This presentation has the purpose to explain the basics of
installation and configuration of a Linux distribution. Along with the
explanation will take place a live install of the GNU/Linux
Slackware distribution.
The main aspects that will be treated are:
- Space allocation on the harddisk
- Bootloader configuration
- Package management
- Network configuration
- X-Windows configuration
- Peripherals configuration
- Users management
- Finding needed documentation
Why Slackware?
The first version of this distribution, 1.0, was released on July 17, 1993.
Now it's already 10.0. During all this time it proved to be a stable,
clean and simple. In this context, 'simple' refers to the viewpoint of
system design, rather than ease of use. This is the reason there are so
few GUI tools to configure the system. GUI tools are (as the theory
goes) more complex, and are therefore more prone to have problems than
simple command line tools. The overall result of this principle is that
Slackware is very fast, stable, and secure, at the cost of
user-friendliness. Critics generally say that this makes things too
time-consuming and difficult to learn. Advocates say that the
flexibility and transparency as well as the experience gained from the
process more than make up for it.
We will discard the opinion of the
critics as you are future engineers and for you there is nothing too
hard to learn. Thus we will stick to the advocates and will try to
answer to the following questions.
I have no clue about Linux. Should I come?
Yes. This is for you. And you can bring your computer along if you wish.
I already have another Linux. Do I have to come?
I think you could come. You definetively will find out something new. It's not just about
Slackware, it's about Linux. If you have questions about your
distribution, come and ask. We will try to help.
I know this. What's next?
I wish you and the rest a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and we
will make for you some presentations next semester about Linux
programming and kernel customization. If you have questions or ideas or
both, mail
me.
Update
(Mon Dec 20 02:32:00 EET 2004)
Here are some pictures from the presentation.
Thanks to
Mihai Negru for offering his computer as playground at this presentation.
Flaviu Haitonic for the poster.
David Lazar for his comments.
Everyone who helped to organize this presentation.
