Alright so i wrote this guide because i have read to many forum posts on other forums about users having bad experience in Linux, so to help stop this i decided to write this guide.
Step 1: Make sure you understand that Linux is not Windows and will most likely not do all the things Windows can, whilst it cant run Windows executables it makes up for this in having a large open source developer community, who luckily for Linux user create powerful equivalents to these Windows programs
Step 2: Choose a Linux Distribution that suits your needs. If you are new to the whole GNU/Linux concept i highly recommend that you make sure the distribution you get has a GUI, there are many GUI's available for Linux users, my favorite is Fluxbox as it is minimalistic. If you have a netbook get puppy linux, if you have a desktop get ubuntu or something like that. http://net11.web-ready.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/ftp.png This is a picture of the linux command line without any GUI.
Step 3: Join a Linux based forum so if you run into any problems you can ask the forum but once you know your way around help out the people who were once in your position. Linux forums are normally perfectly happy to help first time users.
Step 4: Search around for tools that are equal to the tools you need that are windows rather than going back to windows. As i said earlier there are many open source equivalents that in my opinion are better than their Microsoft only counterparts.
Step 5: Don't run any commands in "Terminal" that users say will give you "Cool Effects" if it sounds to true to be good it probably is. If there are a lot of users who have said "yes this works thanks" then you can start to think about the legitimacy of the command however do a Google search first before entering the command. Some commands such as the following will do damage to your system.
NOTE DO NOT RUN THE FOLLOWING COMMANDS!!!
rm -rf / rm -rf . rm -rf *
If you see this command as advice do not run it as it will delete everything in the folder and everything above that folder.
mkfs mkfs.ext3 mkfs.anything
This command above will reformat your partition to ext3 and cause loss of data as said above do not run this command.
Step 6: Have fun and most of all customize, Linux is one of the most customize-able platforms in existence. You can make it look as awesome as you want so if it looks a bit ugly at the start, just stick with it and change it so your are happy with it.
For Linux distributions i recommend the following:
Puppy Linux for netbooks, it really light and comes with all the things a netbook needs already installed. Not to mention the ISO file is tiny, roughly 200 MB. http://www.puppylinux.org/
Ubuntu for desktops, its like a blank canvas and has a very large community. Ubuntu can be obtained from http://www.ubuntu.com/ .http://linux.softpedia.com/screenshots/Ubuntu-NextG_1.jpg
Ultimate Edition for desktops, Ultimate edition is the best thing since sliced bread its got everything you can think of that is open source its what i recommend to all people who want to DL a Linux Distro.
SO in conclusion if you aren't happy with the distribution switch and try another one.
Links:
"Guide to not getting fucked on linux" By Chroniccommand