BITS: Introduction to linux, distributions and installation

Dive into Linux Introduction Distributions Installation BITS/VIB Bioinformatics Training – 3 oktober, 2011 – Joachim Jacob (archive: Luc Ducazu <luc@daphnia.com>) http://www.bits.vib.be/training

What is Linux? In a strict sense, Linux is a freely distributable, Unix-like operating system kernel (Linux kernel) In a broader sense, Linux is a freely distributable, Unix-like operating system that includes a kernel, system tools, applications and a complete development environment (GNU/Linux distribution)

Linus Thorvalds Student at the University of Helsinki, Finland in 1991 Inspired by Minix (Andrew Tanenbaum) Started Linux as a simple UNIX-like OS on the Intel 80386 processor Today Linus still decides what gets into the kernel and what not: Benevolent Dictator for Life .

Why should I bother? Since Linux is free (as in beer) open (as in science) user-friendly (depending on the definition) it gets a lot of attention in academic circles Linux is the preferred software development platform for eg NCBI Linux drives innovation

Linux Distributions A Linux Distribution ( Distro ) bundles: the OS kernel (Linux) tools and applications software package manager initialization & configuration scripts commercial support There are many distributions (600+), but only a few that really matter http://www.distrowatch.com

'Big' distributions Red Hat: RHEL http://www.redhat.com Fedora http://fedoraproject.org CentOS http://centos.org Novell SLES http://www.novell.com/linux/ openSuSE http://www.opensuse.org Debian Debian http://www.debian.org Ubuntu http://www.ubuntu.com

Mini-distros Live CD / DVDs: burn an .iso image to a CD and Linux starts from the CD without changing your system http://www.livecdlist.com Recovery: SystemRescueCD http://www.sysresccd.org/ Bio-informatics: bioknoppix http://bioknoppix.hpcf.upr.edu/ biolinux http://nebc.nerc.ac.uk/nebc/tools/bio-linux

Mini-distros A live CD / DVDs can also be written to a bootable USB stick using the Unetbootin http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/ This tool is available for Linux and MS Windows

Distrowatch Exhaustive collection of information on (Linux) distributions: http://distrowatch.com Distro Popularity Statistics 2011 (1) Ubuntu (2) Fedora (3) Mint (4) openSuSE (5) Debian (14) CentOS (24) RedHat

Linux Installation Goal: desktop vs. server Desktop: check whether your hardware meets the system requirements is supported Obtain installation media on website of distro Make sure you have some free disk space. (See later about installing next to or in Windows)

Supported Hardware Do your home work Hardware Compatibility List http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/HCL Fedora 15 is in itself available as a live CD, this is a quick way to check what hardware is supported

Fedora 15 “ Bleeding Edge” distribution. Popular with Bioinformatics developers, latest, but potentially unstable. http://fedoraproject.org

Fedora 15 “ Bleeding Edge” distribution. Popular with Bioinformatics developers, latest, but potentially unstable.

System requirements Minimum system requirements for Fedora 15: http://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/Fedora/15/html/Release_Notes/sect-Release_Notes-Welcome_to_Fedora_15.html CPU: Pentium Pro @ 400MHz system Memory: Minimal 256 MB Recommended for a graphical desktop 640 MB Full graphical for graphical: 1152 MB Disk space Minimal 90 MB Recommended 10 GB

Obtaining installation media The most comprehensive page to start from is http://fedoraproject.org/en/get-fedora-all Download CD or DVD iso-images using HTTP Download torrent files for bittorrent downloads Once the iso-images are downloaded burn the images on CD or DVD put the image on a USB stick ( UNetbootin )

Windows If you want to install Linux next to MS Windows, there are a few alternatives: Dual-boot : Windows and Linux on separate disk partitions Run Linux in a virtual machine under MS Windows Run Windows as a virtual machine under Linux Virtual Box http://www.virtualbox.org/ For this session, we will run linux as a virtual machine on Windows.

Windows/Linux dual boot With dual boot, upon start-up of your computer, you have the choice to start up linux OR windows Windows occupies all disk space, you need to free up disk space You should be aware that changing disk partitions is risky and can result in data loss – take a backup first In Windows, defragment the drive(s) Reduce the Windows partition – a handy tool is gparted , which can be launched from a live CD http://gparted.sourceforge.net/ For a Windows/Linux dual-boot installation you should install Windows first

Virtual linux We will make use of VirtualBox, a software that can be installed on your computer and that allows you to install another OS in it. Alternatives: VMWare, KVM. www.virtualbox.org

Installation walk-through Search for the .iso file on the USB stick you received.

Installation walk-through Important! Please fill in: bitstraining as password

Uncouple the .iso file for installation PRESS SPACE

Installation walk-through Fill in as password: b!t$

Linux Put the fun back into computing

BITS: Introduction to linux, distributions and installation

More Related Content

What's hot

Similar to BITS: Introduction to linux, distributions and installation

More from BITS

Recently uploaded

BITS: Introduction to linux, distributions and installation