Chapter 1: Installing Linux
The recent years have marked a significant rise in the adoption of Linux as the operating system of choice for both server and desktop computing platforms. From enterprise-grade servers and large-scale cloud infrastructures to individual workstations and small-factor home appliances, Linux has become an ever-present platform for a wide range of applications.
The prevalence of Linux, perhaps now more than ever, brings into the spotlight much-needed administration skills for a growing community of system administrators and developers. In this book, we take a practical approach to Linux administration essentials, with the modern-day system administrator, DevOps, or developer in mind.
In this first chapter, we'll guide you through the Linux installation process, either on physical hardware (bare metal) or using a Virtual Machine (VM). We'll take you further with a few case studies on choosing a Linux distribution based on functional requirements. Along the way, we introduce you to the Linux graphical user interface with some hands-on examples of configuring GNOME and KDE. Finally, we build a Linux workstation suitable for our daily computing needs.
Here are the topics we cover in this chapter:
- The Linux operating system
- Linux distributions
- Choosing the right Linux distribution
- Installing Linux - the basics
- The Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)
- Installing Linux graphical user interfaces
- Setting up and using the Linux workstation