The supported desktop experience for lab users is openSUSE 10.3 running KDE. There are certainly other popular linux distributions that can be used, but openSUSE has done a good job of balancing developer flexibility, desktop usability, and hardware transparency. The current release of this writing is openSUSE 10.3. There are many resources on-line to help with installing openSUSE. A good place to start is openSUSE.org. These instructions won't attempt to duplicate already available information, but rather provide convenient notes for local configuration.

openSUSE has a good history of hardware support, but as with any operating system, if you stray too far from the hardware profile of popular platforms you can run into complexities with esoteric or deprecated hardware. The easiest install experience is to use hardware not older than 5 years and to do a clean install (ie. erase the existing hard drive). For example, these instructions were created using Dell 650N systems circa 2003. Other approaches are certainly possible and sometimes necessary, but you'll need to look elsewhere for instructions on how to address them.

If you are wanting a linux desktop experience as a secondary desktop, you are strongly encouraged to use VMware to install linux on your existing desktop rather than attempt dual booting configurations. Running other systems in a virtual machine under these circumstances is by far the easiest approach. You can find more information on using the no-cost VMware Player and download a ready-to-run virtual machine image of openSUSE 10.3(direct link) from VMware. This platform is completely sufficient for following all the UABgridDeveloper instructions.

Install openSUSE 10.3

The network install is the preferred approach for installing openSUSE in the lab. We use the nearby mirror generously provided by Georgia Tech. A network install requires burning a network install ISO image to CDROM. Use the i386 or x86_64 image as appropriate for your hardware.

Boot from this burned CDROM and at the boot menu:

  • Press F4 to select the install location
    • Choose HTTP as the protocol (the default is SLP, which won't work because there is no SLP service available)
    • Enter www.gtlib.gatech.edu as the hostname
    • Enter pub/opensuse/distribution/10.3/repo/oss as the path
    • Press Enter to select OK
  • Press F5 and select "Safe Settings" for the install program boot options. (Note only needed under special hardware circumstances, eg. 3D graphics cards or less completely supported hardware.)
  • Highlight Installation from the boot menu
  • Press Enter to begin the install program

It will take a few minutes to boot the install image, as it has to be downloaded from the network repository. This should be fairly quick on a 100Mbs connection. Once the install program is running, the first screen you'll see is the Language selection. The following bullets simply show the correct selections and assume you will press enter or click Next after the selection. Details are only provided for non-obvious configurations.

  • Language: English (US)
  • License Agreement: Yes.
  • System Analysis: New Installation also check the box Add On-line Repositories Before Installation
  • Online Repsitories: OSS and Non-OSS should be selected
  • Clock and Time Zone:
    • Region: USA
    • Time Zone: Central
    • Hardware Clock Set To: UTC
    • Click Change... to set up NTP for time synchronization
      • Select Sychronize with NTP Server
      • Click Configure...
      • Click Advanced Configuration
        • Delete the default Server listed (bigben.cac.washington.edu)
        • Add a Server named ntp1 and select use for boot synchronization (if you're outside the lab use tick.dpo.uab.edu)
        • Add a Server named ntp2 and select use for boot synchronization (if you're outside the lab use tock.dpo.uab.edu)
        • Click Accept
      • Click Accept (Your screen may blank here if the time shifted enough to trigger the screen saver, just wiggle the mouse to activate the screen.)
    • Click Next
  • Desktop Selection: KDE
  • System Configuration: the defaults should be OK if you started with a blank disk. The lab configuration we want to overwrite existing disks, so the following steps should be taken.
    • Click on Partitioning
      • Select Create Custom Partition Setup
      • Select 1: SCSI disk
      • Select all partions except the Dell Utility partition
      • Unselect Propose Separate Home Partition
      • Click Next to complete the partition configuration. For the lab systems this will be a 2Gb swap partition and 31Gb system partition.
    • Click Accept to begin the install. NOTE: This begins the install and will erase your disks as configured.
      • Accept the software license for Adobe fonts and flash player, and the Sun Java virtual machine, these license are exceptions to the free software licenses agreed to above. These tools complement the desktop experience eventhough they are more restrictively licensed.
  • Software Install: watch the packages download and wait for the install to complete. About 20 minutes on a 100Mbs connection
  • Password for "root: use the default lab password for root, this will be replaced by sudo in the final configuration (for those following along elsewhere use something secure.
  • Hostname Config: we use DHCP in the lab, so these settings are just for booting. Use the desktop name as the hostname and darknet.lab.ac.uab.edu as the domain name.
  • Network Config:
    • Firewall: make sure SSH port is open. (You'll have to click on the open option as it is closed by default.)
    • All other defaults should be OK.
  • Test Internet Connect: yes
  • Registration: Configure Later
  • User Authorization Method: Local(/etc/passwd) (see DesktopConfig for how it will be configured after the install).
  • New Local User:
    • Uncheck: "Automatic Login"
    • Create the localtest account (all values set to localtest)
  • Release notes: read them
  • Hardware Configuration: Accept defaults (on lab equipment there is a slight delay in configuring the display, have patience).

After this point, the system install is complete and the running system with a login prompt will come up. You should configure BlazerID authentication, LDAP accounts, and NFS file shares as described in DesktopConfig.