FWIW: O'Reilly published a Special Edition book LEARNING DEBIAN
GNU/LINUX (c. 1999). It was a very good introduction and step-by-step
guide to installing and using Debian. I got it for free from the Debian
booth at Las Vegas COMDEX 1999. This was the first year Linux had a
major presence at COMDEX. Having the Linux people all in one exhibit
hall greatly simplified my investigations of making the switch from the
Amiga. I still have the book. However, ultimately, I chose Mandrake 7
as my first distro. Debian was not a distro for the noobie, either then
or now.
I wouldn't agree. I started with Debian being a complete noob and I
manage somehow. Actually some of my first experiences were with compiling
the kernel because the one bundled with stable (Lenny) didn't have the
module for my wireless interface :). And I managed to get it to work then
although I suppose the process must've looked funny. I wouldn't try that
today though... Nowadays just about any distro is noob-friendly enough,
perhaps excluding Gentoo and Slackware.
KTB