The Answer Gang

Linux Box on windows

From Uri Rado

Answered By Heather Stern, Breen Mullins

How can I install a linux windows on windows?????
Thanks!!!!!!!!

Uri Rado.

[Heather] Hmm, such a simple question, so many ways to interpret it.

• "a linux windows"

  The usual graphical system for Linux is called the X Window System (no plural) or often, just X. The usual flavor of that we use is "Xfree86"... even if we're on Alphas and some other hardware, but since you're using Windows(tm) you're pretty likely to be using 80x86 compatible stuff.

  The part that makes it look impressive is called a "window manager" and many of them, even the really plain ones, support themes, though not the same theme files from Windows without a little help.

• "on windows"

  1. a linux windows "inside" windows ... to run like a windows app?

     One possible way is to use VMware for Windows, and install Linux into the child volume that it would create for you. This can be a little tricky to setup, but may not be too bad, and allows you to run Windows and Linux things at the same time. Yes, we here in The Answer Gang are more likely to do it the other way, running Windows inside of Linux, but it's your choice to make, not ours

  2. a linux windows "inside" a windows partition, but to boot into from windows.

     There are several distributions (many of them describe themselves as a "loopback loading" linux) whose install does not repartition your drive, just uses up a bunch of space inside of your C: ... I have little experience with them personally so I can't tell which one is the best. (PhatLinux got a lot of attention at one point :D) All I can say is that Linux Weekly News' "Distributions" section (http://www.lwn.net) has the best listing, and you'll want to look at several web pages before picking one, if this is what you wanted.

  3. I'm using windows, how do I install linux without wiping my windows?

     Many of the commercial distros promise to do this, and they have varying degrees of success... the most frightening part is the part about resizing your drive space so Linux can use the rest.

     Don't feel bad, it's frightening to us old hands too - and it should be. There was never a better time to make a backup!

     Partition Magic is reeeeally popular for doing that, in fact, so popular that it is what a couple of the big Linux distros use. But, I have heard of a few rare cases where it didn't do things right - and if you have Windows ME you desperately, importantly, don't-take-maybe-for-an-answer, need to use the newest version, or it won't work.

     FIPS used to be the handiest, but it's a DOS app. It's also quite old and unmaintained. Basically if you have a new enough version of Windows that you're not sure how to boot from a floppy into a DOS prompt... or that you *can't* ... you shouldn't use FIPS anymore. Its docs are still valuable reading though.

     GNU Parted is the current good tool to use if you come up in Linux. I'm not sure if it's seen any problems with those WinME partitions or not, but it is being actively developed, at least...

     The most careful way is to do your own defragging and backups, use any one of probably several available tools to cut your C: into a C: and D:, and then, start your selected Linux distro installer. The space assigned to be your D: can safely be chopped up into parts for Linux (for ordinary flavors of Linux) or used as the resting place for Linux parts (for distros which use UMSDOS, live in FAT filesystems directly, or use "loopback loading".)

     If you have an IDE drive your C: will almost certainly be /dev/hda1 when mentioned in the Linux tools, and should be left alone and absolutely NOT formatted during your installation of Linux. (For SCSI systems, /dev/sda1.)

  4. I just want to make my windows box look like Linux so my nerdy friend will stop bugging me

     (Hey, it's april coming up, isn't it? ) Well, it might be a little hard to make it look like K desktop, but there are apps for virtual workspaces in MSwin, and I bet someone has a hack to replace that "Start" logo with you own thing, so with the right backdrop, a kinda boring enough cursor, and maybe being able to tune the bevels so they look flatter (can it do that naturally? Been a while since I looked) ... plus some effort with an ico editor turning some popular "gnome" and "K" icons into MSwin icons...

     Maybe a student's project "icoutils" could help you out here:

     http://www.student.lu.se/~nbi98oli/src/icoutils-0.12.0.tar.gz

     You'd have to be a little bit programmer instead of artist though, he says turning images back into .ico's is "not yet implemented". But it was just updated this week, so let's encourage him, okay?

     Anyways don't forget to use Windows' features to make the icons 48x48 size and not to lose pixels by getting stuck with 32x32 "old style" .ico or it won't look very linux-y...

     Hopefully, your buds would get the hint that by applying apropos Windows tricks, that you are nerdy enough in your own right, in the environment you prefer.

[about adding Linux to an existing Windows install]

[Breen] WinME apparently added a new and bizarre way of reporting cylinder numbers on large drives (the physical cylinder modulo 1024 or some such) which confused the dickens out of Parted. I don't know if the fix is in the latest released version but it has been reported on the parted list.

Make very very sure that you're using the latest version of whatever tool you're using if you've got WinME anywhere near your box.

Thanks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Uri Rado.

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