RED HAT Installation Steps

These instructions can be used to install and configure Red Hat Linux 7.2 on a typical
PC. They may need to be tweaked slightly, depending on the exact configuration of
your PC.

1. Install Linux
A. Turn on computer and quickly insert disk 1 of Red Hat Linux 7.2
B. If system fails to boot Linux, insert boot disk into floppy drive and
restart
C. At the boot prompt, press the 'Enter' key
D. Initial Selections
1. Language Selection: English
2. Keyboard Configuration:
a. Model: Generic 104-key PC
b. Layout: U.S. English
c. Dead Keys: Disable dead keys
3. Mouse Configuration:
a. Microsoft: IntelliMouse (PS/2)
b. Uncheck 'Emulate 3 Buttons'
E. Welcome to Red Hat Linux, click Next
F. Install Options, choose Install: Custom
G. Disk Partitioning
1. Choose Manually partition with Disk Druid for easy partitioning,
or choose Manually partition with fdisk [experts only] for full
control over the partition layout
2. Create the following partitions (sizes suggested):

1. /boot 150MB (only if your computer is pre-1999)

2. swap 1024MB (or twice RAM size)
3. / 8192MB
4. /home 8192MB
5. /usr 1256MB and Click 'Fill to maximum allowable size'
6. /var 400MB
2. Accept defaults if satisfied with mount points, filesystem types,
and formatting; otherwise, select each partition and click Edit

Note: Only 4 primary partitions are allowed. One of these may

be an extended partition, which can contain up to 12 logical
partitions. Some older BIOS limitations require that the
Linux /boot directory be contained in its own partition which
does not extend beyond cylinder 1024. DOS/Windows requires
a primary partition from which to boot, and additional drives
must be logical partitions.

A. Boot Loader Installation

1. Use GRUB as the boot loader

2. Install Boot Loader record on /dev/hda Master Boot Record (MBR)
3. Do not enter a GRUB password unless needed
B. Network Configuration
1. Uncheck 'Configure using DHCP'
2. Make the following settings: (talk to you network adminstrator for correct
values)

a. IP address: {ip_address}
b. Netmask: {subnet_mask}
c. Network: xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (Fills in automatically)
d. Broadcast: xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (Fills in automatically)
e. Hostname: {hostname.domain}
f. Gateway: {gateway_address}
g. Primary DNS: {dns1_server_address}
h. Secondary DNS: {dns2_server_address}
B. Firewall Configuration

1. Choose Medium security

2. Choose Customize and allow incoming SSH and WWW(HTTP); if desired, also
allow incoming Telnet and FTP
B. Language Support Selection, click Next
C. Time Zone Selection

1. America/Detroit (or your timezone)

2. Leave 'System Clock uses UTC' unchecked for Linux/Windows dual boot
systems
B. Account Configuration

1. Set root password

2. Add at least one user account
B. Authentication Configuration, accept defaults and click Next
C. Package Group Selection

1. Printer Support
2. Classic X Window System
3. X Window System
4. Gnome
5. KDE
6. Sound and Multimedia Support
7. Network Support
8. Messaging and Web Tools
9. Graphics and Image Manipulation
10. Windows File Server (only if you will run samba)
11. Anonymous FTP Server (not recommended)
12. Web Server
13. Authoring/Publishing
14. Emacs
15. Utilities
16. Software Development
B. Video Card Configuration, accept default video card or choose one
manually
C. Preparing to Install. This is the last chance to safely cancel the
installation process. Click Next, and wait a very long time while
partitions are formatted and packages are installed. Insert disk 2 when
prompted and click OK. A log will be written to /tmp/install.log
 D. Boot Disk Creation. Insert formatted floppy and click Next. Label disk
as "Linux 7.2 Boot Disk for {hostname}"
E. Monitor Selection and X Configuration

1. Choose specific monitor, or choose and appropriate Generic Monitor

2. Adjust syncronization rates as follows
a. Horizontal sync: 30-64 kHz
b. Vertical sync: 50-75 Hz
3. Customize graphics configuration as follows
a. Color Depth: High Color (16 Bit)
b. Screen Resolution: 1024x768
c. Desktop Environment: GNOME (default) or KDE
(recommended)
d. Login Type: Graphical (for use as workstation) or Text
(for use as server by experts)
4. Click 'Test Setting' to test X screen settings
NOTE: (Control+Alt+Backspace) exits X immediately
5. Click 'Next'
B. Congratulations, Linux has been installed! Remove floppy, click Exit,
and remove CD-ROM to reboot
2. Verify aspects of the system configuration
A. Verify the date and time
$ date
Adjust the date and time if necessary
# date MMDDhhmm[YYYY].ss
Write the new date and time to the system's CMOS clock
# clock -w
B. Verify that all of the machine's RAM has been detected
$ free
If Linux reports less RAM than is actually installed your system, follow
instructions to specify at boot time the amount of available RAM
C. Verify that domainname can be determined
$ hostname -d
If the domainname is not reported, then edit /etc/hosts so that the
fully qualified domain name appears before the hostname
# cd /etc
# cp -p hosts hosts.000
# vi hosts
      127.0.0.1   {hostname.domain}   {hostname}  
localhost.localdomain   localhost
3. Install update packages from RedHat

It is critical that any security related updates be applied to your

system. Root access security holes are reguarlay uncovered, and
machines connected to the internet are regularly probed for these
weaknesses. It is a certainty that unpatched machines will soon be
hacked