The standard installation of Fedora should install OpenJDK (based off of Sun Java). However if not, it can be installed using YUM:

[Chris@Chris ~]$ sudo yum install java-1.6.0-openjdk 
java-1.6.0-openjdk-plugin

With OpenJDK installed, Java application and Web applets should automatically work. Unfortunately some applets may not run properly and the OpenJDK might have some limitations. Majority of user should find OpenJDK perfect for everyday use.

Using Sun (Oracle) Java Instead

Continue reading →

Fedora, like all other Linux distributions, has a root user and has individual users. The root is the “superuser”, somewhat similar to “Administrator” in Windows.

Use the personal account you created at First Boot for daily use. You should use ‘root’ only for administration/configuration. To run as ‘root’ use su or sudo commands. However sudo requires setup. As root run:

echo 'loginname ALL=(ALL) ALL' >> /etc/sudoers

Where 'loginname' is your user account.
Use 'ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL' if you don't want to be prompted a password.
If you are prompted for a password with 'sudo' it is the user password, 
not root.

Example:

[chris@chris ~]$ su
Password:    <--- Enter root password

[root@chris ~]# echo 'chris ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL' >> /etc/sudoers
[root@chris ~]# exit
exit

The following is an example of how sudo lets you execute root commands:

[chris@chris ~]$ du -sh /root
du: `/root': Permission denied  <--- Fails!!!

[chris@chris ~]$ sudo du -sh /root
163M    /root                   <--- Works!!!