Hey, I'm extremely new to this; I don't have a clue what on earth any of this is...
You see, I'm looking to find a good host, and I found one, but my good friend (Surferdude) directed me here and said to use this instead, and he started going on and on about how it's different from shared hosting and yadda yadda yadda...

Thing is, I just didn't understand anything he was talking about.
Literally, I don't have a damn clue what the difference between a place like vizaweb.com (the place i wanted to go with) and this place is.
The only thing I understand is that we can't get cut off because of too much resource usage. That's good, but apparently there's a lot I don't seem to understand.

I don't get how to work it if I decide to get hosting here or whatever it'd be called...I've gotten hosting from invisionboard.com allready, and that was perfect. I used them for about half a year and never had any problems.

But it seems like it'd be so different, so could someone explain to me just how to use it. Do we get ftp and all that crap?
Basically I want to know, how would I manage it; since there's no cpanel.

Thanks a bunch to whoever helps me out.

- Kudin

Basically, what you get, is a virtual Linux server. In general, you'll need Linux administration and configuration knowledge.

What you get from a Linode, is an installed Linux distribution of your choice as well as harddrive space to store data, etc. What you do from there, is entirely up to you, as long as it doesn't violate the Linode terms of service or acceptable usage policy. To start with, you only get a SSH service running on port 22 as well as console access via LISH (the Linode Shell).

Setting up and configuring other services, such as web, FTP, mail, DNS or even Cpanel, is entirely in your own hands. If you have no idea where to start, I'd suggest getting help from a friend who can set things up for you while you're learning Linux administration bit by bit.

Third party administration for the services you install is not included. Cpanel licenses for virtual servers is available at $15 per month. This comes in addition to the Linode rental fee.
http://www.linode.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1552

Well that makes a little more sense.

I'll just have Surfer help me; he's explaining everything to me now and walking me through everything, so I should be fine.

Thanks for the help.