Every other forum has rules about these posts because there's such a glut of them, and yes, I could go read a stickied thread elsewhere, but here I am not doing that.
How would someone with no computer skills get acquainted with the OS? What version would you recommend to the hopeless novice? Can I keep windows on my PC and run the new OS or a practice version of it in a partitioned space while I learn? Can someone with minimal skills/time/patience be happy with a unix-like OS?
I'd say you can get acquainted simply by using it and learning as you do so. I'd recommend either Ubuntu or Manjaro as these are the two that I've used for more than a few hours and are straightforward to install and use. Both Ubuntu and Manjaro have instructions for installation on their websites on creating a bootable USB for installation, the installation wizard will walk you through the process and give you the option of installing it in a separate partition. It is also possible to just run the os from the thumb drive itself to get a feel of it before you install.
It's perfectly possible, getting certain games to run might be challenging but for the most part of surfing the web, answering emails, creating documents/spreadsheets/slides I almost don't notice the difference
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