My friend and former coworker Joe Audette has posted an article on setting up a development environment for Mono.  Joe has worked primarily with Microsoft technology over the last several years, and has only recently begun his descent into the Linux domain.  As he completes this series of articles, I'm sure he will provide many bits of wisdom to anyone who wishes to make the same journey.

Setting Up a Development Environment for mono - Part 1 Choosing and Installing a GNU/Linux Distro