Revision as of 23:10, 19 July 2020

Installation It means use as main system in physical machine, bare metal or embebed device. Unless Alpine Linux are most used inside docker and containers.. this document will described how Alpine Linux could be also put over a hardware to use as main operating system.

By example as do in smartphones by the PostmarketOS system (an operatiing system for smartphones based on Alpine Linux) or as Desktop over a computer like Adelie Linux. In fact, Alpine Linux are already installed in your media dumped, it means downloadble media files of Alpine Linux are already the system ready to use (live system) directly from the media where are dumped!

Quick Requirements

This is a simple and quick reference list, nowadays any hardware is supported for Alpine Linux:

At least 128 Megs of RAM for server without graphical GUI, or at least 1.6 Gigs for graphical desktop
At least 1 Gigs storage device for server without graphical GUI, or at least 10 Gigs for graphical desktop with web browsing

Highly recommended if you do not have great knowledge, to read wiki page for requirements: Requirements!

Installation : setup-alpine : booting process until login prompt

Installation Overview

The most used are traditional way of booting and installing from media, but more specific or other architecture or machines (e.g. ARM, RPi, etc) are defined in Installation:_Use_cases wiki pages.

1. Download the media source

Just grab from stable-release ISO image. Take note of architectures in green buttons.

2. Dump, burn or flash the image

Dump the ISO image onto a media source like USB/SD flashing; or CD/DVD/BR disk with burning software. For more detailed on this topic check Additional Details section

3. Boot and install process

Log-in as the user root with its initially empty password. Then execute setup-alpine here you can perform that questions and hit enter on each answer:

Installation : setup-alpine : complete process single install

Select keyboard layout: Let you to perform the keyborad layout, e.g. us or es
- Select keyboard variant: Choose your keyboard variant, e.g. us-nodeadkeys or es-winkeys respectively
Host name, which will be the name of your computer; localhost are enough and recommended for starting.
Initialize network cards: here most people can just go with the default (just press enter).
- Any other configuration: about any other configuration, just type "no" and hit enter
- Select domain name: if asked this are not commonly asked.. just hit enter.
DNS nameservers?: if asked just type 8.8.8.8 and hit enter.
Changing password for root: Next a root password must be defined, input a pass phrase, chars will not be show.
- retype password, input twice for confirmation, when typed no chars will be show.
Witch timezone to choose?: just hit enter to use UTC when perform a single installation.
Proxy chooser: just type none and hit enter if you have direct internet connection.
Enter mirror repository: .. just type 1 and then press enter
Witch ssh server?: Choose an SSH server allows you to remotely manage your machine. Just type enter.
Witch NTP client to run? This is for time sync, just press enter to use default.
Setup Disk This will setup the destination usage of the files
- Witch disk choose to use?: To choose the disk destination .. commonly sda are the hard disk cos sdb the USB boot or CD/DVD image
- How would be used?: type of installation (described at Setup modes section at Alpine setup scripts), just type "sys" and then press enter, is the familiar install to disk well knowed for usage as main OS to computers.

After al the scripts setup ends, a "reboot" will be offered:

If the configured runtime mode was "sys", then remove the initial installation media to boot the newly installed system.
If the configured runtime mode was "data", then keep installation media to boot the newly installed system.

The relevant commands for this are reboot or poweroff, after exits from setup-alpine process.

Additional Details

1. About Media download of image sources: Take note of the "architecture" namestring in each green button. Most common cases just download x86 or x86_64 types.. for further information check Architectures section and then Media Downloadable section of requirements wiki page. Optionally you can perform a sha256 checksum as described in Checksum section of Requirements wiki page but is not necessary in general cases.

2. About Media sources to dump image sources: This depends of your hardware, for some like ARM or PowerPC you could check Ways_to_install_Alpine_listed_by_architectures wiki page if you have special cases like ARM, PPC or s390 machines.

3. About boot install process: The boot process depends on each computer device, mostly need to specify wicht device to boot, for that check Booting section wiki page. Boot process copies the entire system into the RAM memory, and then runs it completely from RAM, so that the started command line environment does not depend on reading from the (slow) initial boot media anymore. After that a prompt for "login" are displayed, input the "root" as user and just enter. So there's no need to ask for password at first boot. Then the script called setup-alpine, can be used to configure the pre-install and installation, next section will explain each question.

4. About running mode of the media source: However, even though it is not installed on your device it is working as if it were, all the setup-scripts and the apk package manager are available to direct use, and all the general command line tools. All of this is from the media you boot, this mode is called "diskless mode", for further information check Setup_modes section for "alpine running modes". All the media Alpine images are already Alpine running live systems

Further Documentation

After the system has been installed, it has only placed the operating system, but things like internet browser or movie viewer are not yet installed, things like web server or mail server neither much less. For that you must check Tutorials_and_Howtos Post-Install section

@@ Line 13: / Line 13: @@
 Highly '''recommended if you do not have great knowledge, to read [[Requirements|wiki page for requirements]]''': [[Requirements]]!
+[[File:Installation-alpine-alpine-setup-2-boot.png|350px|thumb|right|Installation : setup-alpine : booting process until login prompt]]
 = Installation Overview =
@@ Line 28: / Line 30: @@
 == 3. Boot and install process ==
-'''Log-in as the user <code>root</code> with its initially empty password. Then execute <code>[[Alpine_setup_scripts#setup-alpine|setup-alpine]]</code>'''
+'''Log-in as the user <code>root</code> with its initially empty password. Then execute <code>[[Alpine_setup_scripts#setup-alpine|setup-alpine]]</code>''' here you can perform that questions and hit ''enter'' on each answer:
-=== Running <code>setup-alpine</code> ===
-The <code>[[setup-alpine]]</code> script offers to configure pre-install setup and install process, here you can perform that questions and hit ''enter'' on each answer:
-* '''1. Keyboard map''': Let you to perform the keyborad layout, this is really two cuestions:
+[[File:Installation-alpine-alpine-setup-3-setup-scripts.png|350px|thumb|right|Installation : setup-alpine : complete process single install]]
-** The first ante the general map: e.g. ''us'' or ''es''
-** And second the variant of e.g. ''us-nodeadkeys'' or ''es-winkeys'' respectively
-* '''2. Hostname''' this is the name of computer, mostly knowed as the human name, in Linux this are default to "localhost" if not configured.
-* '''3 Network''' (e.g. automatic DHCP IP address discovery)
-* '''4. DNS''' Servers
-* '''5. Timezone'''
-* '''6. Proxy''' ("None" for direct connections to the internet.)
-* '''7. SSH''' (Openssh is part of the default images.)
-* '''8. NTP''' (Chrony is part of the default images.)
-* '''9. Runtime Mode''' (Select between "diskless" (disk=none), "data" or "sys")
-== 4. Rebooting to the new system ==
+* '''Select keyboard layout''': Let you to perform the keyborad layout, e.g. ''us'' or ''es''
+** '''Select keyboard variant''': Choose your keyboard variant,  e.g. ''us-nodeadkeys'' or ''es-winkeys'' respectively
+* '''Host name''', which will be the name of your computer; '''localhost''' are enough and recommended for starting.
+* '''Initialize network cards''': here most people can just go with the default (just press enter).
+** '''Any other configuration''': about any other configuration, just type "no" and hit enter
+** '''Select domain name''': if asked this are not commonly asked.. just hit enter.
+* '''DNS nameservers?''': if asked just type <code>8.8.8.8</code> and hit enter.
+* '''Changing password for root''': Next a root password must be defined, input a pass phrase, chars will not be show.
+** '''retype password''', input twice for confirmation, when typed no chars will be show.
+* '''Witch timezone to choose?''': just hit enter to use <code>UTC</code> when perform a single installation.
+* '''Proxy chooser''': just type <code>none</code> and hit enter if you have direct internet connection.
+* '''Enter mirror repository''': .. just type <code>1</code> and then press enter
+* '''Witch ssh server?''': Choose an SSH server allows you to remotely manage your machine. Just type enter.
+* '''Witch NTP client to run?''' This is for time sync, just press enter to use default.
+* '''Setup Disk''' This will setup the destination usage of the files
+** '''Witch disk choose to use?''': To choose the disk destination .. commonly sda are the hard disk cos sdb the USB boot or CD/DVD image
+** '''How would be used?''': type of installation (described at [[Alpine_setup_scripts#Setup_modes|Setup modes section at Alpine setup scripts]]), just type "sys" and then press enter, is the familiar install to disk well knowed for usage as main OS to computers.
-After the installation is completed, the system may be power-cycled or rebooted to confirm that everything is working.
+After al the scripts setup ends, a "reboot" will be offered:
 * If the configured [[Alpine_setup_scripts#sys_mode|runtime mode was "sys"]], then remove the initial installation media to boot the newly installed system.