Malta Linux User Group

As I mentioned before, it’s a good idea to create a new user for experimenting. In Linux, a normal user cannot break anything in the system, but can still delete his/her own files. By creating a new user you will have a new "playpen" to play around in, so if you make some mistake you won’t delete the files you normally work with.

One thing you must never do (until you know what you’re doing) is to work as the "root" user. This user has the necessary permissions to delete or alter all files on the computer, which is generally not considered a good move.

So the first thing to do is to use your favourite tool to create a new user. Use all the normal settings, but ensure that the "shell" setting is "/bin/bash". I called mine "sandbox" but you can use any name you like. Since different Linux distributions provide different tools which can be used to perform this step you should use whichever tool you find best. Some examples include KDE’s User Manager or the LinuxConf tool.

This picture shows KDE’s User Manager being used to create the user "sandbox". Any other user-management program may be used instead.

After you have created the new user, you can log out, then log in using that user to ensure that you can perform any command safely.