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Glory, Triumph and Ownage are Mine!

Slackerer and Slackerer

w00t!

Finally got a pretty good installation using a big box of floppy disks. Slackware version3.

Of course, there are still some kinks to work out; notably, xconfig - the file that makes the x server work properly with the multimedia I/O hardware.

I did a fair bit of study to make the thing work properly. Notably, I found this page about WD90C24 chipsets and XFree86 which helped me to get everything into alignment.

I actually had quite a few obstacles to overcome. When I finally got around to making another attempt at setting up the little box, the CMOS battery had gone all peculiar. I had to replace it by cracking open the box itself and detaching the battery from its place amid the circuitry (see picture). There were alarming cracking noises when I did this and I was pretty sure I was never going to get it to work again but when I got down to Map-f***in'-lins and waved the poor dead thing at the assistant and exchanged it for a new one everything seemed to work fine.

Apparently, CMOS batteries used to come with wires attached, laminated in place with transparent plastic, but this is no longer the case, so I had to cut the plastic open and sellotape the connectors onto the top and bottom surfaces of the battery.

This done, the next step is to open the BIOS setup program by pressing delete at boot time and saving the new settings so that the bios chip can get used to the idea that there is a new CMOS battery in place. For more info about the T3600CT, its BIOS and other bits and bobs, see the 'Introducing the Victim' section of the Linux Deathmarch.

Kewl, so that's taken care of then.

Slackware version 3 is much smaller than the later versions so it fits comfortably into the titchy little toshiba hard disk. I installed cuteFTP pro on my desktop system to make sure that the transfer of the system went smoothly. Transferring it to floppy disks was a pain in the arse, of course, but that's the way the ball bounces, G!

At last, I've managed to get a fully fledged Slackware installation on my crappy little box. It isn't great, but it's a start; it boots and it's something to play with.

I can hardly tell you how chuffed I am, at long last, to have pulled it off.

Yessssss!

Recipe: How to install Slackware Linux v3.3 on a Toshiba T3600CT if you know absolutely nothing.

1. Getting It.

Get the disks. Go to the Slackware website and download them. I'm using version 3.9 because it can be loaded from floppy disks. If you have a CD drive that will work with the T3600CT then by all means use something more up-to-date. You will find version 3.3 and others at the bottom of this page. Specifically, you will need the boot disk bareapm.i and the root disk color.gz. You won't need the pcmcia disk because you won't (at least if you're following this recipe) be needing any pcmcia cards to install the OS. PCMCIA support will be set up later. You will also need to get all or some of the disk sets. See below for a discussion of what the packages are and what they do. Lastly, get a copy of rawrite appropriate to whatever system you're using. If you're using Windows XP you will have to get a copy of RawriteXP.

2. Making The Disks

Put them all on floppy disks. You will need to use rawrite to make the boot and root disks but the rest can be made in the usual way by sending all the files to the disk. Make sure you just put the files themselves on the floppy though, not the folder they're in!

3. Before You Start

You can partition your disk using a utility like the Partition Magic Boot Floppy if you like, before you start. This is by far easier than using fdisk. See below for my suggested partition table. Again, though, the usual disclaimers apply. I am not an expert and this may well not be the optimal arrangement.

4. Let's Begin!

Start the computer with bareapm.i in the floppy drive. Press <enter> when the prompt appears. After a while you will be prompted for the root disk. Put color.gz in the drive and press <enter> again.

5. Log In

Log in by typing 'root' and pressing <enter>

6. Partitioning with FDISK

If you haven't already partitioned your system you will now need to make a partition table by typing fdisk. Even if you have already done it, it is a good idea to type fdisk now just to make sure everything is OK. You can see the partitions by entering 'p' at the prompt. Entering 'm' will get you a list of commands. 'D' for example, will delete an existing partition, so if windows is installed you may want to type

d<enter> 1 <enter> to delete that partition (Obviously, this will get rid of windows so don't do this unless you really want to commit to switching operating systems. You will lose all programs and all operating system components!

Then type n<enter> to make a new partition. To set up your disk the way I did, do the following list of commands:

n<enter> p <enter> 1<enter> 1<enter>10<enter>
n<enter> e<enter> 2<enter>11<enter>280<enter>
n<enter> e<enter>3<enter>281<enter>789<enter>
n<enter> l<enter>281<enter>330<enter>
n<enter>l<enter>331<enter>650<enter>
n<enter>l<enter>651<enter>789<enter>
a<enter>1<enter>
t<enter>5<enter>82<enter>
p<enter>
w<enter>

Now, you may well ask, what the hell was that all about. Well, this series of commands makes a series of partitions, one of which was primary and one extended. Within the extended partition are three logical drives. The last four sets of commands toggle a bootable flag on drive 1 (a<enter>1<enter>), changes drive 5 to make it a swap partition(t<enter>5<enter>82<enter>), allows you to inspect your handiwork (p<enter>) and then writes the partition table (w<enter>). If you screw up at any point, don't worry too much. you can delete any stray partitions with 'd' and start all over again if you like. I know it looks scary but it isn't that bad really. What's the worst that could happen?

At this point, your partition table should look something like

Reboot the machine with ctrl-alt-del and then go through steps 4 and 5 above to get back to this same place.

7. Slackware Setup

This time, instead of entering 'fdisk', do 'setup' instead. You'll get a blue menu which you can navigate with the arrow keys. Go to keymap first and pick the appropriate keyboard layout for your area. In my case, that's uk.map, but it's up to you.

8. Swap Space

Then it's on to the swap space. The setup program should detect one swap partition if you did everything right in fdisk. Allow it to reformat it and just say yes to everything.

9. Mounting the Partitions

Next up is the main partition allocation. You need to set your second partition as the root partition so select /dev/hda2 and (because you have an old machine with a small disk) opt for 'check' (slow, thorough format, marking bad blocks as unusable) and for an inode density of 1024. The format process will take ages and may appear to have crashed (e.g., white writing may appear under the menu if it detects bad blocks) but give it time. It'll get there in the end. Repeat the process for the other drives (1, 6 and 7 in my scheme), and mark them as /boot, /usr and /home respectively.

Congratulations! You have now completed the tedious business of setting up your disk. Now we'll move on to the even more tedious business of installing the software.

10. Media Selection

The setup program now asks what installation media you are using. This is likely to be floppy disks, unless you happen to have a compatible CD drive lying around, so pick 'floppy disks' and '1.44MB, drive A' or whatever it says.

11. Disk Sets

Selecting disk sets is the fun bit, I always think. I love it. Here's a rundown of what's on offer:

A - You have to have this.
AP - Not much on here to be honest...
D - Program Development. This may not sound useful but actually it has the compilers and things you'll need to upgrade your system. I definitely need it for my PCMCIA card and you probably will too.
E - Emacs is a powerful text thingy, apparently. I don't need it because I have another version of it on the Dell and I want to keep this installation to a minimum.
F - Um...
K - Kernel source code. You only need this if you want to try recompiling the kernel. This is a tricky job, but if you feel up to the challenge...
N - Networking. You want this. Of course you do!!!.
T - Um...
TCL - TCL/TK language. No idea what this does. I hope I don't need it because i haven't installed it.
X - XFree86 is the system that handles windowing in Linux. It acts as a server and, in conjunction with a window manager such as KDE or Gnome, makes the whole thing a heck of a lot easier to use. You can skip this if you want to be macho and command-liney - It's up to you.
XAP - various applications for XFree86.
XD - tools for developing apps for XFree86. This might come in handy too - see section 14 below.
XV - A window manager and some other things that will provide a crude GUI for the system. Obviously, you'll need the X set to install this.
Y - Games. Not exactly essential, but...

12. Installing the Software.

Lastly, you'll be given the option of how you want the disk sets to be installed. Personally, I suggest 'menu'. It's a bit of a hassle but it's better because if you've only got a little bit of disk space you'll want to make sure you only use it for the things you really need/want.
You are prompted to put in disk a1. When you hit <enter> you will be shown a menu of available packages in the 'a' set. Use the arrow keys to move around and the space bar to select or deselect various options. You then have to swap out the disks in order so I hope you don't have any important meetings elsewhere because you aren't going anywhere for the next few hours, I promise you! At the start of each set you'll be shown another menu. Remember that you have limited disk space so don't install anything unless you are sure you need it. for example, I didn't bother installing any help files or 'man' pages because I know I can find them online if I need to, but if this is your only computer maybe you should go ahead and install them all. Here are my personal opinions, but of course everyone's system is different.

A - I deselect the SCSI kernel because the machine doesn't have SCSI hardware. I also drop the print spooler (no printer!), the archiving utility (no storage!) and a thing called gpm. I have heard this sometimes prevents the graphical user interface from loading and I'm not taking any chances. It's quite useful though, so if you're brave, go for it. Lastly, make sure you check the box for PCMCIA support if you want to be able to use PCMCIA cards later.
AP - Not much worth bothering with really.
D - Accepted the defaults, mainly. No idea what I need to compile packages so I let it make the decision. The only extras I picked up were the SVGA graphics libraries.
K - No choices available.
N - Obviously, you'll need to keep TCP/IP but you probably won't want all the default options. Personally, I also scooped Apache (Version 1.2.0 included with this distro is not tremendously up-to-date though, so you'll probably need to update it to 1.2.7 if you want to do anything with it) and Lynx. Lynx is an old command-line browser. It is unlike any of the commonly used browsers but it is often used by people with impaired vision because it hooks up nicely with screen-readers. As such, it's a sort of trial-by-fire for web pages. If someone can use Lynx to find the information they need then you're doing a good job!
X - There are two menus in the X disk set. Firstly, you need to select a chipset. I gather that the WD90C24 video controller in the Toshiba T3600CT is a super VGA card, so I picked the Super VGA server to install. In the next menu there are some other options. You might try the virtual framebuffer server if you're feeling optimistic. It is meant to give you better screen resolution and colour depth but only when the moon is full and the wind blows easterly.
XAP - There are a few optional extras here. Grab whatever you fancy.
XV - Just the window manager. Not interested in the rest.

13. Finishing it off.

Now you're back in setup.

The first question is which kernel to use. I used the kernel from the disk because it has apm features. To be honest, this is probably not the best way because it includes a lot of stuff I don't need, but I'm no expert so getting a spot-on perfect set-up will just have to wait. Next, make a Lilo bootdisk to use in case of the inevitable emergency (see below!).

Where to install Lilo: Now, this is a tricky one. You should have partition 1 (/dev/hda1) set up as the bootable partition by this time, so installing lilo to the mbr of that partition should work. Choose 'begin' and press enter, then pick a delay (zero, in all probability!). Then choose 'Linux' and point it at /dev/hda2 - i.e., the second partition. What should happen now is that when you come to boot your machine, Lilo will load from hda1 and cause the main bit of the system to load from hda2. Clever eh?

I don't have a modem so I skipped the modem setup.

The pointer, apparently, is a P/S2 mouse (option 2)

I don't have a CD-ROM drive, so that's another one I skipped.

Screen fonts. Ugh! They are all either boring or unreadable or both. The scrawl fonts are quite funny but I don't think i could do much work with one!

14. Are We There Yet?

<---THIS SECTION ISN'T FINISHED YET...NOT VERY HELPFUL EH? IT WILL BE SOON - 23-1-04 --->

There are 3 problems I came across before I even got going:

Firstly, the well-known LILO-LI problem, which is when Linux doesn't load properly but gets stuck at L or LI. This is because LILO displays one letter for each part of its process, so if it gets stuck half way through you'll only get LI displayed on the screen, possibly followed by a number. A full discussion of this can be found at this page, which is actually dedicated to the SuSE distribution. I found I got this problem repeatedly and it drove me nuts. That's why I included a smaller partition for the /boot section in the instructions above. If you followed the recipe step-by-step you should now have a good installation of Linux at the very start of the disk.

Anyway, a temporary solution, if you've messed it up, is to boot from the floppy disk you made near the end of the installation. That's OK.and it will work fine.

Next came the issue of the PCMCIA card. PCMCIA support comes from a program called pcmcia.cs, which is free, of course. The version that ships with Slack3.3 is an old one (pcmcia-cs-2.9.6) and doesn't support any of the cards I have in the house. The newer version needs to be downloaded and compiled. I actually had trouble installing it but I think (not sure) that was because I hadn't installed the XD set which includes some elements you need to make things like GUI control panels for the card so you can control it just as you would with Windows - using a little dialog box thingy.

Anyway, for what it's worth, here is how it's done, in case you want to have a bash. I strongly recommend getting the XD set as well as all the others I've mentioned above. More info about PCMCIA setup can be found here, and a list of supported PCMCIA cards in the latest version is here

Lastly came the question of the XF86Config file. The "Man Page" (sort of online help file thingy) for this file can be found here.