Satissh S
Youngling
The College had asked us to contribute articles for our department (magazine), I was first working on an article called Online Safety - How to be secure? . But my friend wanted to write an article on it and he took my notes too. Now, Within 2 hours 30 minutes (Yesterday Night 1:30 to 4:00 ) I have to Submit it today! I have written this article "How to Install Linux" . How is it? Any suggestions , corrections , comments are gleefully welcomed! 
Note : Friends please don't waste your time trying to find out from where the above was plagiarised from. I had studied them in my college library and all the above where original. So I cannot post the source and apparently Google hasn't indexed my Brain.
What is Linux?
Linux is the brain child of Linus Torvalds. Developed as a clone to the then popular Unix Operating system, Linux soon gained popularity as a stable and secure OS. Since Linux was sponsored by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) most of the software that came under Linux was authorized by Open source movement or The GNU/GPL public License. This License gave any user the right to change and modify the software. Hence Open Source Softwares are called Freedom wares.
Installation of Linux:
Linux used to be called an operating system for geeks. Just because of its dreaded installation and post-Install configurations it was assumed to be difficult. And people used to think of installing Linux to be equal to going to moon! Not any more! Recent Linux distro’s come with a fresh streamlined GUI for installation. And it’s pretty much a cake walk if one knows the basics. Here in this article we cover installation of Linux in General. Several Distro’s such as Redhat, Mandrake and Suse have their own setup Graphical install utilities whereas Debian base distro’s are usually command line based.
Basic Steps Involved:
1. Downloading the ISO and burning it.
2. Booting using the CD.
3. Setting Locale and preferences such as Language.
4. Selecting the Install type.
5. Partitioning.
6. Configuring Firewall, Setting up a root password and/or creating another User.
7. Selecting packages for Installation.
8. Post Install configuration like X-Server configuration , configuring a soundcard etc.,
9. Installing a Boot Loader and / or creating a boot disk.
10. Updating your Linux System.
Installation:
Downloading ISO from Web:
Linux distributions usually come in the forms of images called .iso which can be burnt using CD writing software such as Nero or K3B or Roxio. When done correctly you’ll get a CD that has the same properties of the ISO. These are usually bootable CD’s that can be booted after POST tests at system startup. There may be several CD’s depending on the Distribution you wish to install and a high speed internet connection is a must.
Booting Using CD:
1. To boot using the CD you created, restart the system and press F2 or Del key as appropriate to your motherboard and enter the bios SETUP utility. Here choose Boot Options, Boot Device Priority, and First Boot Device as CD-ROM or DVD-ROM as appropriate and make sure that it is the drive that u are going to use for the Installation. Note that the exact process for the above operation can vary depending on your bios vendor, but the basic process is the same and you can find your way out easily unless of course if you were sleeping !! Now press F10 to save config and exit SETUP.
2. Now after the CD boots you may see some graphics citing the name of the distribution and that prompting you to press ENTER to start the Installation. If you are on a real hurry to install do so, or wait and let’s Review the various Options. Press F1 for Help menu, F2 for options menu, F3 for Kernel commands menu, F4 for Kernel Arguments if any, F5 for License Agreement. This as usual is also a general procedure and may vary depending on your distro. Now if you want to have a text mode installation type linux text, else if you want to have a graphical installation just press ENTER.
Setting Locale and preferences such as Language:
1.After a few seconds or minutes of continuous text commands running all over the screen you will be taken to graphical or text screens as you chose. These are actually loading of several devices and drivers and kernel commands that find and analyze your system configuration and compatibility. These processes strictly depend on your system specs.
2.Next you will have to set your language, Country, Time Zone etc., Here if you plan to use other OS such as Windows do not select the option “System Clock uses UTC�.
Selecting Install Type:
This too, strictly depends on the Distro you intend to use. Basically there are options to configure your system as Workstation, Server or Home. Select one depending on your usage or just click custom to get our hands dirty and customize our installation.
Partitioning:
NOTE: Back-Up your data before proceeding.
Partitioning used to be the single most dreaded step to installing a linux Distro. Most first time users were left out with a blank hard disk and nothing more. Yes it’s true, you need to have basic understanding of linux file systems to partition manually. Or you can just click automatic partition and select the disks you wish to use for linux and click “Next�.
But if you wish to use other OS such as Windows dual boot, manual partitioning is a must. For most of this process we refer to Disk Druid (redhat partition Utility). But the basic process is same.
Let’s review two of the most popular choices.
1.Linux Stand Alone:
This one is real piece of cake. Just select automatic partitioning and select the partitions you wish to allocate to Linux (Usually an Entire Hard-Disk).
2.Windows Dual boot:
So, finally here comes the tough part (at least for First timers). We’re going to dual boot linux with windows. Here again, we have three choices:
1.The Easiest way to do it is to allocate separate hard disks for Windows and Linux and partition accordingly.
2.If you have two separate partitions on a single hard disk, allocating windows to one partition and dedicate linux to another partition and partition accordingly.
3.The toughest part. Resizing a Windows partition to accommodate linux.
First Option:
This is just a pup’s work! Just select the hard disk you wish to allocate to linux and unselect the window’s hard disk. Select Auto Partitioning. Now you will have partitions created for you. Or you can also select manual partition and partition as follows.
Second Option:
This too is Simple. Do not touch the windows partition. Select the other partition. Click Delete to delete the partition. Now create the following partitions. (Note press undo if you have done something wrong, as this is just a virtual process and nothing is done to your hard drive!)
1.Press new partition button and create a swap partition (No Mount Points) and specify a size twice as the amount of RAM you have.
2.Press new partition and create an Ext3 (Journalized FS) Partition and allocate most of the free space to it. Select mount point as /.
3.If you have any more free space you can allocate some to /home and /usr or /var. (creating them is similar as you’re just going to specify different mount points as /home or /usr or /var).
4.Click “Finish� or “Done� to write changes to disk. Note: You won’t be able to undo the changes once this is done!
Third Option:
So here we are the third option and extra challenge. We are going to resize a windows partition to install linux. Use this method only if you do not have any other choice.
A.) Create a Microsoft Windows Boot disk. To do so, insert a blank floppy on you floppy drive and right click the drive and select format. Click on check box “Create a boot disk� and click “ok� After it’s finished take the floppy out and store it safely. Download the following files from *www.igd.fhg.de/~aschaefe/fips/ . Un-Zip them.
1. FIPS.exe
2. RESTORRB.exe
3. Errors.txt
Copy the above files to the floppy you just created.
Boot using the floppy. When you see the DOS Prompt a :\> run fips command.
E.g: a :\> fips <enter>
B) After the warning sign about not using FIPS on multitasking environment “press any key� to continue.
C) Choose the hard drive you wish to install linux, if you have more than one hard drives.
D) Select the partition you want to split (Fips can only split primary partitions) by selecting the number.
E) You are shown Information about the selected partition and you are asked to create a back-up on the boot disk. Select yes to both the questions. This is for restoring the partition using RESTORRB command.
F) You get a message similar to Writing file a:\rootboot.ooo. If you have any problems you can restore the partition table using this file.
G) Now you can Split the partitions. Use the arrow key to split the partitions into the specified size.
H) Press Enter to confirm. And when asked to confirm press C to continue and Y to write the partition scheme to disk.
Whew! Finally we have completed the resizing of windows partition. Some newer distro’s such as mandrake and suse have their own GUI partition resizing utility and it saves us a lot of sweat!
Now as final step create the linux file systems on the new partition created and were ready for the Installation to proceed.
Configuring Firewall, Setting up a root password and/or creating another User:
Firewall is a critical part of any computer be it a pc or a linux workstation. To avoid unauthorized intrusions to your system a firewall must be installed and properly configured. Fortunately, most linux distro’s come with preinstalled firewall so you just have to configure them.
The best way is to just select automatic and click next. This is also the safest way to browse. If you have to allow access to peer to peer sharing or to use torrents you would have to configure accordingly.
Next give a password for root account. Use the root account only for system administration. Create a non root account for other purposes. Click “Next� to continue.
Selecting packages for Installation:
Now select the packages you wish to install. Usually the default installation has most common and essential packages or if you like you can also select according to your needs. Usually a basic X Server with GNOME or KDE is preferable. Click “Next� and wait for the installation to finish.
Post install configuration:
After the installation we would have to configure Graphics, Sound and Networking. The Set-Up tool will usually detect your configuration by itself. Or if you think it’s incorrect you can select the correct graphics card you have and later configure the xorg.conf file after installing the drivers. This file is located at /etc/X11/ Directory.
Some distro’s may or may not allow you to configure sound during the setup process. This depends on the distro you use. Redhat and mandrake allow you to configure sound during Set-Up process.
You can also configure network and internet settings if your distro’s Set-Up tool has an option.
Installing a Boot Loader and (/ or) creating a boot disk
Some distro’s allow you to configure boot loader options early during the install stages or after the installation. Usually GRUB (Grand Unified boot Loader) or LILO (Linux Loader) is installed on Master Boot Record (MBR) by default. The other OS (Windows) should be detected automatically. If it didn’t then click “New� and type a name for the new item (Windows here for example) and in the path area type “/dev/hda1� and you can also specify if you want it to be the default boot target.
Next you will also have the option of creating the boot disk. This is extremely useful if you have to recover from problems in booting linux.
Updating your Linux System
It is very important to update your system to the very latest in order to ensure optimum performance and also to cover security holes or bug fixes. Each distro usually has its own update utility. For example Red Hat has up2date and Suse has YAST2.
What you have read is just a general installation of a Linux Distro. For specific Instructions see the distro’s manual.
Note : Friends please don't waste your time trying to find out from where the above was plagiarised from. I had studied them in my college library and all the above where original. So I cannot post the source and apparently Google hasn't indexed my Brain.
What is Linux?
Linux is the brain child of Linus Torvalds. Developed as a clone to the then popular Unix Operating system, Linux soon gained popularity as a stable and secure OS. Since Linux was sponsored by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) most of the software that came under Linux was authorized by Open source movement or The GNU/GPL public License. This License gave any user the right to change and modify the software. Hence Open Source Softwares are called Freedom wares.
Installation of Linux:
Linux used to be called an operating system for geeks. Just because of its dreaded installation and post-Install configurations it was assumed to be difficult. And people used to think of installing Linux to be equal to going to moon! Not any more! Recent Linux distro’s come with a fresh streamlined GUI for installation. And it’s pretty much a cake walk if one knows the basics. Here in this article we cover installation of Linux in General. Several Distro’s such as Redhat, Mandrake and Suse have their own setup Graphical install utilities whereas Debian base distro’s are usually command line based.
Basic Steps Involved:
1. Downloading the ISO and burning it.
2. Booting using the CD.
3. Setting Locale and preferences such as Language.
4. Selecting the Install type.
5. Partitioning.
6. Configuring Firewall, Setting up a root password and/or creating another User.
7. Selecting packages for Installation.
8. Post Install configuration like X-Server configuration , configuring a soundcard etc.,
9. Installing a Boot Loader and / or creating a boot disk.
10. Updating your Linux System.
Installation:
Downloading ISO from Web:
Linux distributions usually come in the forms of images called .iso which can be burnt using CD writing software such as Nero or K3B or Roxio. When done correctly you’ll get a CD that has the same properties of the ISO. These are usually bootable CD’s that can be booted after POST tests at system startup. There may be several CD’s depending on the Distribution you wish to install and a high speed internet connection is a must.
Booting Using CD:
1. To boot using the CD you created, restart the system and press F2 or Del key as appropriate to your motherboard and enter the bios SETUP utility. Here choose Boot Options, Boot Device Priority, and First Boot Device as CD-ROM or DVD-ROM as appropriate and make sure that it is the drive that u are going to use for the Installation. Note that the exact process for the above operation can vary depending on your bios vendor, but the basic process is the same and you can find your way out easily unless of course if you were sleeping !! Now press F10 to save config and exit SETUP.
2. Now after the CD boots you may see some graphics citing the name of the distribution and that prompting you to press ENTER to start the Installation. If you are on a real hurry to install do so, or wait and let’s Review the various Options. Press F1 for Help menu, F2 for options menu, F3 for Kernel commands menu, F4 for Kernel Arguments if any, F5 for License Agreement. This as usual is also a general procedure and may vary depending on your distro. Now if you want to have a text mode installation type linux text, else if you want to have a graphical installation just press ENTER.
Setting Locale and preferences such as Language:
1.After a few seconds or minutes of continuous text commands running all over the screen you will be taken to graphical or text screens as you chose. These are actually loading of several devices and drivers and kernel commands that find and analyze your system configuration and compatibility. These processes strictly depend on your system specs.
2.Next you will have to set your language, Country, Time Zone etc., Here if you plan to use other OS such as Windows do not select the option “System Clock uses UTC�.
Selecting Install Type:
This too, strictly depends on the Distro you intend to use. Basically there are options to configure your system as Workstation, Server or Home. Select one depending on your usage or just click custom to get our hands dirty and customize our installation.
Partitioning:
NOTE: Back-Up your data before proceeding.
Partitioning used to be the single most dreaded step to installing a linux Distro. Most first time users were left out with a blank hard disk and nothing more. Yes it’s true, you need to have basic understanding of linux file systems to partition manually. Or you can just click automatic partition and select the disks you wish to use for linux and click “Next�.
But if you wish to use other OS such as Windows dual boot, manual partitioning is a must. For most of this process we refer to Disk Druid (redhat partition Utility). But the basic process is same.
Let’s review two of the most popular choices.
1.Linux Stand Alone:
This one is real piece of cake. Just select automatic partitioning and select the partitions you wish to allocate to Linux (Usually an Entire Hard-Disk).
2.Windows Dual boot:
So, finally here comes the tough part (at least for First timers). We’re going to dual boot linux with windows. Here again, we have three choices:
1.The Easiest way to do it is to allocate separate hard disks for Windows and Linux and partition accordingly.
2.If you have two separate partitions on a single hard disk, allocating windows to one partition and dedicate linux to another partition and partition accordingly.
3.The toughest part. Resizing a Windows partition to accommodate linux.
First Option:
This is just a pup’s work! Just select the hard disk you wish to allocate to linux and unselect the window’s hard disk. Select Auto Partitioning. Now you will have partitions created for you. Or you can also select manual partition and partition as follows.
Second Option:
This too is Simple. Do not touch the windows partition. Select the other partition. Click Delete to delete the partition. Now create the following partitions. (Note press undo if you have done something wrong, as this is just a virtual process and nothing is done to your hard drive!)
1.Press new partition button and create a swap partition (No Mount Points) and specify a size twice as the amount of RAM you have.
2.Press new partition and create an Ext3 (Journalized FS) Partition and allocate most of the free space to it. Select mount point as /.
3.If you have any more free space you can allocate some to /home and /usr or /var. (creating them is similar as you’re just going to specify different mount points as /home or /usr or /var).
4.Click “Finish� or “Done� to write changes to disk. Note: You won’t be able to undo the changes once this is done!
Third Option:
So here we are the third option and extra challenge. We are going to resize a windows partition to install linux. Use this method only if you do not have any other choice.
A.) Create a Microsoft Windows Boot disk. To do so, insert a blank floppy on you floppy drive and right click the drive and select format. Click on check box “Create a boot disk� and click “ok� After it’s finished take the floppy out and store it safely. Download the following files from *www.igd.fhg.de/~aschaefe/fips/ . Un-Zip them.
1. FIPS.exe
2. RESTORRB.exe
3. Errors.txt
Copy the above files to the floppy you just created.
Boot using the floppy. When you see the DOS Prompt a :\> run fips command.
E.g: a :\> fips <enter>
B) After the warning sign about not using FIPS on multitasking environment “press any key� to continue.
C) Choose the hard drive you wish to install linux, if you have more than one hard drives.
D) Select the partition you want to split (Fips can only split primary partitions) by selecting the number.
E) You are shown Information about the selected partition and you are asked to create a back-up on the boot disk. Select yes to both the questions. This is for restoring the partition using RESTORRB command.
F) You get a message similar to Writing file a:\rootboot.ooo. If you have any problems you can restore the partition table using this file.
G) Now you can Split the partitions. Use the arrow key to split the partitions into the specified size.
H) Press Enter to confirm. And when asked to confirm press C to continue and Y to write the partition scheme to disk.
Whew! Finally we have completed the resizing of windows partition. Some newer distro’s such as mandrake and suse have their own GUI partition resizing utility and it saves us a lot of sweat!
Now as final step create the linux file systems on the new partition created and were ready for the Installation to proceed.
Configuring Firewall, Setting up a root password and/or creating another User:
Firewall is a critical part of any computer be it a pc or a linux workstation. To avoid unauthorized intrusions to your system a firewall must be installed and properly configured. Fortunately, most linux distro’s come with preinstalled firewall so you just have to configure them.
The best way is to just select automatic and click next. This is also the safest way to browse. If you have to allow access to peer to peer sharing or to use torrents you would have to configure accordingly.
Next give a password for root account. Use the root account only for system administration. Create a non root account for other purposes. Click “Next� to continue.
Selecting packages for Installation:
Now select the packages you wish to install. Usually the default installation has most common and essential packages or if you like you can also select according to your needs. Usually a basic X Server with GNOME or KDE is preferable. Click “Next� and wait for the installation to finish.
Post install configuration:
After the installation we would have to configure Graphics, Sound and Networking. The Set-Up tool will usually detect your configuration by itself. Or if you think it’s incorrect you can select the correct graphics card you have and later configure the xorg.conf file after installing the drivers. This file is located at /etc/X11/ Directory.
Some distro’s may or may not allow you to configure sound during the setup process. This depends on the distro you use. Redhat and mandrake allow you to configure sound during Set-Up process.
You can also configure network and internet settings if your distro’s Set-Up tool has an option.
Installing a Boot Loader and (/ or) creating a boot disk
Some distro’s allow you to configure boot loader options early during the install stages or after the installation. Usually GRUB (Grand Unified boot Loader) or LILO (Linux Loader) is installed on Master Boot Record (MBR) by default. The other OS (Windows) should be detected automatically. If it didn’t then click “New� and type a name for the new item (Windows here for example) and in the path area type “/dev/hda1� and you can also specify if you want it to be the default boot target.
Next you will also have the option of creating the boot disk. This is extremely useful if you have to recover from problems in booting linux.
Updating your Linux System
It is very important to update your system to the very latest in order to ensure optimum performance and also to cover security holes or bug fixes. Each distro usually has its own update utility. For example Red Hat has up2date and Suse has YAST2.
What you have read is just a general installation of a Linux Distro. For specific Instructions see the distro’s manual.
