I see there are few tutorials for 11.04.

Should i simply install 10.04 LTS 32 bit edition? Also im coming from hostgator so i don't know what version they use. I am hoping that after setting up things, i can simply transfer data and cross fingers for it to work..

Also i have no experience with Linux but i have played with ubuntu long ago, just with GUI.

Gave up.

So minds fresh to take anything in. Would love to know best OS for 512mb system.

Welcome!

In some sense, learning to use Linux on the server is easier than learning to use it on the desktop. When you install Linux on your home computer, you must learn to use an entire suite of new programs in order to do what you used to do with the other OS, and if you break something, the whole computer might become unusable until you fix it. When you have a Linux server, on the other hand, you can manage it from the comfort of your usual OS, and even if something goes seriously wrong, you can just search for solutions in a browser window.

Besides, Linux was designed to be managed using the command-line interface in the first place. An SSH session is the most natural way to talk to a Linux machine. GUI configuration utilities for Linux generally suck.

For new users, Ubuntu 10.04 LTS would be the best choice for most purposes. With Ubuntu it's a good idea to stick with LTS releases, as they are supported for a longer time (5 years) and generally more stable. A lot of people just skip non-LTS releases such as 11.04, so most online tutorials won't be updated until next year when 12.04 LTS comes out. But if you already installed 11.04 and the tutorials seem to work, there's no need to reinstall.

If you're migrating from a shared host, note that all recent Linux distributions use PHP 5.3 by default. If your website uses PHP and it's not compatible with PHP 5.3, it might break. For example, old versions of Drupal don't like PHP 5.3. (If this happens, try to upgrade your app rather than downgrading your server to PHP 5.2. Old versions of PHP don't get security fixes.) Anyway, it would be a good idea to test your sites thoroughly on your Linode before actually moving over.

BTW, Hostgator probably uses some version of CentOS. CentOS is very popular among cPanel shared hosts, but not so much among VPS users. Just check the PHP version and you should be OK.

Wat? Maybe not among Linode users, but CentOS is a ENTERPRISE class Server OS, so I'd say plenty of VPS's out there are running it. The choice of Distro's isn't so much about the distro, but about the app's (and more importantly the app's version).

It's so enterprise there's no upgrade path from 5.x to 6.x, because REAL enterprise completely rebuilds systems every time there's a software update

Backwards compatibility is the bane of all software advances.

Besides, except for rolling releases, major version changes are best done with a fresh install instead of a inplace upgrade. Maybe hidden gremlins are ok in desktop systems, but not for servers.

Centos got so much popular because Cpanel choose it as their companion!

*Open for discussion*

Hey guys

I was a VDS user with them. So i guess i was on CentOS?

Anyway, they are going to shut down my website so i just basically did full backup. I did not want to pay for the next month.

Should i cancel or just let them cancel it? As in does it effect my Credit card or etc? They said they'll be suspending in the next 3-4 days.

What my plan is that as i have directed DNS to my new machine, I am going to upload the zip file and extract within machine.

I have followed beginners guide and LAMP guide. Any other guide i need to do?

I am not sure about DNS guide as linode support linked me to: http://library.linode.com/dns-guides/co ... de-manager

figured it out - above question still unanswered.

Also where do these files go?

And where does the homedir go? inside the homedir folder after i extract homedir?

/ or /root?