UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

All i no about telnet is that hackers use it, and it uses shells etc

but when i dont even know what a shell is im kinda stuck ah?

Telnet is a type of server I believe that unix users use to send email to each other.. it was generally used before the web and and hackers and all the new forms of email available like ssh which is a secure form of telnet type email proxy.. which has something to do with networks.. today networks don't tend to use telnet as much because it is so easy to hack... they use ssh and other more secure forms of network email.. as for your other question.. the best way I can describe a shell to you is by mentioning the two main shells you will be working with on the command line.. the bourne shell (sh) and the bourne again shell (bash) each of these and a few others are the basic commad line you are working with and the processes in them.. a parent shell is the shell you started a specif task before envoking another type of shell or a child process (shell) which means that it is part of the parent shell and belongs only to the shell that you envoked it from .. if you have three terminals up and envoke a chiid process to terminal 2 that is said to be the parent shell....each terminal is a shell and each shell can be a bash shell, a bourne shell and amongst the few others I would worry about a csh shell (c shell for programming)....
hope that helps... and if was't it clear enough holler! there are plenty of users on this site who know exactly what they are talking about..and would be glad to explain it to you some more..
moxxx68

Thank you very much for your reply, im sure ill understand it abit better when im more awake

telnet is also on windows systems tho? Can you connect directly to someones computer via telnet? Does it have file transfer properties to it? like FTP

Unix is so confusing sumtime, need a coffie i think

thanks for spending the time to explain moxxx68

yes I believe that you can connect directly to another computer via telnet through a main server.. it has file transfer capabilities but unlike FTP its capabilities are less powerful than direct FTP file transfer something to do with how much data you are transfering in the file.. FTP is the prefered file transfer protocol...so basically the file transfer properties of telnet are not like FTP which does precisley that transfer data from one machine to another while Telnet is mainly used for email.. also telnet was probably being used years before windows came out or the public had access to the internet.. and it was used by unix users.. at the time when .edu and .gov was all that there was on the internet and telenet has been around for far longer than the world wide web of today and unix has been around since the beginning in 1969... microsoft has only been around since 1985 so truly telnet is a unix thing so is FTP and so on.... then there was linux!!!
moxxx68

thanks for that information, iv come the the conclusion that telnet is pritty crap and old lol it was sumthing in the back of my mind botherin me coz i remember a few years back on a site called hack3r they used to have servers/box's were people could telnet to and try and hack etc, and iv always been interested since then

i sit here at my desk wonderin were the nets goin to go, and if one day windows will just be a memory as unix takes over! thats why i want to learn now, while im young... iv seen courses for unix, and they cost about £3k and iv seen the jobs as well! £40k!!! thats why im so interested and so glade i can learn from people like your self

thank you very much for your time and effort

dear epic.admin i am glad i could help and only have two pieces of advice for you.. first i am a self taught newbie who has only been into unix for a year and into computers for about 5 otr 6.. if you put your mind to it you can really accomplish alot and learn quick its just a matter of wanting to learn as you do!.. and second read, read books, media and use the man pages after a while even chinese is comprehensible at first i couldn't understand anything from the man pages now i have a file with a collection of different man pages on specific commands that I am reading up on and belive me after a while a little trial and error and some experimentation you'll get it.. reading is the most you can do and with unix its a snap because you can just keep adding new tricks to the ones you learn as you go along.. it never stops...
over and out moxxx68
and good luck!

moxx....this is just wrong. Good try, but keep reading your books