From: ralph@falcon.SLAC.Stanford.EDU (Ralph Becker-Szendy) Subject: Re: ** Request better install instructions! Date: Tue, 14 Sep 1993 17:34:03 GMT
In article <1993Sep13.150502.1590@rivers.acc.uwrf.edu> ,
ph9991_hall@rivers.acc.uwrf.edu writes:
First comment: The c.o.l newsgroup is "obsolete"; followups should go
to one of the replacement groups. I left this post in the old
newsgroup, maybe the original poster's site doesn't get the new groups
yet (in which case they are way behind the times, and she/he should
have a word with the news administrator there).
> Installing a system should not be this hard..
Well, it wasn't for me ... and I installed SLS too. And no, I don't
think I'm a genius. And neither do I have Unix system management
experience (and no DOS experience whatsoever). Reading the FAQ's and
HOW-TO's really helps. Print them out on paper, read them carefully
three times, and whenever you hit a snag in the installation, look
what the instructions say about it.
> I've posted three msgs on this topic, and rec'd a few good hints. But
> nothing seems to help! I.E. On my last attempt, I killed all partitions of
> any kind using Linux's fdisk,
You don't have to kill all your partitions; for example you could keep
a small DOS partition, install DOS in it, and make it bootable. That
way you have at least an imitation OS running while installing Linux
(can come in handy sometimes). On the other hand, you may not want to
waste any space on DOS.
> reinstated a Linux/MINIX partition. !!This met with two errors:
> 1.) Odd number of cylinders when I choose the limits on my disk 1-981,
> 2.) Linux cannot currently use ___ sectors on this partition.
These are not errors, just warnings. First, you might want to use the
EXTended filesystem (actually, EXT2 or XIAFS), and make a partition of
type EXT for these filesystems. These newer file systems have multiple
advantages over the Minix filesystem (longer file names, much better
performance, and they allow much larger partitions, I vaguely remember
that the Minix file system doesn't allow partitions larger than 64MB).
See the back traffic in this newsgroup and the FAQs for EXT2FS and
XIAFS for a very detailed discussion of the benefits (and relative
performance) of these two filesystems.
Second, if the number of {cylinders, sectors} is odd (I forget which)
the last one does not get used. It seems that message 1 warns you that
that happened, and that you are wasting a very small fraction of your
disk. Message 2 refers either to the loss of the last (odd)
cylinder/sector, or to the fact that you have a partition larger than
what the Minix filesystem can handle, so the rest of the partition
will be unused.
> I reboot anyway, and find that I cannot install a damn thing to
> the computer!
Say ... this may be a stupid question: Did you ever do a MKFS (in the
case of the EXT2 filesystem I think it's called MKE2FS)? If not, the
partition you just created won't do you any good. After creating the
partition you still need to put a file system into it (I think the DOS
equivalent is that you FDISK to make a partition a.k.a. drive-letter,
and then FORMAT that drive).
Before doing MKE2FS on a largish partition, remember that you will
need enough memory or swap space. Older versions of MKE2FS used to die
without warning if they ran out of memory. You might want to first
create a swap partition with FDISK, then MKSWAP it, and SWAPON it,
then run MKE2FS. This is explained in the FAQ.
> I really need some step-by-step instructions on what to do. I feel like a
> total fool trying to install this silly mess, and I need a way to get out.
As I said at the very top: Begin by reading the FAQs and HOW-TOs, read
the traffic on the Linux newsgroups for a few weeks, and keep printed
copies of the installation instructions (such as the Linux, SLS, and
EXT2FS FAQs and HOW-TOs) around while doing the installation.
>I just don't want the $150 I spent on the SLS disks to go to waste!
Did you know that you can get SLS for free from various archives
around the network? Reading c.o.l.a. for a few weeks would reveal
numerous places where it exists; the premier locations are
sunsite.unc.edu and tsx-11.mit.edu.
Good luck!
-- Ralph Becker-Szendy RALPH@SLAC.STANFORD.EDU Stanford Linear Accelerator Center RALPH@SLACVM.BITNET M.S. 95, P.O. Box 4349, Stanford, CA 94309 (415)926-2701 My opinion. This is not SLAC, Stanford U, or the US DoE speaking. Just me.