Living (and dying) with Linux in the workplace

Setup, part 1: Installation

As volunteer admin, my job was to install SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop on an old Dell machine we had kicking around the office, and to connect it to our office infrastructure.

Installation is easy: Just put in the CD, pick a few things, agree to a few things, click "next" a lot of times, put in the next CDs, one after the other, and voila! It's done.

A few specifics:

-- I selected GNOME for the desktop interface. In my mind, I associate KDE with a more advanced user than the one I'll be supporting, although if there ever were a reason for that association it is now lost in the mists of a very poor memory.

-- I tried to give "root" an easy password -- this is only a test, after all. But it would have none of that. I had to go with eight characters that do not form a word but do include numerals.

-- I made two user accounts, one for me (jcarpenter) and one for Sharon (smachlis), giving each a strong password.

-- I accepted the default networking configuration. This included an enabled firewall and a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol-enabled network card, which was discovered without any problem.

-- I downloaded the latest updates and enabled automatic updates, which was the only change from the defaults for the entire installation process.

-- Joyce Carpenter