Trying to learn Linux 1

[clapper62]

I have a Pentium II 333mhz with 32mb of ram and a 1.2 gig hard drive that I would like to use a a Linux learning machine

I've never used Linux so I have the following questions


Is this machine good enough for what I want to do?

Also once I install Linux will I be able to use it to connect to my home network of windows machines?

Thanks from newbie

 

[AP81]

Yes and Yes.

Be sure to select only the bare esentials, as 1.2Gb is not that big. I would look around for a ~4-8Gb drive, as you can pick a second hand one for cheap. That way you could do a fulll installation and play around with more packages.

 

[clapper62]

Thanks for the reply AP81

I will look around for a bigger HD as I would like to get all the options I can.

 

[skiflyer]

That machine is likely to have trouble if you plan on installing an X server with 32 megs of ram tho.

-Rob

 

[AP81]

32 is a tad low, but you can pick up another stick of RAM. RAM is pretty cheap.

One other thing- use fluxbox instead of KDE or Gnome. It is a lot lighter and does't have any dependencies. I have 768MB RAM and still use fluxbox as I find it a lot quicker and better. It can also be compiled to enable the KDE system tray.

 

[jwenting]

to truely learn the OS you would not want to install X anyway...

Another excellent alternative to KDE and Gnome (if you insist on using a graphical interface) is pure X with WindowMaker.
Much lower resource use, making it faster. Plus it needs a lot less diskspace.

Personally I use X mainly because it gives me several command prompts on the same screen, which can be convenient.
Mind that my Linux machine is not my main machine...

Now for the bad news (ye knew it was coming right?): most "modern" distributions aimed at beginners don't even give you an option to not install X, KDE or Gnome and will happily install them all plus a huge array of applications you'll likely never need without asking.

That's why I'd advise Debian, as it can be installed without anything at all yet still give you a running system.

 

[Morsing]

Install Debian and the fvwm1 window manager.

Cheers

Henrik Morsing
Certified AIX 4.3 Systems Administration
& p690 Technical Support

 

[skiflyer]

And get used to five different answers on the best way to do anything in linux

-Rob

 

[flugh]

skiflyer: no, there's at least six different answers ;-)

1.2GB hard drive is pretty small, but can get you by. My 166MHz, 56MB RAM laptop running Debian only has 312MB of space used for the system itself, the rest is /home. It only serves as the gateway for my LAN, so it's got very little GUI stuff installed.

I say install Linux (any distro), cuss, fuss, reinstall, repeat, etc. Get to where you can get on the internet with it. Then download some MuD source code. Spend a few weeks tinkering with C and modifying the MuD. Give up, start working on PHP+MySQL+Apache. Do a blog-ish set of scripts with a MySQL backend. Then push your Linux box off in the corner and use it as a fileserver.... That should give you a good set of skills, wow your friends, and intimidate your boss' IT guy ;-)

Well, that's my story anyway. Didn't start with MuDs (actually started writing 'chat' scripts for 'ppp' with my 10lb Learning Linux: Second Edition book). Got me this far ;-)

Oh, and learn to use your ;-) effectively. By the way, the post is a bit tongue-in-cheek, but honestly, those little activies really boosted my knowledge of the OS. Getting the compiler to jive with extra libraries, headers, etc. Learning why stuff breaks, and even fix them. Shoot, a way-back-when, I broke out the source code for gnome-panel and changed the pixel-height on the icons so they'd be reasonable on my little laptop screen (it was a simple #DEFINE to change, but hey, I had to do a lot of 'grep's to find it ;-) ).

----
JBR

 

[clapper62]

Thank you flugh,

Your post hit right on the mark for what I want to do

I don't want to do it right the first time(how can you learn anything that way).

I want to cuss and spit my way all the way through it

I have no idea what fluxbox or KDE or Gnome or Debian is (not yet)

but thanks to all your post I have a general idea of what the limitations of my box is and what I need.

Thanks all

 

[dsmart01]

As a newbie still playing with Linux myself, here are some tips :
* get used to the idea of installing your distro /many times/, I'm up to 5 reinstalls and I expect to have to do it another few times before I get it right
* backup your MBR (I use MBRTOOL) if you plan to dual-boot ... when you screw it up you'll need to restore it so you can boot back into Windows
* You will be pushing it with those machine specs ... if you are coming from Windows you will want all the GUI interfaces you can find to establish a common frame of reference between the 2 OSs. This means using resource-hungry interfaces like KDE or GNOME (don't ask for my preference ... try them both). You'll need at least 256mbRAM + 3gbHDD + PII CPU for a decent install of goodies.

The first point is important -- when you play around, don't be afraid of breaking anything. Thats when you really start to learn ... but thats when you're most likely to need to reinstall.

 

[Peahippo]

I started a bit like yourself, but I have a background in using Unix during the 1990s.

I looked around at distros and whittled them down to either Debian or Slackware. Both were more geeky and configurable than the industry primaries (Red Hat, Mandrake, SuSe). I chose Slackware since it was older .. allegedly the oldest Linux distro (other than what Mr Torvalds was handing out, I guess). So it could be your preferences and mine are aligned.

I'm not the kind of guy who -- after nearly 20 years of working with computers -- appreciates re-installing over and over. Unlike you, I aim to get it right the first time.

Our machines are similar enough. I've a PI 120MHz 48MB 1.6GB. You have similar RAM and HDD space restrictions.

I didn't want Gnome or KDE. I want to deal directly with a window manager of my choice ... maybe wm or blackbox.

Partitioning took some time. I made my system dual-boot with Windows 95 since that seemed like a good starting point. It was particularly interesting and time-consuming to manage the partitions on the HDD. The machine is a Compaq Presario, hence it has a tiny (4MB) configuration partition (which I've kept). I had to choose a small FAT16 partition size (128MB) for my pared-down Win95. I had to choose a Linux Swap partition, using the rule-of-thumb of at least 2xRAM size ... I chose 128MB, reasoning that I could perhaps upgrade my 72-pin SIMMs to 64MB later. (I actually used Microsoft's fdisk to make the swap partition.) Eventually I ran cfdisk from the Slackware CD and made the rest (~1360MB) a Linux partition; then I ran mke2fs in some way to make it ext3 format (why use ext2 if ext3 is available?).

I couldn't boot from the CDROM, and so had to resort to sbootmgr.dsk. This means I had to surf the CDROM, find rawrite, find sbootmgr.dsk, make a boot floppy from those, and then boot into the floppy to boot into the CDROM. Using my small Win95 OS came in real handy for this.

I installed Slackware, picking and choosing packages. I omitted KDE and Gnome, so from prior reading I was pretty sure 1360MB would be enough space.

Then I ran into the Loadlin kernel-size problem. That took some time to figure out. Only the latest version of Loadlin (1.6c) was able to load the >1MB size of Slackware's bare.i kernel.

Soooo ... after some weeks of on-and-off work on this thing, I was finally able to boot a kernel image and login as root on my own Linux machine. Now, I'm stuck on understanding how to configure X with large assurances that it will be correct. But I'll get through it ... there I am, hitting Alt-Function keys between my 6 virtual terminals to read man pages, the Slack8Book.html, etc. in order to take the next tiny step towards a GUI.

 

[AP81]

Slackware and blackbox/fluxbox (or Window Maker) is your best option. Slackware is is the best option for a low spec machine. I have put Slackware on a box with 16Mb RAM before (not running X).

 

[flugh]

*sigh* I have no real data to back up my claim, but...

I just hate to hear "is the best option" mentioned without Debian being the suggested option ;-)

Sorry, this post has no technical value. But I would like to suggest this:

http://www.gnoppix.org/

It's a "Live CD" Linux-based OS. It uses the Gnome desktop (gnome 2.2). The .iso was less than 450MB, so it's not a bad download. Haven't actually booted it yet, but since it's based on Knoppix (which I've used and liked), it should be worth mentioning. That way, you have no risk. Don't like it, reboot without the CD and you are back in Windows. That's a sweet deal

----
JBR

 

[AP81]

flugh, Debian is the best distro. No one can really put an argument to that. No other disto comes close in terms of robustness, stability and package management. It too runs very well on low spec machines.

Slackware is one disk. You can select the packages you need from the one disk. Debian is 7 disks. Sure you can do a base install from one, however you may require other packages from other disks. Too much hassle to download numerous disks if you just want to dabble...

 

[jwenting]

AP81, as soon as you have an internet hookup configured (making it a LAN hookup with the actual internet hookup being on another machine, most likely running Windows, is easiest) you can install everything apart from that over the internet.
That's what I did, install a core Debian from CD1, then change the apt sources file to point to testing (needed some of those packages for my hardware) and just installed the rest through there.
Or you could just order a CD set from somewhere and spend the time before the mailman arrives reading

 

[AP81]

I suppose you could. Personally, I have only used Debian with broadband. Dial-up can't cut it. If you are installing a few packages, then maybe it can.