Yes, you’re right, my mistake!

I was a little lost until the iPod and the t9 showed up, then it was almost scary how normal it all felt. I didn’t even realize I still remembered t9 but I didn’t even have to think.

Thanks! This is all good information and I appreciate you taking the time to write it all out for me!

I did google it, and found a bunch of articles about dual booting with windows 7. I didn’t know if it was still possible or if it would be smart to try for someone with no experience with Linux, so I thought I’d come to a sub where there are tons of people who use Linux daily and could give me some advice about whether I should try it or not. Thanks for the input :)

Thanks! I’ve been interested in Linux for awhile now. I don’t plan on sharing files between the two OSes, and I’m religious about my backups. If I don’t have at least 3 or 4 backups I don’t consider my data backed up :)

I have no idea. I’ve known it for years. All my computer knowledge is self taught so random things I’m fairly knowledgeable on and then there’s things that are common knowledge I’ve never heard of. I’m doing my best out here! I was a sheltered kid who grew up into an adult that doesn’t know anyone tech savvy!

Thank you! This is all good advice. I’ve never actually used a VM but will have to do more research on installing and using one. When you (and everyone else here) say shrink the partition from inside windows, do you mean from within the disk management software? I’m familiar with that, having added extra drives on my other computers. I actually have 3 computers, 2 laptops and a gaming rig I built, but they both have Nvidia GPUs and I’ve heard so many bad things about Nvidia and Linux and I don’t want my first Linux experience to be fighting it out with those. If I like Linux I’ll probably switch one of my other computers over to Linux either entirely or on one of the second drives (both my other computers have 2 different drives).

My school uses MS for a bunch of the logins. 2FA is setup through your phone, which isn’t annoying or anything. So anytime I login, I need my phone handy, and then I have to type in the stupid code into my phone and then a password to approve it and then maybe 25% of the time it decides me clicking “yes this is me” actually means “no, deny!” and boots me out and then I have to authenticate a different way. And if I sign into a different school website that uses the same damn MS login it kicks me from any other school websites I’m currently logged into so I have to log back into them even if they’re still open in another tab and I’m actively working in then. So yeah, I’d like to think I’m smart, but I’d definitely just rush through another MS authentication request because I’m so damn sick of them.

Thank you, this is a start!

This is really good advice, thank you. Do you have any recommendations for trustworthy resources to learn more about cybersecurity, ie websites, YouTube channels, whatever? I’m so worried about misinformation.

I’m a computer science major. I’m technically classed a sophomore because I take a lot of classes at a time, but I wont transfer to a 4 year school til spring 2025. I’m at a community college taking a degree specifically designed to transfer to a 4 year school and I’m only on my first actual computer programming class right now, it’s been all pre-reqs and gen-eds up until now so that once I transfer they’re all out of the way. When I transfer the plan is to switch to cybersecurity - the school I’m transferring to has a cybersecurity degree designed to pick up where my AS leaves off.

But I know nothing really as of right now! I’d appreciate any advice anyone in the field wants to give a very interested but very ignorant newbie who wants to learn. I come from emergency medical services so I have no experience in tech, but I’m fascinated with it.