Newbie looking for some answers please...........

[chadCan@gmail.com (Chad)]

I just installed Debian 3.0 r3. I'm a newbie and looking for some
anwers to some of my questions...if someone can anwser one, some, or
all Please....

1. I know that apt-get is the main utility to add and remove programs
(in Debian anyways), also to veiw what is installed on your OS. But
what about other packages or applications that are not installed
through apt-get. Is there a another utility to tell you want is all
installed on your OS, or to keep track of all
software/packages/applications installed?

2. How do you check for all running services and how to start/stop
system services that are unused?

3. How do you check for all open ports and what programs are using the
ports.

4. What is the common folder Where most software/packages/applications
installed into?

5. Anyone has a good site for descriptions of the configuration files
on a linux system. For Example XF86Config-4. I have no idea of what
configuration files do what or where they are located.

6. Where is the boot files? So I can control or know what programs
start at boot.