Starting out with Oracle Linux

I have been wanting to learn more about Linux for some time now, and the time has come to transform a desire to action. I have landed on Oracle Linux, for reasons that will soon become clear. As I don’t have any machine to dedicate to this, and because I want to have the ability to take snapshots and revert to previous states, I will be running Linux as a virtual machine.

For a while to come, you will see posts like this, all stored in the Linux101 Category, where I chronicle the specific challenges, annoyances and problems I run into, as well as their solutions, when I find them.

I have some experience in running virtual machines, and prefer using VirtualBox for such pursuits, because it is intuitive to set up, and is free to use (that is free as in freedom, AND as in beer). All Oracle software resources are distributed from the Oracle Technology Network, OTN. Using it is free, though I gather some resources are not available (more on this later, when and if I find out more).

In order to install Oracle Linux, you naturally need to download the installation images, distributed as a .iso disk image. To install Oracle Linux, you only need a single file. As I am running Oracle Linux 6, Update 5, this file is V41362-01.iso. There are four other iso-files available from OTN. At this point, we do not need those.

For future reference, here’s how I set my environment up:

• Download the installer from OTN
• In VirtualBox, create a new virtual machine, setting it up as an Linux, Oracle (64 bit) system
• I gave it 1600 MB RAM, and a 55 GB Dynamically Allocated VDI Harddrive
• Booting the virtual machine, I installed the OS from the downloaded installer
• Going through the installer, I kept options at default, setting location, keyboard and root password as appropriate
• Wanting to have a GUI, I opted for a Desktop install

Having done all that, you need to wait for a while; the installation procedure takes anywhere from three to fifteen minutes. Once the VM has rebooted, you need to create a local user account (in addition to root), and that’s it, you’re all set!