Detailed Tutorial

Linux Installation Guide and Tutorial

What is Linux?
Why should I get Linux?
Installing Linux
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Using Linux
A list of commands
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What is Linux? Linux is a Command-based OS, just like DOS. But it can also be a GUI [Graphical User Interface] with a properly configured X-Windows GNOME or KDE [K Desktop Environment]. Linux makes a perfect server and/or router, because Linux was specifically made for security, which means it has NO viruses! which means NO anti-viruses!Why should I get Linux? You should get Linux if you want to start Programming computers. Also, almost everything on Linux is free [my footsteps, again], so you can get a lot of things. Linux also comes with advanced art and word editors, and is chosen over Windoze to design websites. It has nicer GUI's than Windoze [my opinion], and most importantly, IT IS A TRUE mutli-tasking OS. This is one fast system, the programs pop up almost instantly. Installing Linux Here are the detailed steps of installing Linux: 1)Make a directory inside of your c:/ drive named download. [NOTE: all instructions will be based on this directory so do it!] 2)Get the two ISO images from the RedHat FTP site which is located here. Download the files: enigma-i386-disc1.iso and enigma-i386-disc2.iso[NOTE: This should be only installed if you have a fast connection, each image is more than half a gig!]. Once they are downloaded save them to the download directory 3)Get the CDrecord software. I have this on my website, which is here. Than extract the file into the download directory 'c:\download'. Now how to use this program. Load a blank CD inside the CD burner. Than open cdrecord by opening up the DOS command screen by selecting run from the start menu and typing in command. When the DOS screen pops up, type in: 'cd \download' , than 'cdrecord'. You should see a whole bunch of commands. Now type in : cdrecord -scanbus . It should tell you coordinates [eg. 1,0,0]. Now, type in [make sure first blank disc is in] cdrecord dev=COORDINATES -v speed=16 c:\download\enigma-i386-disc1.iso .Congratulations, You started burning the cd :-). Now when that is done, do it with the second one. 4)When all of that is finished, you will need to [heres the bad part] re partition your drive, unless you want to make your whole computer the Linux system [NOTE: If you want this to happen than you can't have windows]. IF YOU WANT TO RE PARTITION YOUR DRIVE GO ON. I recommend the Partition Magic software which can be found at the PowerQuest website. Now, Re-partition your drive so that the smaller partition has at LEAST 4 gigs of space [NOTE: THE SPACE YOU SELECT THE SMALLER PARTITION TO HAVE WILL BE THE HARD DRIVE SPACE OF YOUR LINUX MACHINE]. After that is done, reboot to make the partition changes. 5)Format a floppy by open the DOS command prompt. Type in 'format a:'. Insert a floppy than press enter. Wait until it is finished formatting, then remove it from the drive and close the command prompt. 6)Now, a more easier part. Open the command prompt again. Now type in : 'd:' than 'cd dosutils'. next, type in 'rawrite'. It should ask you for an image source of some sort. For that part, type in: 'd:\images\boot.img'. It should ask you to insert a formatted floppy, just insert the floppy we formatted earlier, and press enter. It should start writing it. when its finished doing it, exit the command prompt. [NOTE: YOU WOULD PROBABLY WANT TO RIGHT DOWN THE REST OF THIS STARTING AT THIS POINT, YOU WONT HAVE ANY INTERNET WHILE INSTALLING LINUX.] 7)Now you will have to start the installation by rebooting with the FIRST burned cd inside of its drive, and the floppy we just made. When both are inserted, than just reboot your machine, and the installation should pop up. 8)Go through the installation, for the keyboard put in generic, for the mouse select 2 button PS2 and have it emulate the three button. When it prompts you to make a username, use root for yourself and make a password. This will be your login password and root as your username. I recommended you use KDE instead of Gnome. The type of Linux your installing is 'Custom'. The hardest part I believe is Disk Druid. Just give a visit to: The disk druid manual. At the end of the whole installation you would want to make a boot Floppy. Just enter the floppy we used for rawrite. Your all set with Linux. Using Linux Now, login to Linux with the boot Floppy. When it asks you username to login , type in root. For password write in the password you chose. [NOTE: WHEN YOU TYPE IN THE PASSWORD, YOU WONT SEE LETTERS OR *****, NOTHING WILL MOVE, THIS IS NORMAL.] Now to configure your GUI, go into windows and go under your display settings, and look for your video card, or your video adapter. Now right down the name of the card or adapter, and go ahead and reboot. Now, the next step is to log in with root, and type in: Xconfiguration and just follow everything it asks you. When it asks you for your resolution, dont pick large numbers. When everything is configured, type in the screen 'startx'. Now you should see a KDE sign pop up. You are now running KDE. A list of common commands 1)shutdown shutdown shuts down and reboots or halts a system shutdown -r now reboots a system immediately. You can also specify a time to reboot say shutdown -r 09:30 shutdown -h now halts your system so you can turn it off. You must halt a system to turn it off. 2)ls - shows the content of your current directly. ls -l shows the files in long format i.e. the owner of the file, rights etc. ls -a show hidden files like .bash_profile which does not show up with regular ls. 3)ln creates a link from a directory or device to another directory or device, remember the link you made when setting up your modem? A very good use for this is make what is called a symbolic link to a directory. Say your in /root and you hate having to type say ls /usr/local/myfiles to display what is in this directory you always put files in. Type ln -s /usr/local/myfiles myfiles. You now have a symbolic link in your home directory to /usr/local/myfiles. Now if you just type ls myfiles the link points to the actual directory. If you download something to you /root directory. Type say mv testdownload.tar.gz myfiles and you save a lot of time. 4)mount Filesystems are mounted by what's in you /etc/fstab file. Go ahead and look at it. You'll see Filesystems that are mounted at startup and Filesystems that are user mountable like you floppy and cdrom. How do I mount my cdrom? mount /mnt/cdrom. How do I mount my floppy? mount /mnt/floppy. Don't forget to umount it when your done! How do I mount a dos floppy? mount -t msdos /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy These all call the /etc/fstab file to see how they should be mounted. If you read up on /etc/fstab you'll see Filesystems are mounted with options. For instance the cdrom is not mounted at bootup and is read only. Please note that /mnt/floppy and /mnt/cdrom are made by default. If you want to be able to mount other files systems like your win95 partition do this. Mkdir /mnt/vfat. To mount it at any time type mount -t vfat /dev/hda1 /mnt/vfat. hda1 is the first partition on your hard drive, hda2 is the second, hdb1 is the first partition on your second hard drive. Read up on mount as it is useful. Lastly all of these can be put in /etc/fstab so that you can simply type mount /mnt/vfat for example. I recommend not editing this file directly unless you know what you are doing. An easy way to do this is use linuxconf which should be installed by default on your system. Lastly is your wondering if there is a gui to do this yes there is, type usermount on RedHat systems. 5)pwd - shows your current directory position 6)cd changes to a directory ex cd /usr/local. cd on its own brings you to your home directory. cd .. moves up one directory from you current 7)mv - moves a file to a directory mv test test2 simply moves test to the test2 file, note its like renaming it. 8)cp - copies a file. You can copy a file to a directory and also rename it while copying cp can also be used to copy directories. Example cp -r /root/mail /usr/local 9)mkdir - makes a directory mkdir can make a directory anywhere ex mkdir /etc/sysconfig/testdir 10)rm - removes a file and can also be used to rm directories rm -Rf /root removes everything in your /root directory without prompts, DON'T DO THIS!!!! 11)touch - creates an empty file touch test makes an empty file called test you can then edit it with say emacs test I guess I should now explain that files in Linux are either readable or executable. They can also be linked to apps like in windows 95 but for now just accept my explanation. 12)less - displays the contents of a file on your screen with the ability to scroll up and down 13)more - also display the contents of a file but you can only go down not up and only with the enter key 14)exec - executes a file or more likely a script of binary. exec /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifup ppp0 starts an internet session Note that this is easier then cd to /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ then typing ./ifup ppp0. Also note that if a directory is in your path statement you simply need to type a command at a prompt. So if /bin is in your path which it is most likely typing say ls at a prompt negates having to type exec /bin/ls. 15)tar - is just confusing to some people so here is my attempt to make it easy. Say you download a file called test.tar to untar it you simply type tar -xvf test.tar and its contents will be extracted. Most of the time you will download test.tar.gz files which are gziped kind of like winzip or pkzip. To deal with them type tar-xvzf test.tar.gz to extract the files. tar can also be used to archive files. type tar -cvf test.tar * this will archive all files in your current directory into a file called test.tar. this is a useful way to backup files. To also compress or zip them type tar -cvzf test.tar.gz * . 16)gzip - gunzip bzip etc these are compression commands type man gzip or bzip to see how to use them. Basically take a file called test. Type gzip test it compresses the file and adds the .gz extenstion. Bzip acts just the same. Remember that if you have a file that is gzipped and tarred type tar -xvzf to extract it or tar -cvzf to create it. 17)dmesg - this dumps your startup messages to the screen. Notice on startup how you get all of those messages scrolling by. Type dmesg | more to be able to scroll through them. 18)who - displays who is logged on the system, you'll probably see you name a few times. 19)ps - displays the current processes that are running and there process id or number. 20)top - is a program and not a command but it very useful. Type top at a prompt to see what processes are going on, how big they are, they cpu usage etc. Hit q to quit. 21)cat - like less dumps the output of a file to your screen but allows no scrolling just a dump. 22)grep - goes through a file and displays text you searched for. 23)logout - logs you out