Before you begin!!

    Hello everyone once again. Before you begin your adventurous journey with Linux, I would like to suggest few things to make sure you don't end it, before even getting it started. It's like insuring your journey, I guess everyone does, so why not do it before you begin yours with Linux ? Insurance? do they have different policy for Linux users? will I get more benefit? will I have to pay extra premium? if all this questions are hitting your mind after reading the word insurance then just relax, So what exactly are we going to insure here? Very first thing I am trying to achive here is to prevent the readers from hating Linux. I am trying to prevent the users from experiencing un-necessary pain just on their first start, preventing them from un-necessary frustration. In many cases that I've came across are users trying to get started with some  new things, are turned down due to some silly reason. What I am trying to do over here is take away that fear from users. Is that so? well!! the first fear is about lack of knowledge. fear of new things many of us are often afraid to try new things, if you try to see this exercise beyond Linux, this will also help to built up some self confidence. That is total different area, let me take you back to the topic, so what else is left out? well biggest one for many is not knowing the consequences, well If I try to kick that out of you, I many endup give you some management lecture, but that is not the immediate purpose to write down this post , so I am stopping my self once again from distraction(:P). So what exactly I will be trying to convey in this post is some thing like list of thing you go through before you pack your bags. so what do we have one list? Umm packing bags for journey! get those pair of jeans, get my favourite  trawlers jacket, .. !! WAIT!! that's not the thing on list here, let me put down the list. Insurance plan, return tickets, knowing destination... this can become big list but I am trying to keep it short.

   Insurance plan? does one really need to get insurance before starting Linux? does Linux kills one using it? NO!! when I say insurance plan I literally never meant your General insurance, What I am trying to convey here is the plan to Insure your data. Do you intend to get rich by losing data? no that is not happening here, we are simply going to discuss some methods of saving you from losing data. if anyone of you have ever tried any things like installing windows etc with your computer, you must be aware of what I will be some what talking, first thing you need to figure out what is important data that you have on your computer, this one area is all upto user where he/she keeps the data, if the computer is shared. To me any data that can't be regenerated by again is important of course, so what does counts in this? I was lucky in my initial days of computing that I only had mp3s and and movies and games when I use to do crazy things with computers, thoe they were precious to me like diamond back then specially games :D, as we didn't had internet. So what data is important? or not recoverable? for me it is something like pictures and videos of my friends and family. etc, in some cases it may be emails stored on your computers local folder. you can take backup of these all data. I would suggest as many copies as you can, how can I take backup? I believe almost everyone knows how, in case you don't have much idea keep a copy of your personal videos  and pics on cloud storage provided by many, for something with legal importance like documents, emails I would recommend you to keep a copy on flash drive(pen-drive) or burn them on cd-rom or may be external hard-disk may be a good option. Get a through list of documents, files  check with it twice or thrice, try to ensure your backup is good and can be recovered when required. Now if you want to prevent other users from accessing your data, all through it is not full-proof you can put all the data into zip archive and protected with strong password. Again improper handling of data my lead to corruptions of backups (specially archived zip can lead to losing bulk of data at a time), so if your are doing this for first time best way to try out things with some junk data, with all the suggested possible method and then delete this junk data and try to recover it again. try this few times may be, it might be tedious exercise for many of you but trust me, this will save you from lot of pain in future, I would suggest you to make this an habit to keep backup of important data.


   return tickets! it was, huh? what? well that's the next item I've mentioned on the list, so what is return ticket, simply it's the way back to your home, Yess!! I know you are already home, but when you are trying out fancy things with your computer you may not feel yourself home in sometimes as lot of un-familar things on it  or may be some mishap, or software gone wrong situation, well science I've been doing a lots of fun things with my computer I've sometimes ended up in a mess, my recent fedora installation took me something like 12-15 attempts to properly install it, please don't bother with the numbers I've mentioned, It's just I was trying to achieve some thing which was not happening the way I wanted so I had to keep on trying it for some time. If same things happens to you, and you don't know what to do then again you may find yourself in trouble so better know how to get back to original state, in case of windows, you may most-likely have some tools like norton ghost, windows recovery disc, windows installer disc, etc. back then when I was windows user, after couple of tries we had used simple solution wipe and re-install on "C:". if you don't know how-to's  in this area? try to gather some information is first place before you end up getting into trouble(to me it is exciting experience, lol, but that's me, I know n number of ways to get back my data ans stuff) , I don't want to get your work get hampered again or you getting stuck with nu-usable pc(it's actually good opportunity to learn but you must know where your adventure ends and reality is going to kick you hard) this is second most important thing one must know before getting themselves into trouble. With situation you are stuck in between nowhere to go, many simply give-up(I suggest them to just keep on trying), so if you know how to restore thing to normal, here is where you can end your vacation and go back to work and give it a try on another weekend.


   Destinations? well here I would like to tell you some things about what all you are going to face in this journey, It's basically simple to classify into two types i.e. good or bad, but I leave that upto you. Personally It's all good for me as every trouble/ challenge you face teaches you some thing new and more that that it's fun, to over come these things at-least for me. Here good part can simply be achieving the goal of successful installation and we may have many things on other side things like, losing data (this is common) may be with successful / unsuccessful installation, broken pc, no longer booting any operating systems, if you achieve this then congrats, you have reached one milestone in process of understating your computer little more, try to find out why it is not booting in possible way (if you have another computer may be ) or if you are person with singe pc and have lot to lose, I would suggest to be very sure about your return tickets and insurance  of your data at-least. If you don't have return ticket here,  you will be facing various challenges!. In that case better do your home work, to me it's fun to try out new thing but still I need few things in there place, like scripts etc which I use to reduce my manual work. don't worry too much about scripts, they are  not relevant in here.

   I would like to put up a short summary of what I've been trying to convey over here is taking out fear of users of losing and possible chances of hating Linux because of losing some personal data, This conversation could have been more elaborative or might be omitted completely but for the fact everyone don't know every thing and everyone don't think the same way I wanted to put some awareness about some challenges one may face when they try out things with their computers, I've learned all these from my personal experience with computer I would like to the users to have it first hand like me, without knowledge, but all may not think same way and might lose their courage to step ahead in journey with Linux for them I wanted to at-least save them some important data. Finally simple Advice. One should not be afraid of takings risks, as falling and getting backup up is part of learning to walk, one Just have to keep trying till they succeed, think back then when you were child if you had not taken that risk of falling again and again and getting hurt you would never be able to walk and run, This is no different thing, only difference as grown-up is you are more worried about out-come and that stops you from trying, so let go that fear and you will discover journey full of fun is awaiting for you. This things are not just limited to learning Linux but failure, success are just the part of growth process ,if just want to hug and not the other you will never actually grow to your fullest. I am closing my conversation over here hope you will find your way through this journey, do let me know what you feel about this :).