Please make installation clearer WRT minimal vs Gnome

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mebrenchley
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Please make installation clearer WRT minimal vs Gnome

Post by mebrenchley » 2015/02/22 11:29:13

I've spent the last two days battling with the bash window in my new Centos 7 install, trying and failing to set up ip configuration, yum repositories and install Gnome.

Turns out I was a bit of an idiot during the installation process and did not change the "Software Selection" and "Network & Hostname" settings under the "Installation Summary" page. But I've seen plenty of forum posts here and elsewhere from others who are stuck with a minimal install, so I know its not just me who messed-up.

For the sake of other newbies, I would suggest that you please update the "Installation Summary" page to make it clearer to check these settings. Perhaps you could ad some extra warning symbols, as displayed as default under "Installation Destination".

Looking forward to using Centos properly now - I've heard great things about it.

Thanks,
Mark

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TrevorH
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Re: Please make installation clearer WRT minimal vs Gnome

Post by TrevorH » 2015/02/22 11:31:01

The minimal install is intended for experienced users.
The future appears to be RHEL or Debian. I think I'm going Debian.
Info for USB installs on http://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/InstallFromUSBkey
CentOS 5 and 6 are deadest, do not use them.
Use the FAQ Luke

mebrenchley
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Re: Please make installation clearer WRT minimal vs Gnome

Post by mebrenchley » 2015/02/23 11:12:02

That is the point I'm trying to make!

I didn't want a minimal install, but when I first started going through the installation process I didn't know what it meant. It hadn't even occurred to me that an installation could end up with just a command line and no GUI. Would it hurt to add a warning line "Minimal install does not include a GUI and is only intended for experienced users"?

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TrevorH
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Re: Please make installation clearer WRT minimal vs Gnome

Post by TrevorH » 2015/02/23 11:13:47

The readme file on the mirrors in the isos directory is fairly specific:
CentOS-7.0-1406-x86_64-Minimal.iso
The aim of this image is to install a very basic CentOS 7 system, with the
minimum of packages needed to have a functional system. Please burn this image
onto a CD and boot your computer off it. A preselected set of packages will be
installed on your system. Everything else needs to be installed using yum. The set
of packages installed by this image is identical to the one installed when choosing
the group named "Minimal" from the full DVD image.
The future appears to be RHEL or Debian. I think I'm going Debian.
Info for USB installs on http://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/InstallFromUSBkey
CentOS 5 and 6 are deadest, do not use them.
Use the FAQ Luke

mebrenchley
Posts: 4
Joined: 2015/02/22 11:02:48

Re: Please make installation clearer WRT minimal vs Gnome

Post by mebrenchley » 2015/02/23 11:27:00

Yes, it is. But I wasn't installing from a minimal iso - I was using one of the DVD isos from this page:
http://isoredirect.centos.org/centos/7/ ... 64-DVD.iso

Look, I was just making a suggestion to try and help new users get up and running with CentOS. If you only want seasoned web server professionals to use it then fine, don't change anything. I'll keep my mouth shut in future.

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Re: Please make installation clearer WRT minimal vs Gnome

Post by scottro » 2015/02/23 14:16:06

Firstly, it's not our decision to make. Generally, CentOS does what RedHat does. (Although I'm not sure what RedHat's install does--does it still default to minimal? I don't even know what they have available for downloading, though if they continue to follow Fedora, they probably won't have a minimal.)

The documentation could certainly be clearer for the inexperienced. The best thing to do though, might be to file a bug report with a mention that as an inexperienced user, you didn't realize that minimal meant no graphic environment and you feel it should be specified. They may ignore it or they may act upon it.
New users should check the FAQ and Read Me First pages

mebrenchley
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Re: Please make installation clearer WRT minimal vs Gnome

Post by mebrenchley » 2015/02/23 16:15:31

Okay, thanks Scott, I'll do that.

Sorry for being grumpy, I've just found Linux (mainly Ubuntu) to be very frustrating recently, as whatever I try to do seems to go wrong. Hopefully as I become less inexperienced I'll have more success.

Thanks again,
Mark

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