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| Version | User | Scope of changes |
|---|---|---|
| Feb 15 2008, 2:28 PM EST (current) | Tuxthepenguin | 1424 words added |
| Feb 15 2008, 2:20 PM EST | Tuxthepenguin |
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Key: Additions Deletions
Basic guide to installing linux.
How to create a $0 computer.
What is Linux? Linux was created to be a powerful and free OS (operating system), driven by the community rather than sales (or greedy super-ceos). Linux has been basically the same over the years. However in this time, the graphical user interfaces (such as GNOME and X, but ill talk about those more later) have made it as, If not more, than today’s cutting edge OSes from Microsoft and Macintosh.
Common misconceptions about Linux.
1) Its hard to use
This may have been true in the past, but in some cases it is MORE user friendly than windows xp/vista. (Why am I not mentioning Macintosh? Because ultimately Macintosh IS Linux, yep that is right. Steve job’s OS, famed for usability, is based off of Linux.)
2) I have programs that only run on windows, so I can’t use Linux.
Wrong again, there are many programs that are for windows/Linux compatibility. Such as WINE (an acronym for “wine is not an emulator” which it is) which allows you to run windows .exe files on Linux with a certain degree of compatibility. There are other programs such as samba which allow network interfacing between Linux and windows computers.
3) Linux requires the use of the “terminal” as well as a bunch of different commands.
Again, not completely true…… Although many people (such as myself) use the “shell” (terminal) because we find it easier to use and it is necessary for the things we do, it is not necessary with GUIs (graphical user interface) such as Gnome, x, or KDE.
So, how do I install it?
First you must identify your hardware, this doesn’t mean you have to crack open your computer and see exactly what kind of hardware you have, its as simple as determining your “architecture” .
So here are the basic architectures
I386 This basically covers most of the computers in the world, this will work with any 32 or 64 bit processor. This is your computer if you have any Pentium 1-4, a Celeron, or any other generic, non 64 bit, processor. Also true for any non-64 bit AMD processor (almost all AMD processors have 64 bit variants so I’m not going to list them.) Statistically speaking, there is a 70% chance this is what your computer is, however if it is not then its one of the ones below.
64bit (also known as “AMD 64”) If you have a Pentium processor this usually WILL NOT work with your computer, this will only work if you have an amd 64 bit processor running on a 64 bit Front side bus. I would only suggest this if you KNOW your computer has these two vital components. If in doubt, got with an I386 version, they are backwards compatible. But if you know your computer will work with this, then it will make your computer run a lot faster.
PowerPC (macintosh) This will work for any kind of Macintosh.
Xbox/playstation 3/other yes you can load Linux on your console system. However I wouldn’t suggest it unless you REALLY know what you are doing….
There are other architectures, but they are almost exclusively on purpose-built servers…..
Obtaining install media
This is basically the disk which your computer will “boot” off of in order to install the OS to your hard drive.
you must either order the CDs or burn them to a cd, either way its free, you must pay for the shipping of the CDs however, so burning them is usually a cheaper option.
If you provide me (Grayson head) with a CD I can make copies of any of the distributions listed below, in addition to a few others.
Ubuntu - https://help.ubuntu.com/community/GettingUbuntu
Fedora Core- http://fedoraproject.org/get-fedora Note how x86 and AMD 64 are on the same disk, that disk should work for either architecture.
OpenSUSE- http://software.opensuse.org/
Those are the three distributions (subdivisions) of linux I would suggest. I’m not going to say which one is “better” as basically, they are the same thing. Ubuntu is probably the easiest to use, but I like Fedora for its flexibility and security. openSUSE is also a good distro if you want an easy to use interface.
Choosing GUI
Shortly after installing one of the three distributions listed above, you will get a choice between 3 GUIs, being GNOME, KDE, and “X”. This step may be kind of out of order, but it would be best to decide now so you know what to do after you get your install media set-up. GNOME is probably the most advanced of the three, however, it also is the most resource “hungry”. If you are running on a computer with less than 256 of ram, or anything less than a Pentium 3 or AMD with a speed of less than 1.0GHZ, you should probably choose to run KDE or X instead. The reason that im touching on this now is that certain distributions require you to choose which GUI you will use from the install portion of this.
However, should you choose the KDE CD option if you install fedora core and do not want to use GNOME.
Installing
Opensuse:
http://en.opensuse.org/INSTALL_Local
Fedora Core:
http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/f8/en_US/
(I will provide a simpler and complete walkthrough on Fedora Core 8 in the near future.)
Ubuntu:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation#head-a4ce2efae45e59e9c2d668173338133ac2e755e4
As with almost all linux distributions, these contain very simple easy to use GUIs for installing.
To start the install process you may need to set your BIOS (basic intelligent operating system) to allow booting from a CD drive. Guide is here: http://www.hiren.info/pages/bios-boot-cdrom
Note: If done wrong then there is a slight chance your computer might not function properly. If your computer does get temporarily messed up, it is easily reversible by opening up the computer and popping out the watch sized battery on the motherboard (the main part of the computer) with the power DISCONNECTED for 15-20 minutes then plugging it back in. The memory of the CMOS (stores data that can be edited by the bios) is volatile (will not store data unless there is power) so removing that power source will reset it back to factory defaults, which will work.
Partitioning
You can set the installer to partition automatically, but in case you want to partition it manually to utilize the best of your space, I will describe more in-depth here.
/root partition, also known as simply “/”.- This is the equivalent of your windows C:/ drive, it contains all of your operating system information. Minimum of 3 gigabytes, no maximum
/ boot – this contains the information that certain boot loaders use. Usually 256 megabytes give or take.
/swap - this portion of the drive is used as ram, I would suggest a 256 megabyte minimum and a 1.5 gigabyte maximum, although theoretically you can assign it to whatever size you want.
Others:
You can also mount a drive to a subdirectory of /root, for example.
/home is inside of /root, this the location would be /root/home. You can mount /home to a different portion of the hard drive outside of /root. (home is comparable to “my documents”
So in the partitioner you can assign any subfolder of root, to a different partition to changing the mounting location to …/*whateverfoldernameyouwanthere* the advantages of having a different partition for /home is that if your /root partition is somehow ruined, all of the information in /home is safe and can still be used when the os is repaired.
If you choose to mount a folder in this fashion, look for the “mount location” in the partitioner window after you have chosen to modify a partition.
Install!
After this step, its time to install the operating systems files to your hard drive….this is an automated process and does not require close monitoring unless you are using more than 1 cd/dvd.
Enjoy!
After the install step, there is usually a configuration program that appears after words that should walk you through some basic operating system settings.
You will find after learning some basic functions that the operating system is easy to use, and the best part is, its reliable and installing new features is easy!
Some basic guides can be found on your distributions website, I will provide some more in-depth guides in the future. Most operating systems have a guide that pops up when your operating system first starts as well that provides a basic guide for using the operating system.
I will be writing some more in-depth guides in the future.
A local Linux freak.
-Grayson Head
How to create a $0 computer.
What is Linux? Linux was created to be a powerful and free OS (operating system), driven by the community rather than sales (or greedy super-ceos). Linux has been basically the same over the years. However in this time, the graphical user interfaces (such as GNOME and X, but ill talk about those more later) have made it as, If not more, than today’s cutting edge OSes from Microsoft and Macintosh.
Common misconceptions about Linux.
1) Its hard to use
This may have been true in the past, but in some cases it is MORE user friendly than windows xp/vista. (Why am I not mentioning Macintosh? Because ultimately Macintosh IS Linux, yep that is right. Steve job’s OS, famed for usability, is based off of Linux.)
2) I have programs that only run on windows, so I can’t use Linux.
Wrong again, there are many programs that are for windows/Linux compatibility. Such as WINE (an acronym for “wine is not an emulator” which it is) which allows you to run windows .exe files on Linux with a certain degree of compatibility. There are other programs such as samba which allow network interfacing between Linux and windows computers.
3) Linux requires the use of the “terminal” as well as a bunch of different commands.
Again, not completely true…… Although many people (such as myself) use the “shell” (terminal) because we find it easier to use and it is necessary for the things we do, it is not necessary with GUIs (graphical user interface) such as Gnome, x, or KDE.
So, how do I install it?
First you must identify your hardware, this doesn’t mean you have to crack open your computer and see exactly what kind of hardware you have, its as simple as determining your “architecture” .
So here are the basic architectures
I386 This basically covers most of the computers in the world, this will work with any 32 or 64 bit processor. This is your computer if you have any Pentium 1-4, a Celeron, or any other generic, non 64 bit, processor. Also true for any non-64 bit AMD processor (almost all AMD processors have 64 bit variants so I’m not going to list them.) Statistically speaking, there is a 70% chance this is what your computer is, however if it is not then its one of the ones below.
64bit (also known as “AMD 64”) If you have a Pentium processor this usually WILL NOT work with your computer, this will only work if you have an amd 64 bit processor running on a 64 bit Front side bus. I would only suggest this if you KNOW your computer has these two vital components. If in doubt, got with an I386 version, they are backwards compatible. But if you know your computer will work with this, then it will make your computer run a lot faster.
PowerPC (macintosh) This will work for any kind of Macintosh.
Xbox/playstation 3/other yes you can load Linux on your console system. However I wouldn’t suggest it unless you REALLY know what you are doing….
There are other architectures, but they are almost exclusively on purpose-built servers…..
Obtaining install media
This is basically the disk which your computer will “boot” off of in order to install the OS to your hard drive.
you must either order the CDs or burn them to a cd, either way its free, you must pay for the shipping of the CDs however, so burning them is usually a cheaper option.
If you provide me (Grayson head) with a CD I can make copies of any of the distributions listed below, in addition to a few others.
Ubuntu - https://help.ubuntu.com/community/GettingUbuntu
Fedora Core- http://fedoraproject.org/get-fedora Note how x86 and AMD 64 are on the same disk, that disk should work for either architecture.
OpenSUSE- http://software.opensuse.org/
Those are the three distributions (subdivisions) of linux I would suggest. I’m not going to say which one is “better” as basically, they are the same thing. Ubuntu is probably the easiest to use, but I like Fedora for its flexibility and security. openSUSE is also a good distro if you want an easy to use interface.
Choosing GUI
Shortly after installing one of the three distributions listed above, you will get a choice between 3 GUIs, being GNOME, KDE, and “X”. This step may be kind of out of order, but it would be best to decide now so you know what to do after you get your install media set-up. GNOME is probably the most advanced of the three, however, it also is the most resource “hungry”. If you are running on a computer with less than 256 of ram, or anything less than a Pentium 3 or AMD with a speed of less than 1.0GHZ, you should probably choose to run KDE or X instead. The reason that im touching on this now is that certain distributions require you to choose which GUI you will use from the install portion of this.
However, should you choose the KDE CD option if you install fedora core and do not want to use GNOME.
Installing
Opensuse:
http://en.opensuse.org/INSTALL_Local
Fedora Core:
http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/f8/en_US/
(I will provide a simpler and complete walkthrough on Fedora Core 8 in the near future.)
Ubuntu:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation#head-a4ce2efae45e59e9c2d668173338133ac2e755e4
As with almost all linux distributions, these contain very simple easy to use GUIs for installing.
To start the install process you may need to set your BIOS (basic intelligent operating system) to allow booting from a CD drive. Guide is here: http://www.hiren.info/pages/bios-boot-cdrom
Note: If done wrong then there is a slight chance your computer might not function properly. If your computer does get temporarily messed up, it is easily reversible by opening up the computer and popping out the watch sized battery on the motherboard (the main part of the computer) with the power DISCONNECTED for 15-20 minutes then plugging it back in. The memory of the CMOS (stores data that can be edited by the bios) is volatile (will not store data unless there is power) so removing that power source will reset it back to factory defaults, which will work.
Partitioning
You can set the installer to partition automatically, but in case you want to partition it manually to utilize the best of your space, I will describe more in-depth here.
/root partition, also known as simply “/”.- This is the equivalent of your windows C:/ drive, it contains all of your operating system information. Minimum of 3 gigabytes, no maximum
/ boot – this contains the information that certain boot loaders use. Usually 256 megabytes give or take.
/swap - this portion of the drive is used as ram, I would suggest a 256 megabyte minimum and a 1.5 gigabyte maximum, although theoretically you can assign it to whatever size you want.
Others:
You can also mount a drive to a subdirectory of /root, for example.
/home is inside of /root, this the location would be /root/home. You can mount /home to a different portion of the hard drive outside of /root. (home is comparable to “my documents”
So in the partitioner you can assign any subfolder of root, to a different partition to changing the mounting location to …/*whateverfoldernameyouwanthere* the advantages of having a different partition for /home is that if your /root partition is somehow ruined, all of the information in /home is safe and can still be used when the os is repaired.
If you choose to mount a folder in this fashion, look for the “mount location” in the partitioner window after you have chosen to modify a partition.
Install!
After this step, its time to install the operating systems files to your hard drive….this is an automated process and does not require close monitoring unless you are using more than 1 cd/dvd.
Enjoy!
After the install step, there is usually a configuration program that appears after words that should walk you through some basic operating system settings.
You will find after learning some basic functions that the operating system is easy to use, and the best part is, its reliable and installing new features is easy!
Some basic guides can be found on your distributions website, I will provide some more in-depth guides in the future. Most operating systems have a guide that pops up when your operating system first starts as well that provides a basic guide for using the operating system.
I will be writing some more in-depth guides in the future.
A local Linux freak.
-Grayson Head
