If you’ve installed fresh Windows off a usb then process is the same for Linux, and you don’t really need to mess with terminal by just using the Microsoft Store equivalent on the Linux distro you choose. I didn’t find it too different from using Windows or MacOS. I was able to download all my usual programs like Steam and Firefox off the Linux appstore.

But if I had to install a program outside of the Linux store they usually came as a sh or deb file.

If it was deb I’d open terminal where the deb file was and type in sudo dpkg -i filename.deb

And if sh I’d open terminal where the sh file was and type in sh ./name_of_file.sh

That’s pretty much the only terminal commands I’ve needed to know to get started.

When it came to drivers I was lucky enough to have it be pretty much handle everything for me on my old laptop out the box. Main reason I had tried Linux was because Windows ran slow on it, and also an old scanner I had didn’t have drivers that supported it anymore. But, on Linux the scanner just worked.