Chapter 1. Introduction
Welcome to the Official Red Hat Linux Alpha Installation Guide.
The Official Red Hat Linux Alpha Installation Guide contains useful information to assist you during the installation of Red Hat Linux. From fundamental concepts such as installation preparation (gathering information about your current system) to the step-by-step installation procedure, this book will be a valuable resource as you install Red Hat Linux.
This manual will walk you through a typical installation using the Red Hat Linux CD-ROMs. Once you have completed the installation as outlined in this manual, you will have a fully functioning Red Hat Linux desktop system.
Documentation Conventions
When you read this manual, you will see that certain words are represented in different fonts, typefaces, sizes and weights. This highlighting is systematic; different words are represented in the same style to indicate their inclusion in a specific category. The types of words that are represented this way include the following:
- command
Linux commands (and other operating system commands, when used) are represented this way. This style should indicate to you that you can type in the word or phrase on the command line and press
[Enter] to invoke a command. Sometimes a command contains words that would be displayed in a different style on their own (like filenames). In these cases, they are considered to be part of the command, so the entire phrase will be displayed as a command. For example:Use the cat testfile command to view the contents of a file, named testfile, in the current working directory.
- filename
Filenames, directory names, paths, and RPM package names are represented this way. This style should indicate that a particular file or directory exists by that name on your Red Hat Linux system. Examples:
The .bashrc file in your home directory contains bash shell definitions and aliases for your own use.
The /etc/fstab file contains information about different system devices and filesystems.
The /usr/share/doc directory contains documentation for various programs.
Install the webalizer RPM if you want to use a Web server log file analysis program.
- application
This style should indicate to you that the program named is an end-user application (as opposed to system software). For example:
Use Netscape Navigator to browse the Web.
[key] A key on the keyboard is shown in this style. For example:
To use
[Tab] completion, type in a character and then press the[Tab] key. Your terminal will display the list of files in the directory that start with that letter.- Combinations of keystrokes
A combination of keystrokes is represented like this:
[key] -[key] . For example:The
[Ctrl] -[Alt] -[Backspace] key combination will restart the X Window System.- Sequences of commands in Graphical User Interface (GUI) menus
If you need to type in a sequence of commands from a GUI menu, they'll be shown similar to the following example:
Click on Programs=>Applications=>Emacs to start the Emacs text editor.
Additionally, we use several different strategies to draw your attention to certain pieces of information. In order of how critical the information is to your system, these items will be marked as a note, a caution, or a warning. For example:
 | Note |
|---|---|
Remember that Linux is case sensitive. In other words, a rose is not a ROSE is not a rOsE. |
 | Caution |
|---|---|
Do not do routine tasks as root — use a regular user account unless you need to use the root account to administer your system. |
 | Warning |
|---|---|
If you choose not to partition manually, a server-class installation will remove all existing partitions on all installed hard drives. Do not choose this installation class unless you are sure you have no data you need to save. |