LINUX OPERATING

SYSTEM
INTRODUCTION:
Linux is a free UNIX work
alike operating system. It comes
with full source code and oodles
of UNIX freeware including the
GNU C (and C++) compiler,
Perl and Tcl / Tk.
INTRODUCTION:
Linux runs on a variety of
computer architectures,
including ARM, SPARC, Alpha,
PowerPC, M68k, MIPS, and
Intel.
Linux is free on the Internet and
you can purchase CD-ROMs
with Linux for about US$30-$50.
INTRODUCTION:

Major companies are now

endorsing Linux as a platform
for their wares, including IBM,
Hewlett-Packard, Silicon
Graphics, Oracle, Informix,
and Sybase.
INTRODUCTION:

Linux is an ideal platform for

many potential users:
With Linux, you can turn
your PC into a UNIX
workstation
 Users - who want to learn more about the UNIX
operating system and the X Window System.
 Internet surfers - who want a powerful platform for
cruising the Internet.
 System administrators - who want an alternative to
expensive Windows systems and licensing issues.
 Programmers - who want a cheap home or small-
business platform for developing software that can
be used on other, more powerful UNIX systems.
 HISTORY OF LINUX:
 Linux was created as an offshoot of Unix. It has
more similarities to Unix than to any operating
systems.
 As an operating system, Unix continues to be
widely used in commercial environment, as well as
in the educational world, although it is also often
found running on today’s client –server intranet
networks too.
 While versions of Unix have long been available
for PCs, they never had the grace or power of the
operating system available for minicomputers,
mainframes and today’s server.
 In additional, the early commercial versions
of Unix were costly, sometimes coating more
than the PC hardware they were destined to\
run on
This lack of accessibility ultimately gave
birth day to Linux as a means to make an
Unix-like operating system available on a
widespread basis.
 Evolution of Linux
 Richard Stallmand and the free software
Foundation (FSF) began work on this
alternative operative system in the mid-1980s.
 By the end of that decade, they had developed
functional alternatives to every major Unix
component except the kernel.
 Linux Torvalds at the university of Helsinki in
Finland developed the original Linux Kernel
in 1991.
 In March 1992, version 1.0 of the kernel came
into being, marking the first officially release
of Linux. At this point, Linux ran most of the
common Unix tools from compilers to
networking software to X Windows.
Linux continues to evolve as the pre-eminent
Unix-clone operating system for PCs.
Hardware support is now board, including
the most popular and common peripherals;
performance is strong, giving many pcs
power comparable to that of mind range
workstations such as Sun Microsystem’s
SPARC systems.
 Linux is even now ported to the
PowerPC and Compaq alpha platforms,
among others. Although technically
today’s Linux is not Unix because it fails
to quality for the brand name, Linux is
functionally equivalent to Unix almost
every important way.
Linux is
 A Multi-user Operating System
 A Multitasking Operating System
Linux Application
As an operating system, Linux can be used to
develop almost any type of application. Among
the applications available for Linux are the
following:
Text and word processing applicati
Programming languages
X Windows
Internet tools
Database
Windows & DOS Compatible Software
Linux as free software
Text and word processing
application:
Linux offers powerful tools for editing text
files and processing text in an automated
fashion.
Programming languages:
A wide variety of programming and
scripting languages and tools are available
for Linux and all Unix operating systems.
This abundance of programming tools
makes it easy to develop new applications
that can run not only on Linux but also on
most Unix and Unix like operating systems.
X Windows:
X windows is Unix’s answer to the
graphically user interface. X windows is a
highly flexible and configurable GUI
environment that runs on Linux as well as
on most Unix systems. Numerous
applications that run in X windows help to
make Linux an easy to use operating
systems.
Internet tools:
In addition to supporting well known
software such as Netscape and mosaic,
Linux provide a wide range of internet
software, including character based and
graphical mail-reading applications, the
full range of software needed to create
internet serves, plus complete network
support to connect to the internet via a
local network or modem.
Database:
Linux provides a robust platform for
running client server database
applications. Today, oracle, Sybase and
information all offer relational database
products for Linux.
Windows and DOS
compatibility software:
Linux can be made to run DOS software
with a high degree of stability and
compatibility and offers several approaches
to running windows software.
Linux as free software:
Linux kernel and most of the applications
written for Linux are available for free on the
Internet, often with no restriction on the
copying and redistribution of the software. to
begin with, the Linux kernel is distributed
under the GNU General Public License. This
special software license, developed by stall
man’s free software foundation, promotes the
open distribution and more importantly open
development of software.
LINUX FEATURES:
Version 7.1 of Red hat Linux offers several new
features not found in earlier versions and still
not found in all distribution of Linux. These
features include the following:
The 2.4 Linux Kernel
Integrated PC hardware support
A diversity of platforms
Support for smaller devices
New configuration tools
Improved X window systems
Improve performance Features
Few limits:
The new kernel now supports a large
amount of RAM (64 Gb), virtually
unlimited multitasking and the ability to
create a single volume over multiple disks
for every large file.
LINUX DISTRIBUTIONS
A number of organizations, some
commercial and some volunteer,
collect together versions of all these
programs with the Linux kernel,
test that everything works together,
and then release a what is called a
distribution of Linux.
LINUX DISTRIBUTIONS
Most distributions are more or less
equal. The main differences lie in
platform support, administration,
and installation. For example, the
PowerPC distribution, as you'd
guess, focuses on Linux for
PowerPC platforms.
The main Linux distributions include:
Debian
Kondara MNU/Linux
Linux Mandrake
LinuxPPC
RedHat
Slackware
Stampede
SuSE
TurboLinux
Mostly Linux
HARDWARE SUPPORT
 Linux runs on a number of hardware
architectures. By far the main platform,
though, is Intel systems. Linux supports
most Intel PC hardware.
 Linux supports a wide variety of older
hardware and can run fine on 386s and
486s you may have lying around.
 Linux runs fine on laptops.
HARDWARE SUPPORT
 Most Linux systems run Intel-compatible
chips, as Linux grew out of the PC arena.
Linux runs on a number of other
architectures, though, including Alpha,
MIPS, and SPARC from the traditional
UNIX RISC realm.
 So, there's a lot of support for Linux in
the non-Pentium world.
LINUX SOFTWARE

Linux includes most standard UNIX,

networking, and X Window
applications in most distributions.
In addition, more and more
commercial software vendors are
supporting Linux.
OFFICE SOFTWARE FOR LINUX
In general, there's a lot more
software available for Windows than
Linux, particularly in the area of
office productivity software. Even so,
you can get a number of packages for
Linux, including:
OFFICE SOFTWARE FOR LINUX
 OpenOffice,org (open-source StarOffice)
 StarOffice
 ApplixWare
 Corel WordPerfect Office 2000
 AbiWord open source word processor very
much like Microsoft Word.
 Siag Office, it sucks less.
 KDE KOffice
 Maxwell word processor
 Freshmeat List of Office Applications
Desktop Applications
Use Application
Text editor nedit
Text editor emacs
Word Processor AbiWord
Office Suite OpenOffice.org
Email (text only) elm
Email (graphical) Ratatosk
Web browser Mozilla
WINDOWS APPLICATION LINUX: WINE
 WINE is a Windows application
execution environment that runs under
Linux on Intel systems. With WINE, you
can run many Windows applications,
sort of like Sun's older WABI package,
or Insignia's Soft PC. WINE, though, is
free.
The current status of WINE is available
on the Web, along with a list of Windows
applications and how well they work.
Hardware Requirement
For an ideal Linux based PC your computer must have
the following :

 An IBM Compatible PC with minimum 80386.

80486 is better.
 Any processor from Intel, Sparc , Alpha or AMD
 Minimum 128 MB RAM
 Minimum 2 GB free hard disk space
 Input devices such as keyboard, mouse etc.
 Controller cards such as SCSI, IDE, etc
 A Network card such as ISA, PCI, re USB etc.
 Sound card compatibility to Linux
Software Requirements

A partitioning program such as

fdisk or disk druid supplied by Red
Hat
Linux Software package
Linux Directories
Root(/)
/bin - Contains Exe files
/dev – Contains Special device files
/etc – Contains all the systems wide
config. information as text file
/kernel – Contains kernel specific code
/lib – Contains the library file
/mnt – Contains device(except harddisk)
mounting files
/tmp – Contains temporary files
/usr – Contains the home directories of
the users, source text for the online
manual pages.
Steps For Installation Linux
 Insert the CD in a M/c With new Hard disk
 Start the system
 Select the mode (Graphics)
 Create the different partition
Root ( Preferebly 2GB)
Boot (64 to 128 MB)
Swap ( Double of RAM)
 Format the partition
 Select LILO for dual booting
 Select MBR for dual booting
 Provide the network address
 Select the appropriate firewall
 Set language & time format
 Set administrator password
 Select encryption method
 Install the required packages
 Reboot the systems
Mode of Linux operation

Text mode
Graphics mode
Switching between different mode

CTRL+ALT+F1- F6

CTRL+ALT+F7
Commands of Linux
 dir
 cat
 cp
 rm
 mkdir
 chdir
 rmdir
 ls
 vi
 chmod