 | Level: Introductory Ian Shields (ishields@us.ibm.com), Senior programmer, IBM
01 Jan 2003 This article highlights the key requirements and steps for getting SuSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 8 installed and configured on your workstation or laptop. With our suggested installation, you can explore Linux and get comfortable with it. This article is intentionally brief. For detailed information, please refer to your hardcopy SuSE Linux documentation, or the SuSE Linux documentation on your installation CD. For questions, comments, or help, visit our tech support discussion forum.
Before you begin
To fully evaluate the tools on the Speed-start your linux app SEK, we recommend a machine with at least a 500 MHz Pentium II®, at least 5 GB of available disk space, and at least 512 MB of RAM.
If you have less than 512 MB of RAM, see the note on increasing your swap space in step 7 below.
To install Linux on a workstation or laptop running Windows, start with step 1. Or to install Linux on a workstation or laptop with no operating system on it, skip to step 2.
Setting up the SLES8 installation
- To install Linux on a machine with another operating system in place, you will need a dual boot environment and approximately 5 GB of free disk space.
If you have less than 5 GB available, you will need to install an additional drive or carve the space out of your existing drive.
The Yast2 install program used with SLES8 has repartitioning capability built in for certain types of partitions. Otherwise, you can use a free utility such as FIPS or a commercial product such as PartitionMagic. (Neither Yast2 nor the FIPS utility will resize NTFS-formatted drives.) Repartitioning a drive involves some risk, so be sure to back up your data before repartitioning. For more info on these utilities, as well as tips on partition planning and setting up a dual boot environment, see Resources.
If you're already familiar with Linux -- or if you have only a small amount of disk space available -- you may wish to customize your installation to install fewer features. For example, you may wish to install either the GNOME or KDE desktop, rather than both (custom installation is described in step 8).
- Make sure that your machine is capable of booting from a CD or DVD. You may have to set startup options in your BIOS to enable booting from the CD or DVD drive. If your machine is not capable of booting from CD or DVD, consult the SLES8 installation guide for instructions on installing from a hard disk or over a network. You will find English and German PDF versions of the installation guide in the docu\HOWTOs directory on CD 1 of the SLES8 distribution.
- Boot your SLES8 distribution CD 1. Press Enter to perform an installation. Read and accept the license agreement to continue. Select your language.
If you already have a Linux distribution on your system, you will be prompted as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1. Selecting installation type
Select New installation to install a new copy of SuSE Linux Enterprise Server.
- The install process will analyze your system and suggest installation settings, including a suggested partitioning scheme
as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Suggested installation settings
Normally the suggestion includes a swap partition of approximately twice the size of your installed memory and the remainder of free space mounted as / (the root of your new filesystem). In this example, the disk system is already nearly full, so we will use the partitioning tool to reuse an existing partition for the new installation. You can safely explore at this point, because your choices will not be written to disk until you confirm your intention in the last installation dialog.
-
To change your partitioning choices, click Partitioning. You will see several choices as shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3. Changing the partitioning choices
-
In this example, we chose Create custom partition setup and then selected Custom partitioning -- for experts, giving us the screen shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4. Expert partitioning
-
We highlighted the entry for /dev/hdc3 and then clicked the Edit button. We elected to format the partition using the ext3 file system as shown in Figure 5. The default file system for SuSE systems is ReiserFS, which is another journalling file system. We use ext3 on this computer as we also use Partition Magic (version 8) for moving partitions and it handles ext3 but not ReiserFS.
Figure 5. Editing the root partition values
We also elected to edit the entry for /dev/hda7 to mount it as /download (a partition that we share among the multiple Linux distributions that run on this system) and to format the existing 1 GB swap partition (/dev/hda8). Partitions that will be formatted will be shown with an F in the third column.
As we said, these choices will not be written to disk until you confirm your intention in the last installation dialog, so if you make a mistake, you can still abort the installation and start over.
Note: If you need to use the SEK on a system that has less than 512 MB of RAM, you should increase your swap space above the default of twice your RAM. We recommend increasing it to 1 GB. This may permit software to continue working (albeit with degraded performance) when it would otherwise crash for lack of memory.
- Once you have completed or accepted your partitioning choices, you may customize the installed software, booting, time zone, and language choices. When you click Software, you will see a menu with choices of four standard configurations. Click Detailed selection... on this menu to review or further refine your choices as shown in
Figure 6, which shows the selected packages resulting from first choosing the Default system for UnitedLinux software configuration.
Figure 6. Selecting software packages
The Filter dropdown at the top left allows you also to view more granular package groups or to search for individual packages. Use it now to look for "Shells" under the System group and verify that you are installing the pdksh package, which is required for several of the IBM middleware packages.
-
If you are new to Linux and you are adding it to an existing system, we strongly suggest that you also customize your booting to boot your system from a boot floppy as shown in
Figure 7. This will allow you to experiment without putting any of your other systems at risk. After you have become familiar with Linux, you can install GRUB in the master boot record if you wish. A GRUB password will require users to enter the password before changing the boot parameters or booting in special modes such as single user mode. As with many security procedures, note that there are ways to bypass this if a user has physical access to the machine.
Figure 7. Choosing where to install boot manager
- After you have updated your time zone and language (if necessary), you are ready to begin the actual installation. When you click Accept, you will see a final warning as shown in Figure 8.
This is your last chance to make changes or abort the installation.
Figure 8. Final confirmation
 |
Installation and final customization
The installation will proceed and prompt you for any necessary CDs. You will also be prompted for a formatted diskette for the GRUB boot floppy.
You will then be prompted to remove the installation media. Leave your new boot floppy in the diskette drive, and your new system will reboot. You will then have the opportunity to configure items such as root password, display properties, networking, printers, and so on.
Expect the software loading process to take 15 to 30 minutes depending on the speed of your system.
- Choose a root password. The Expert Options... button allows you to choose your password encryption method.
Figure 9. Choosing a root password
-
We suggest that you create a user account at this time (use the root account only for system administration tasks). Both user names and passwords are case sensitive. It is common in UNIX and Linux systems to use lowercase user names.
An example is shown in Figure 10.
Use the Details... button to view or change details such as user number, home directory, and so on. The Password settings button allows you to control password expiration rules, and you can use the Additional users/groups button to add or edit additional users and groups.
Figure 10. Creating a new user account
- You will next be prompted for your graphical settings as shown in Figure 11.
Some video cards, such as certain nVidia cards, can use either an OpenGL driver or a more complete driver available from the manufacturer. You may see a pop-up message if this is the case for your card.
Review the settings for video card and desktop resolution. Click the Change... button to change the settings. If you do change settings, you will have an opportunity to test your settings before they are saved.
Figure 11. Configuring your display options
- After you accept the video settings, Yast2 will attempt to set up remaining settings. You may either probe for a printer or specify it manually. My system doesn't have an attached printer, so I chose to skip printer probing. At this point, you may customize your network, printer, modem, or ISDN settings as shown in
Figure 12. Click the title of any item you wish to change.
If you are not using dynamic network setup (DHCP), you will want to change your network settings.
Figure 12. Other installation settings
- Click Next to save your settings and reboot the system. You should see a login prompt when the system reboots.
|
Booting your new system
Log in as root, using the password you specified in step 12, and you should see a desktop background like that shown in Figure 13. You may also be prompted with additional setup options, such as sound settings. Note that this background warns you that you are running as root. For most of your work, you should not log in as root. See
"Basic tasks for new Linux developers" for instructions on how to switch to a different user temporarily.
Figure 13. The root desktop
Congratulations! SuSE Linux is now installed, configured, and ready for your use.
Refer to the article "Installing prerequisite Linux packages" before installing the IBM trial software.
You'll find additional resources for using SuSE Linux and IBM middleware to develop Linux apps at the Speed-start your Linux app training and tech support page.
Resources - For questions, comments, or help, visit our tech support discussion forum.
- For partitioning software, check out a free utility or PartitionMagic, a commercial product.
- For introductory tips on setting up a dual boot environment, read "Operating system flexibility: Setting up a multi-boot machine with Linux and other operating system" (developerWorks, December 2000).
- For advice on partition planning, see "Partition planning tips: How to keep things organized on disk" (developerWorks, May 2000).
- To add prerequisite Linux packages that are typically not installed during most standard Linux installations, see "Speed-start your Linux app: Installing prerequisite Linux packages" (developerWorks, October 2002).
- To learn how to use the vi editor to edit in Linux, take the tutorial "vi intro -- the cheat sheet method" (developerWorks, December 2000).
- To develop your proficiency in using the Emacs editor to edit in Linux, take the "Living in Emacs" tutorial (developerWorks, July 2002).
- Return to Speed-start your Linux app for additional training and tech support resources.
- Find more Linux articles in the developerWorks Linux zone.
About the author | 
| | Currently researching Linux technology for the developerWorks Linux zone, Ian Shields is a Senior Programmer at IBM at the Research Triangle Park, NC. He joined IBM in Canberra, Australia, as a systems engineer in 1973, and has since worked on communications systems and pervasive computing in Montreal, Canada, and RTP, NC. He has several patent filings and seven issued patents. His undergraduate degree is in pure mathematics and philosophy from the Australian National University. He received an M.S. and Ph.D. in computer science from North Carolina State University. You can contact Ian at ishields@us.ibm.com. |
Rate this page
| |
