Newbie guide for the FTP install of SuSe 9.0

[crouse]

This is my newbie guide for the net install (ftp install) of SuSe 9.0
Read through this entirely so you can familiarize yourself with the steps, and get the data you need to finish your install.

Since SuSe doesn't offer free iso download versions of SuSe, I decided to write this guide on how to do an net install (ftp install) of SuSe 9.0 since that is something that they do offer for free, but don't offer support. They do offer a "guide" to installing SuSe from the net, but it lacks detail and seems intentionally cryptic to me. I wanted to write a step by step guide to make things simpler so others don't have to search and search for hints on how it's done. This is my second article on SuSe's ftp install, the first one was for SuSe 8.2. You can find the older 8.2 article here: http://www.usalug.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=524

The first thing you need to do is select a place to download the boot.iso from. You can do that by searching here : http://www.suse.com/us/private/download/ftp/int_mirrors.html and selecting the closest location to you. I choose the ftp://mirror.mcs.anl.gov/pub/suse/ (Chicago, IL). When searching for a mirror, it is very important when looking on the SuSe mirrors page to select a COMPLETE mirror. It just saves you headaches.

Once you have a mirror from SuSe open, you can find the directory where the boot.iso resides, I went to ftp://mirror.mcs.anl.gov/pub/suse/i386/current/boot/ directory and downloaded the boot.iso file. Exact url to the boot iso I used is: ftp://mirror.mcs.anl.gov/pub/suse/i386/current/boot/boot.iso The file Size 21.6 MB so that shouldn't take too long. I did notice it was a few MB's larger than the older 8.2 boot.iso file.

After you have the boot iso downloaded, burn the boot.iso file as an image to a blank cdr. (I won't go into detail here, but there are many helpful tutorials on the net if you need help with that.)

Next, simply insert the disk into your computer, and reboot. You should be rewarded with a screen that displays some welcome message and then be forwarded on to the boot options screen. At this screen you should be able to choose from Installation

Choose Installation --- then hit the enter key.
You should get a {Loading Linux Kernel...............} and then proceed to the next screen.

You should get to a MAIN MENU screen. Several options there. Starting with Settings. System Information. Kernel Modules. Start Installation. Exit/Reboot. Power Off.

Choose Settings first. Make sure your Language selection is correct.
Then choose KERNEL MODULES and then select Load network card modules. Choose your network cards modules and load it.

If you need to load other modules do so here before proceeding. When that's done go back to the main menu and choose START INSTALLATION. Then choose the source medium (NETWORK). Then choose FTP. Then to enable your card to access the internet you need to choose AUTO CONFIG VIA DHCP or do it manually. I choose auto, since I'm on a dsl router that does DHCP.

Next is the hard part. You have to enter the IP ADDRESS of the FTP server. It took me several trys to figure this out. But after a little research, I found that the IP address can be had via the DIG command on Linux.

You must use the dig command in a terminal to find the IP address of whatever FTP server your using. I was using the ftp://mirror.mcs.anl.gov/pub/suse/ FTP server. Using the dig command : dig mirror.mcs.anl.gov returns one IP address. 140.221.9.138 Enter this number into the box asking for the IP address. After hitting enter it asks you if you want to specify a username and password, just say no. Then it asks if you want to use a Http proxy. Say NO again.

If things have went right so far it should say "trying to connect to ftp server". Once connected it says "Please enter the directory on the server"

For the ftp://mirror.mcs.anl.gov/pub/suse/ ftp server the correct entry would be: pub/suse/i386/current/

You should then see a small screen that says "Loading data into ramdisk (46760 kB) WOOT..... the hard part of the install, getting connected, is over!!

After that data is downloaded into the RAM disk, you will be greeted with the YaST Installation and System administration program.

The first thing you get to do is choose your language again. Then Yast detects hardware and checks to see if you want to load those drivers/modules. Choosing yes to detected hardware seems like a no brainer to me... so choose yes. The rest of the installation seems fairly straightforward and should be easy. The YaST installer has a very NICE partitioning tool.

At a minimum, you should probably have these partitions.

/boot small 50 mb
swap 500 mb unless you have alot of ram
/root 2+ gigs at least
/home the rest of the hard drive...or dedicate more to other partitions and root.

NOTE: You can let SuSe auto-partition your drive for you. I decided to go that route this time and ended up with a 1 gig swap partition and a 5 gig root partition on my 6 gig test drive. While I'm not sure that's the best setup, it did work fine.

The net install once it begins does take some time, even with fast connections. The servers are all running and alot of time are running at full capacity. My connection, installing KDE and the rest of the default install, takes about 3 hours or a little more. I set it up to start downloading the packages right before I go to bed Alot depends on what all you install. You get a nice menu with Yast to choose different programs if you desire something besides the default setup.

Wake up and finish the install, setting root password, users, graphic card settings, and that's about it. Reboot and you get rewarded with a SuSe 9.0 Linux Desktop workstation !! I'm very impressed with the ease of use of the SuSe enviroment. I look forward to using it more and more.

I hope this short tutorial was useful to you. If so, let me know

Main Download Page http://www.suse.com/us/private/download/suse_linux/index.html

SuSe Mirrors Page http://www.suse.com/us/private/download/ftp/int_mirrors.html

The installation guideline ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/suse/i386/9.0/README.FTP

Most current version of this article: http://www.usalug.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=8161

By Crouse
http://www.usalug.org
USA Linux Users Group

[trey]

For example, if I'm using the NC mirror, the full URL is:

ftp://distro.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/distributions/suse/suse/i386/current/

so i assume that the path would be:

pub/linux/distributions/suse/suse/i386/current

Is this right?

Thanks.

[crouse]

Yes...... the path you enter would be what you posted EXCEPT you need the trailing / at the end of it.

Welcome to usalug trey

[Guest]

Thanks for the nebie instructions. Here are some related questions for discussion.

Is it possible to download the entire ftp directory to one partion C: and then install to a second partion D:

Hardware:
30 gig Hard drive partioned as follows:

C: WinXP installed 15 Gig partion with downloaded suse ftp directory
D: Blank NTFS formated 15 Gig partion (this might have to be changed to fat32 or just fdisk and erase

E: I have a bootable CDR/W drive.

I would like to install suse 9 on the D: drive partion. Rather then specifing a ftp site could I point to the local C: drive and directory?

Also setup needs to dual boot. I guess Yast does that?

Thanks

[pbharris]

well i refered at least one person to this nice write up

_________________
Fedora

[Xeroid]

[MrPotatoHead]

do we have an ftp server I might be able to "up" the SUSE CD's for those who would like to download and burn the iso images

MrP

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[crouse]

No, that's NOT something SuSe allows, I've even seen SuSe burned copies pulled off ebay. They wouldn't take kindly to that

That, and we don't have a server that's going to host any isos. Legal isos are available at linuxiso.org though (just not suse)

[MrPotatoHead]

Well if SuSE won't allow that that we won't do that to SuSE . We don't want to upset SuSE. I dl'ed these iso's from one of the SuSE ftp server a while ago via Anonymous FTP .. I guess SuSE left a door open. A few days later that ftp server suddenly stopped working

MrP

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[michmcgr]

Thanks for posting the 'newbie guide' ...it helped a lot.

This is my first linux install and I want to do it without buying Suse 9.0 for 80 bucks, just what i can download and figure out from the net.

I'm running into issues connecting to the FTP server (chicago mirror). I get an error after I enter the IP address. I checked, and the server still had anon logons open.

So mabey It's my NIC. I loaded the module for the 3c90x card.

Q 1.) there was a dialog to enter parameters? I just hit enter. Is there anythig that I'm supposed to do there?

btw- I'm behind a router so I choose auto dhcp.

thanks

mike

[Germ]

[cunokyle]

How do you make an iso image from a disk...for example...let's say I had the SuSE 9 disks and I wanted to put the iso images on kazaa or something like that...err...I mean make a back-up copy of course

Is an iso image just a copy of the disk?

[MrPotatoHead]

[Xeroid]

[cunokyle]

They are allowed to keep you from copying and distributing their software under the GPL.