Slackware Linux Essentials
Prev	Chapter 3 Installation	Next

3.2 -System Requirements

- -

An easy Slackware installation requires, at minimum, the following:

- -

Table 3-2. System Requirements

- - --- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Hardware	Requirement
Processor	586
RAM	32 MB
Disk Space	1GB
Media Drive	4x CD-ROM

- -

If you have the bootable CD, you will probably not need a floppy drive. Of course, it -stands to reason that if you don't possess a CD-ROM drive, you will need a floppy drive -to do a network install. A network card is required for an NFS install. See the section -called NFS for more information.

- -

The disk space requirement is somewhat tricky. The 1GB recommendation is usually safe -for a minimal install, but if you do a full install, you will need around two gigabytes -of available hard disk space plus additional space for personal files.. Most users don't -do a full install. In fact, many run Slackware on as little as 100MB of hard disk -space.

- -

Slackware can be installed to systems with less RAM, smaller hard drives, and weaker -CPUs, but doing so will require a little elbow grease. If you're up for a little work, -take a look at the LOWMEM.TXT file in the distribution tree for -a few helpful hints.

- -

3.2.1 The Software Series

- -

For reasons of simplicity, Slackware has historically been divided into software -series. Once called “disk sets” because they were designed for floppy-based -installation, the software series are now used primarily to categorize the packages -included in Slackware. Today, floppy installation is no longer possible.

- -

The following is a brief description of each software series.

- -

Table 3-3. Software Series

- - --- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Series	Contents
A	The base system. Contains enough software to get up and running and have a text -editor and basic communication program.
AP	Various applications that do not require the X Window System.
D	Program development tools. Compilers, debuggers, interpreters, and man pages are all -here.
E	GNU Emacs.
F	FAQs, HOWTOs, and other miscellaneous documentation.
GNOME	The GNOME desktop environment.
K	The source code for the Linux kernel.
KDE	The K Desktop Environment. An X environment which shares a lot of look-and-feel -features with MacOS and Windows. The Qt library, which KDE requires, is also in this -series.
KDEI	Internationalization packages for the KDE desktop.
L	Libraries. Dynamically linked libraries required by many other programs.
N	Networking programs. Daemons, mail programs, telnet, news readers, and so on.
T	teTeX document formatting system.
TCL	The Tool Command Language. Tk, TclX, and TkDesk.
X	The base X Window System.
XAP	X Applications that are not part of a major desktop environment (for example, -Ghostscript and Netscape).
Y	BSD Console games

- -

3.2.2 -Installation Methods

- -

3.2.2.1 Floppy

- -

While it was once possible to install all of Slackware Linux from floppy disks, the -increasing size of software packages (indeed, of some individual programs) has forced the -abandonment of the floppy install. As late as Slackware version 7.1 a partial install was -possible using floppy disks. The A and N series could be nearly entirely installed, -providing a base system from which to install the rest of the distribution. If you are -considering a floppy install (typically on older hardware), it is typically recommended -to find another way, or use an older release. Slackware 4.0 is still very popular for -this reason, as is 7.0.

- -

Please note that floppy disks are still required for a CD-ROM install if you do not -have a bootable CD, as well as for an NFS install.

- -

3.2.2.2 CD-ROM

- -

If you have the bootable CD, available in the official disc set published by Slackware -Linux, Inc. (see the section called Getting Slackware), a CD-based installation will be a -bit simpler for you. If not, you will need to boot from floppies. Also, if you have -special hardware that makes usage of the kernel on the bootable CD problematic, you may -need to use specialized floppies.

- -

As of Slackware version 8.1, a new method is used for creating the bootable CDs, which -does not work as well with certain flaky BIOS chips (it is worth noting that most all -Linux CDs suffer from this these days). If that is the case, we recommend booting from a -floppy disk.

- -

Section -3.2.3 and Section 3.2.5 -provide information on choosing and creating floppies from which to boot, should this be -necessary.

- -

3.2.2.3 NFS

- -

NFS (the Network File System) is a way of making filesystems available to remote -machines. An NFS install allows you to install Slackware from another computer on your -network. The machine from which you are installing needs to be configured to export the -Slackware distribution tree to the machine to which you're installing. This, of course, -involves some knowledge of NFS, which is covered in Section 5.6.

- -

It is possible to perform an NFS install via such methods as PLIP (over a parallel -port), SLIP, and PPP (though not over a modem connection). However, we recommend the use -of a network card if available. After all, installing an operating system through your -printer port is going to be a very, very slow process.

- -

3.2.3 Boot Disk

- -

The boot disk is the floppy you actually boot from to begin the installation. It -contains a compressed kernel image which is used to control the hardware during -installation. Therefore, it is very much required (unless you're booting from CD, as is -discussed in the section called CD-ROM). The boot disks are located in the bootdisks/ directory in the distribution tree.

- -

There are more Slackware boot disks than you can shake a stick at (which is to say -about 16). A complete list of boot disks, with a description of each, is available in the -Slackware distribution tree in the file bootdisks/README.TXT. -However, most people are able to use the bare.i (for IDE -devices) or scsi.s (for SCSI devices) boot disk image.

- -

See Section -3.2.6 for instructions on making a disk from an image.

- -

After booting, you will be prompted to insert the root disk. We recommend that you -just humor the boot disk and play along.

- -

3.2.4 Root Disk

- -

The root disks contain the setup program and a filesystem which is used during -installation. They are also required. The root disk images are located in the directory -rootdisks in the distribution tree. You'll have to make two root disks from the install.1 and install.2 images. Here you -can also find the network.dsk, pcmcia.dsk, rescue.dsk, and sbootmgr.dsk disks.

- -

3.2.5 Supplemental Disk

- -

A supplemental disk is needed if you are performing an NFS install or installing to a -system with PCMCIA devices. Supplemental disks are in the rootdsks directory in the -distribution tree, with the filenames network.dsk and pcmcia.dsk. Recently other supplemental disks such as rescue.dsk and sbootmgr.dsk have been -added. The rescue disk is a small floppy root image that runs in a 4MB RAM drive. It -includes some basic networking utilities and the vi editor for quick fixes on busted -machines. The sbootmgr.dsk disk is used to boot other devices. -Boot off this disk if your bootable CD-ROM drive doesn't want to boot the Slackware CDs. -It will prompt you for different things to boot and may offer a convenient way to work -around a buggy BIOS.

- -

The root disk will instruct you on the use of supplemental disks when it is -loaded.

- -

3.2.6 Making the Disks

- -

Once you've selected a boot disk image, you need to put it on a floppy. The process is -slightly different depending on which operating system you're using to make the disks. If -you're running Linux (or pretty much any Unix-like OS) you'll need to use the dd(1) command. Assuming bare.i is your -disk image file and your floppy drive is /dev/fd0, the command -to make a bare.i floppy is:

- - - - - -

-% dd if=bare.i of=/dev/fd0
-

- -

If you're running a Microsoft OS, you'll need to use the RAWRITE.EXE program, which is included in the distribution tree in -the same directories as the floppy images. Again assuming that bare.i is your disk image file and your floppy drive is A:, open a DOS prompt and type the following:

- - - - - -

-C:\ rawrite a: bare.i
-