No 
and don’t worry, i’m not offended by anything you’ve written.
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Phew! Also just keep searching and asking. Eventually you will just learn the ropes, and become more familiar with how a command line works. Don’t worry. No one knows how EVERYTHING works! 
NICE!!! You have now unlocked the potential of the Gameshell!!
The command line is great to use, but if you just want to transfer say, Roms or anything over. Sometimes it’s easier to use a GUI. A popular one I see lots of windows users using is FileZilla. I don’t use it so can’t really offer much help, but it makes dragging and dropping files much more intuitive. Without it, you will need go manually type in source and destinations for copies files.
Just writing this in advance, in case you ever need to run a program, since it’s a thing a lot of users who are new to Linux ace problems with.
You will need to change the mode of a file to allow of to execute.
You do this by typing
chmod +x ~/filename
Then to run it you type
./filename
(Obviously change the file name as required)
Be prepared to be very patient. You will no doubt accidentally break your installation, making your gameshell unable to boot, or run incorrectly. Don’t worry. Everyone does it. It’s how we learn new things; by taking risks, delving into the unknown. Sometimes it’s faster to just reflash your image and start from scratch when that happens.
Before doing too much, do you know how to flash an image to your SD card?
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No. that’s another word I’ve been trying to define 
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Sorry I was afk all day! I’m so glad you got more help though. Thanks javelinface!
If this is what I think, it is actually typing but will not show the characters for security reasons.
Also, welcome to the world of Linux. This is where I do all of my computing 
even my desktop and laptops are linux haha.
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It’s fine, live your life! 
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but where do you get a Linux laptop?
Ah!
So starting with a few things.
When we want to back things up, we make something called an “image”, which might be a format looking like this: gameshell.img.
This is like a complete backed up snapshot of what the SD card files look like.
This can be big, so people usually compress the file to make it smaller and easier to download. You may have come across zip, rar, 7z, gzip file extension. By default, a lot of the image files for the gameshell come as bz2. So the file looks like this: gameshell.img.bz2.
You will need to have a program that can decompress the file into its original form, ie: gameshell.img.
I used to use WinRar back in the days of using windows.
So that’s file formats sorted. Now flashing!
SD micro cards are the media the Gameshell uses to store information. We can use the image file above fo make our SD card have the exact files as someone else, if we overwrite everything with what is on a pre made image. This is the process known as Flashing.
You will need to use a program to write these files. A popular choice is etcher: https://www.balena.io/etcher/
The thing is, every operating system (eg windows, Mac, Linux etc) needs to have whatever drive it is installed on formatted a certain way. Think of this like how a farmer will need to till the soil and have certain nutrients for different crops.
The gameshell uses the Linux operating system, so uses the ext4 file system. This is not the same as what windows uses: NTFS, FAT, exFAT etc. for this reason, you won’t be able to read what is on a gameshell SD card directly on a Windows machine, without third party software. That is why we SSH into the gameshell to do any modifications.
You don’t have to worry about setting the file system used. The image takes care of that, as it is a complete image of a complete operating system, including its file system.
Hopefully that clears up some basics re: flashing images.
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Now days there are a handful of places you can get them online. System76 and Purism being the ones I know off the top of my head.
I actually just wipe Windows off the harddrive and install it myself. Since Linux Distributions are generally free, it is easy to get and try a bunch before settling on one you like.
I use Fedora now days 
other popular options are Manjaro, Pop!OS, Ubuntu or ElementaryOS. Of course Arch linux should get mention but Manjaro is like a streamlined Arch anyway.
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Just like using an image, you can actually install different operating systems over your existing operating system. In particular, you can install Linux on almost anything. It comes in a variety of “flavours” so to speak. Debian is the one the Gameshell uses.
There are even ways to install MacOS on a windows machine. This was called making a “Hackintosh” computer.
Ah haha @tor.sh already answered it! Right. I’ll palm you over to tor. Bed time for me! Good luck, and have fun! Take it slowly and don’t get overwhelmed! You’ll get there!
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Didn’t mean to interrupt or anything. thought it was directed at me 
Your explanations are more clear though.
Sleep well!
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Haha, you were 100% right! Just wasn’t sure if you were awake to respond. Didn’t mean to step on your toes either!! Everyone’s here to help which is fantastic.
In fact, a lot of this can be the basis of which to help out future beginners with the basics. Even as something to include in the ever populated wiki.
Hearing what a new user wants to know is vital in knowing what to include. @gameshell1, your questions are no doubt the same ones every new user wants to ask, but doesn’t get around to doing.
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Thanks for the summary! So, just to make sure I’m understanding you, first I need to download a program like the one at
, then run it, and create an image thingy? Sorry if I offend you in any way, I read your whole explanation a few times (not to imply that you’re a bad writer or ANYTHING like that; you’re not a bad writer), I probably just have a short attention span 
Exactly! I had the benefit of using Linux and raspberry pi’s and related tech so onboarding was simple for me. But this stuff can be so alien for new users and it would be a shame for them not to get the help they need 
These forums definitely have some great folks helping out. Where is the wiki? Is that new?
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Haha I medically have an EXTREMELY short attention span, so get where you’re coming from.
Etcher is used fo write the image, as opposed to creating images. You don’t need to make an image so to speak “YET” - do that once you get things customised just the way you want things. 
You’ll want to have a copy of the latest OS on hand to write to the SD as well as the Etcher program. The new Os 0.5 is no doubt newer than your current one, with many new features.
You don’t even need to write it on the 16GB card your game shell came with. You can buy a new larger one from the shop as long as it’s at least a class 10 SD micro card.
@tor.sh Yeah! The wiki is being populated by a new user. It’s coming along nicely.
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Thanks Hopefully we’ll get even more Gameshell users because of these posts
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Oh! I did see this! Totally forgot about it 
I have it bookmarked on my desktop (currently mobile)
@gameshell1 if you didn’t know, there is also a discord server for more live discussion too. (Discord is a chat application)
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Alright, going to download image file.
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Downloading it to my Windows computer. Then I’ll transfer it to my Gameshell through SSH. (Feel free to correct me.)
The OS image file? Or PyGame?
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image file. But can I download pygame now?