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Installation of a workstation with the operating-system RedHat**-Linux** 9

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==> On 'weaker engines' (with less than 300 Mhz CPU-speed or less than 96 MB RAM or less than 2,5 GB harddisk-space), GNOME (graphic user-interface) is running quite slow.
For such machines it is recommended to install RedHat-Linux 7.1; for the installation-instruction please follow this link.

With the fast development of office-applications for Linux** (e.g. browser Mozilla or Open-Office for text-processing, spreadsheets and presentation), and the potential, to run client/server-applications programmed with Java (e.g. the supply-chain-management-system), the usage of Linux** as operating-system for a workstation is a serious alternative to Microsoft**-Windows**.

All following instruction are for installing RedHat**-Linux** version 9.

Language Selection, Keyboard Configuration and Mouse Configuration:

Please select the appropriate values according to your configuration.

Installation Type:

This computer is powerful - particularly the RAM (random-access-memory) and the hard-disk-system are fast and of best quality.
To utilise all capabilities an avoid to waste capacity with not used functions Linux** will be installed as Custom System..

Disk Partitioning:

Select Manually partition with Disk Druid

    /boot

    80 MByte

    Format partition as: ext3

    Swap

    250 MByte

    Format partition as: swap

    /

    Rest of the disk

    Format partition as: ext3

    Other directories as requiered;
    can also be on other disks.
    e.g. /home, /SAMBA_Disk, ...

    Size as requiered

    Format partition as: ext3

Choose Partitions to Format:

Boot Loader Configuration:

Network Configuration:
This option is not shown if the NIC (network interface card) is not detected during the installation-process.
In that case the instruction for 'Configure the Network Interface Card' apply after finishing the stardard-installation.

Firewall Configuration:

Language Support Selection:

Time Zone Selection:

Set Root Password:

Authentication Configuration:

Selecting Package Groups:

Select individual packages: Yes (check)

Boot Diskette Creation:

Graphical Interface (X) Configuration:

Monitor Configuration:

Customize Graphical Configuration:


The instructions for the standard-installation end here.
Installation-steps which have to be done manually are described in the following steps.

Under certain circumstances the TCP-/IP-address defined during standard-installation is not put to the configuration-file /etc/hosts.
If you do not find a line starting with the chosen TCP/IP-address (192.168.0.127 in this example), please insert the missing line.
Here is an example how the configuration-file /etc/hosts should look like :
# Do not remove the following line, or various programs
# that requiere network functionality will fail
127.0.0.1   localhost
192.168.0.127   entwicklung.g2t.office.at  entwicklung

The above example assumes, that the TCP/IP--Hostname as described under NetBIOS- and TCP/IP-Setup of a workstation was accounting01.g2t.office.at .

Configure the Network-Interface-Card:

Newer network-interface-cards (NIC) are detected during the standard-installation.
The following instruction have to be done only, if the NIC was not detected during standarn.

The NIC-driver and I/O-adddresses (if not defined by a plug&play-bios) are defined in the file /etc/modules.conf; an example follows here:

alias eth0 ne
options ne io=0x300

If other lines are already existing in this file they must not be deletet.
A more detailed description is given in the Linux Ethernet-Howto.

Setting the TCP/IP-Adresses and the Nameservers:

If the TCP/IP-Adresses and the Nameservers where not requested during the installation, they have to be configured manually.
Do to this, click under the GNOME-GUI the RedHat-Icon (lower left corner) and select System-Settings - Network and enter or change the following values.
Do not forget to save the changes (Ctrl + S) !!

--- double-click on the adapter (Tab 'Devices') to access the input-fields ---



--- Set the Name-Server-values under Tab 'DNS' ---

Enter, respectively change, the following values.
The shown sample-values for Primary and Secondary DNS are for the Internet-Service-Provider (ISP) A-Online; please ask your ISP for your optimized values.

Checking for a correct installation of the network:

If the drivers where installed correctly is shown during startup in the step
'Bringing up interface eth0' ([OK])

or
can be checked after a restart with the following command:.

modprobe eth0
dmesg | tail

There are shown the last lines of the log.
Unfortunately each driver logs its special message; but if the Hardware-ID of the Network-Interface-Card is shown (e.g. 0060 97 72 b0 93) it is a good sign.

Then correct setup of the own TCP/IP-Address can be checked with the following command.

ping 192.168.0.127 (where the TCP/IP-Address of the just installed machine must be used - if you did not take the one from the examples)

shows the result:

PING 192.168.0.127 (192.168.0.127) from 192.168.0.127 : 56(84) bytes of data
64 bytes from 192.168.0.127: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=2.0 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.127: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=1.3 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.127: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=1.1 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.127: icmp_seq=3 ttl=255 time=0.9 ms

The 'Pinging' can be interrupted with the key-combination CTRL-C and thereafter a statistic is shown (example):

--- 192.168.0.127 ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 4 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 0.9/1.2/2.0 ms

If the computer is already connected to a local area network (LAN), then the correct connection can be checked by 'Pinging' a known TCP/IP-Address of another computer connected to the LAN.

ping 192.168.0.2 (where the Operatins-System of the pinged computer must be running - of course)

shows the result:

PING 192.168.0.2 (192.168.0.2) from 192.168.0.127 : 56(84) bytes of data
64 bytes from 192.168.0.2: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=3.2 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.2: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=1.4 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.2: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=1.3 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.2: icmp_seq=3 ttl=255 time=1.3 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.2: icmp_seq=4 ttl=255 time=1.3 ms

The 'Pinging' can be interrupted with the key-combination CTRL-C and thereafter a statistic is shown (example):

--- 192.168.0.2 ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 5 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 1.3/1.7/3.2 ms

Further steps of installation:

Further steps of installation of a Router with RedHat**-Linux** 9 are lined out in the following documents: