A Note About Environments - Red Hat LINUX 7.2 Manual

Section 0.3:A Note About Environments
• X or X Window System: These terms refer to the graphical user interface environments. If you
are "in X" or "running X" you are working in a GUI rather than a console environment.
• Console: Console, shell prompt, terminal, "the screen that looks like DOS" — these are all the
same thing: a non-graphical interface. This environment has no icons, limited menus, and requires
that you type commands to perform tasks, rather than pointing and clicking with your mouse.
• RPM: An RPM is a software package file you can install on your computer. All Red Hat Linux
files are available as RPMs.

A Note About Environments

Your Red Hat Linux system is more than the graphical user interface. However, most new and inter-
mediate users are likely to work within the graphical environment. The Official Red Hat Linux Getting
Started Guide demonstrates the techniques behind accomplishing tasks in two popular environments:
GNOME (as shown in Figure 1, A GNOME Desktop) and KDE.
Figure 1 A GNOME Desktop
In addition to the chapters covering KDE and GNOME, this guide contains plenty of useful informa-
tion on using the shell prompt (as shown in Figure 2, Viewing Text in a Shell Prompt). Using the shell
prompt requires typing commands to perform tasks, as opposed to using the menus and icons in a
graphical environment. The shell prompt can often perform tasks faster than a graphical environment,
but may take more time and effort to learn to use. The shell prompt is something that Linux users
generally become comfortable with over time.
Do not let the appearance of one of these text screens intimidate you. The shell prompt is a lot easier
to use than you might think and it often lets you perform tasks much more quickly than you can in a
graphical environment. Give it a chance, be patient, and give yourself time to learn.
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