It's OK to Hate Linux

But it's not OK to say you hate Linux, if you really have no idea whatsoever. And unlike some technologies, figuring out if you hate Linux doesn't have to cost you an arm or a leg.

When I first went to college, the only "computer" degree a person could get was a Computer Science degree. That meant programming. I loved computers, and so I opted for a CS degree, and started my freshman year taking C++ classes.

I. Hated. Programming.

Once my computer future was no longer an option, I decided to become an Electrical Engineer, because I was at a tech school (Michigan Tech), and EE majors got high paying jobs. Some time around calculus 3, I felt we were doing things with numbers that didn't need to be done, and I started skipping all my engineering classes and hung out in the computer lab. In fact, I spent the better part of a semester skipping all my paid classes and starting my computer career in the labs learning about local area networks, file sharing, central authentication, etc. It was a very expensive and accidental internship, but it worked out very nicely for me in the long run.

Fast forward several decades, and today not only are there "computer degrees" available for college freshmen, but there are many other paths to an IT career that I just didn't have back in the early 90s. If it weren't for all that class skipping, I'd have never discovered how much I love computer networking, and eventually fell in love with Linux. And while I technically learned computer networking in college, it certainly wasn't by attending class. If you want to discover your passion in IT, you can read books, take an internship, go for a certification, or just take some classes on a subject to see if it interests you. One of the reasons I'm a technology trainer at CBT Nuggets is because I want to help people avoid the school of hard knocks when it comes to learning their passion.

You don't have to take my training, but I'm a big fan of learning by doing, and so my training tends to reflect that. Even if you have no intention of getting a Linux+ certification, taking the training is a great way to discover if it's something you enjoy. If you just want to dip your toe into the penguin pond, the Linux Essentials course I teach is a great starting point for someone who don't know Linux at all.

tl;dr -- It's OK if you don't like Linux. Before you make that decision though, you owe it to yourself to learn enough about it to know for sure.

Free training. Full week. Freaking awesome!