very important information, and some of the things we tell you to enter are necessary to set up your account for CS9. Just start from the beginning and work through everything. It might be interesting. And sometimes we might even be funny. If you have any questions at any point, please ask a TA. No question is too basic or too small. The TAs are here to help. |
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This would normally
tell you to do something.