5 Golden Rules of running into trouble with Linux
				for the newbie

Whenever you run into trouble with your box, let these be your matra.

1. Don't panic. Your problem can be fixed.

2. You don't have to reboot.
    Unlike with other OSes, rebooting is seldomly necessary.
    It also won't fix your problem.
    
    There are five cases when rebooting makes sense:
    1) The system is locked hard
	... and the keyboard is still working (check this by hitting CapsLock
	of NumLock and see if the LEDs are responding):
		use the magic SysRq key combination: hold AltGr-SysRq and press k,s,u,b in order.
	... the keyboard is not working:
		if you have another machine connected to the locked one, try sshing in
		and issuing the shutdown command. You can even do some useful things
		before rebooting.
		Press the Power button briefly. Perhaps ACPI is configured to
		shutdown your machine cleanly.
		Press the reset button. only if the above don't work.
    2) You have built and installed a new kernel (and run /sbin/lilo)
    3) You have repartitioned a hard disk
	Probably not really necessary, but recommended.
    4) There is some problem with the boot process itself. See below for how
	to start fixing things.
    5) You have specifically been instructed to do so by documentation or a
	human helping you.
    
3. You don't have to reinstall.
    Linux systems can run for years without problems and without reinstalling.
    I have yet to see a problem that can't be fixed other than through a
    reinstall. (Running strip * in /usr/lib to save space almost had me that 
    far, but it turned out it was fixable after all.)
    Upgrading can usually be done on a live system.
    Narrow the problem down, and fix the component causing it. 
    Think of children and the bathwater.

    UPDATE: okay, so a friend of mine did it. There is no easy way to recover from:
    mount --bind / /some/where
    cd /some/where
    tar -xz my.tar.gz
    ## something went wrong here ##
    rm -r /some/where/*

4. Errors are your friends.
    Unlike what you might be used to, error messages actually mean someting
    and can tell you where the problem is. 
    Read them, and try to figure out which component is causing them.

5. The solution is out there.
5.1 The solution is right on your box.
    If your system used to work and now it does not, it's likely you did
    something wrong. Look at error messages, logs and configuration files.
    Read manpages, READMEs and HOWTOs and other documentation carefully.
5.2 The solution is out there.
    Someone on the internet is bound to have had a similar problem. Learn how
    and where to search. Start with google and support forums, and proceed to
    newsgroups and IRC. Bookmark or download helpful sites.
5.3 When asking for help, do so in a way that people can actually help you.
    Read "How to ask questions the smart way" and act accordingly.