The purpose of this phase is to install a complete, working linux system.
For these practicals, I have chosen the Ubuntu distribution. There are many distributions which we could have used. There are many reasons for choosing between distributions, most of which are fairly religious. I have chosen Ubuntu because it's simple, fairly robust and because I happen to like it.
During these practicals, we will be using VMWare. It would have been possible to install linux directly on to your desktop machine either overwriting windows or as "dual-boot". Instead, we are going to use virtual machine. This is for two reasons. First, you will have access to a working host operating system at all times, and secondly because it decreases the chances that we will have to reinstall your desktops. Essentially, it works like a normal PC, with RAM, networking and so on.
In this phase we will install a full Linux system. For the purposes of these practical lessons the Linux installation will be installed under a program called "VMWare Player". This software acts as an emulator of a fairly normal PC, virtual machines have RAM, networking, sound and ports, hence are the equivalent of a real PC. 1
In this practical, a lot of new words and concepts are introduced. If you do not understand anything, please feel free to ask a demonstrator; however, if you can work out the answer for yourself using online resources, you should do.
You should have administrator access to your machine by now; if you don't it's going to make this module hard, so ask your demonstrator to provide you with access.
Linux is freely available and may be downloaded from the web. For this course, you should be installing the desktop version of Ubuntu linux.
Linux is normally installed using a physical CD-ROM or a CD-ROM image. An image can be thought of as a file copy of a CD-ROM. These files are normally know as "iso's" after the organisation which defines their format.
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Find a copy of the Ubuntu Linux desktop distribution on the web. You need an ISO image, not a torrent, and you should get one appropriate for the architecture of your desktop PC. Please ask the demonstrator for help if you are lost. Continue with the next section while this is downloading. |
As I have described, we are going to use VMWare player, because it's the nicest of the options that I have tried.
VMWare player should have been installed on your machines for you.
Now that you have a copy of Linux, you need a virtual machine.
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 | While you are waiting provide a short (100 words) description of what linux is, and what a distribution is. Find the names of three different distributions. |
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Follow the instructions on screen. In most cases, the answers should be fairly
obvious. You want to install Ubuntu rather than try it out. If you have
problems clicking on things, it's because of the virtual machine. You have to
click once inside the window; until this the mouse doesn't receive any input.
There is advice on-screen about how to return to the host machine.
If there are any questions that you don't understand, try here for further information. |
The base system should now install. This takes quite a long time (although a lot less than it used to!), so while this is happening, you find out some good sources of information about Linux.
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Linux will probably still be installing at this point. In the next section, we will be using a linux shell. Answer the following question, to prepare.
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Congratulations, you've now got a complete linux system 3. Well, nearly. It's probably going to need updating. Give it a few minutes or so and it should pop up a dialog tell you about this. Follow the instructions and make sure that you have the machine is updated.
1. In previous years, we used Microsoft Virtual PC and VMWare Workstation, so this year, I'm using VMWare Player; this is the virtual machine software that I use myself. I've tried to update all the screen shots to VMware. If I've missed one, this is what you are seeing.
2. VMWare includes an "easy-install" option these days, which is even easier. You can use this if you wish. It is, however, good to see how the process works once, and installing like this is basically the same as a non virtual machine installation.
3. Your system is complete, but it's also not as easy to use as it could be. You might want to install VMWare tools, for which you can find instructions on the web.