title: Gentoo I :Overview and Quick Installation
author: Cynorr
category: Gentoo & Linux Server
tag: Gentoo Tutorial
date: 2015-07-01
toc: true
Intruction
Overview
Gentoo is a fast, modern mate-distrubution with a clean and flexible design, which is build around free software and doesn't hide from its user what is beneath the hood. Portage, the package maintance system which the Gentoo use, is written in Python, meaning the user can view and modify the source code. Gentoo packaging system uses source code and configuring Gentoo happens with regular text file. In other words, openness everwhere. Welcome to the world of choice and performance.
Quick Installation
In the process of installation, we are provided with GCC, bash and some specific tools, which makes fresh man daunted. In order to help fresh man build their confidence, this paper provide a quick installing tutorial, following which we can build a light version of Gentoo in 2 hours.
Good Luck!
Installation Structrue
Light Version List
| ------Configure------ | ------Value------ |
|---|---|
| Boot Media | Minial installation CD |
| Stage Archives | stage3 |
| Boot | grub2 |
| Partitions | GPT |
| Init | openRC |
| Desktop | xfce |
Preparation
- Bootable CD
- U disk with stage3
- Ethernet Network
Steps
- 1.File System: After step 1, we will have base linux environment and chroot
- 2.Configure the System: After step 2, most necessary configuration files will have been configured
- 3.Portage & Kernel: After step 3, the portage is ready to use and the linux kernel is installed
- 4.Bootloader: After step 4, we can boot the gentoo without the Installation CD
- 5.Desktop: After step 5, we will have graphical environment and xfce desktop environment
Step1: File System
Preparing the disk
Firstly, we split the full disk into several partitions using GPT partitioning technology.
parted is a popular and powerful tool to split the disk into partitions. Fire up parted aginst the disk (in our example, we use /dev/sda)
root # parted /dev/sda
type p to display the disks' current partition configuration
(parted) p
Model: ATA PLEXTOR PX-128M6 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 128GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags:
Number Start End Size File system Name Flags
1 1049kB 211MB 210MB fat16 EFI
2 211MB 479MB 268MB ext2 BOOT
3 479MB 16.6GB 16.1GB ext4 ROOT
4 16.6GB 43.4GB 26.8GB ext4 USR
5 43.4GB 108GB 64.4GB ext4 HOME
6 108GB 128GB 20.2GB UNTITLED
First of all, we should set the disk partition list label as gpt
(parted) mklabel gpt
Then, tell parted that the size unit we work with is MB
(parted) unit mib
Now create a 200 MB partition as EFI loader partition. Use the mkpart command for this, and inform parted to start from 1 MB and end at 201 MB (creating a partition of 2 MB in size).
(parted)mkpart primary 1 201
(parted)name 1 EFI
(parted)p
Model: Virtio Block Device (virtblk)
Disk /dev/sda: 20480MiB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt
Number Start End Size File system Name Flags
1 1.00MiB 201.00MiB 200.00MiB EFI
Important: Make sure the label "EFI" is upper case, which can be recoginzed by loader when booting.
Then, do the same for other partitions, my partition scheme likes following, in which the usr partition is recommended to be larger than 20GiB and be split separately.
Number Start End Size File system Name Flags
1 1049kB 211MB 210MB fat16 EFI
2 211MB 479MB 268MB ext2 BOOT
3 479MB 16.6GB 16.1GB ext4 ROOT
4 16.6GB 43.4GB 26.8GB ext4 USR
5 43.4GB 108GB 64.4GB ext4 HOME
6 108GB 128GB 20.2GB UNTITLED
Applying proper filesystem to these partitions
root # make.vfat /dev/sda1
root # make.ext2 /dev/sda2
root # make.ext4 /dev/sda3
root # make.ext4 /dev/sda4
root # make.ext4 /dev/sda5
Installing the Stage3
First mount the disk and U disk with stage3, type fdisk -l to check the U disk partition( our example is /dev/sdb1)
mount /dev/sda2 /mnt/gentoo
mkdir /mnt/gentoo/boot
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/gentoo/boot
mkdir /mnt/gentoo/usb
mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/gentoo/usb
Then copy the stage3 file to root directory and unpack in root directory
root # cd /mnt/gentoo/
root # cp usb/stage3-*.tar.bz2 ./
root # tar xvjpf starge3-*.tar.bz2
Chroot
We need to copy the network configuration file and mount some specfic system partition before chrooting.
root # cp -L /etc/resolv.conf /mnt/gentoo/etc/
root # mount -t proc proc /mnt/gentoo/proc
root # mount --rbind /sys /mnt/gentoo/sys
root # mount --rbind /dev /mnt/gentoo/dev
Then chroot and reload the system environment variables
root # chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash
root # source /etc/profile
Step2 Configuring the System
Set the password
root # passwd
To optimize Gentoo, it is possible to set a couple of variables which impact Portage behavior. All those variables can be set as environment variables. To keep the settings, Portage reads in the /etc/portage/make.conf file, a configuration file for Portage.
Fire up an editor (without vim here, we use nano) to alter the optimization variables.
root # nano -w /etc/portage/make.conf
Configuring the compile options
A first setting -march= flag, which specifies the name of the target architecture. A common used value is native as that tell the compiler to select the target architecture of current system.
CFLAGS="-march=native -O2 -pipe"
CXXFLAGS="${CFLAGS}"
The MAKEOPTS variable defines how many parallel compilations should occur when installing a package. A good choice is the number threads in the system plus one. For instance, the hyperthread i5-3230M with 4 threads( 2 cores), should set 5 parallel compilations.
MAKEOPTS="-j5"
Configuring the USE flag
USE is one of the most powerful variables Gentoo provides to its users. Several programmes can be compiled with or without optional support for certain items. Most of xfce desktop users will want to set the following:
USE="X dbus jpeg lock session startup-notification thunar udev -gnome -kde -minimal -qt4
**UEFI configuration
GRUB_PLATFORMS="efi-64"
Selecting mirrors
In order to download source code quickly it is recommended to select a fast mirror. we should surf Gentoo mirror list and search for a mirror that is close to the system's physical location.
First back to boot installing CD environment, which provided a nice tool called mirrorselect:
root # exit
then select the fast mirror by direction key and Enter.
root # mirror -i -o >> /mnt/gentoo/etc/portage/make.conf
root # mirror -i -r -o >> /mnt/gentoo/etc/portage/make.conf
Final chroot again
root # chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash
root # source /etc/profile
Select Profile & Locale
We select default/linux/amd64/13.0/desktop without gnome or kde, since we will use xfce desktop.
root # eselect profile list
root # eselect profile set 3
It is now time to set the system-wide locale settings. We Strongly suggest to use at least one UTF-8 locale because some applications may require it. Here, we use en_US.utf-8
root # eselect locale list
root # eselect locale set 239
Configuring the Network
In this tutorial, we use dhcp. We specfic the dhcp settings right now and install dhcp after syncing the portage tree.
First check the net port by typing ifconfig:
root # ifconfig
enp2s0: flags=4163<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,MULTICAST> mtu 1500
inet 192.168.1.101 netmask 255.255.255.0 broadcast 192.168.1.255
inet6 fe80::fabc:12ff:fe80:ada3 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x20<link>
ether f8:bc:12:80:ad:a3 txqueuelen 1000 (Ethernet)
RX packets 81407 bytes 116649996 (111.2 MiB)
RX errors 0 dropped 0 overruns 0 frame 0
TX packets 46215 bytes 3370975 (3.2 MiB)
TX errors 0 dropped 0 overruns 0 carrier 0 collisions 0
lo: flags=73<UP,LOOPBACK,RUNNING> mtu 65536
inet 127.0.0.1 netmask 255.0.0.0
inet6 ::1 prefixlen 128 scopeid 0x10<host>
loop txqueuelen 0 (Local Loopback)
RX packets 3144 bytes 1874421 (1.7 MiB)
RX errors 0 dropped 0 overruns 0 frame 0
TX packets 3144 bytes 1874421 (1.7 MiB)
TX errors 0 dropped 0 overruns 0 carrier 0 collisions 0
The enp2s0 is the Ethernet port flag, set the connecting method as dhcp
root # echo "config_enp2s0=`dhcp`" > /etc/conf.d/net
To have the network interfaces activated at boot, they need to be added to the default runlevel.
root # cd /etc/init.d/
root # ln -s net.lo net.enp2s0
root # rc-update add net.enp2s0 default
Configuring the fstab
Under Linux, all partitions used by the system must be listed in /etc/fstab, the /boot and /root partitions must be mounted automatically.
nano -w /etc/fstab
Below is a example of an /etc/fstab file:
/dev/sda1 /boot ext2 defaults,noatime 0 2
/dev/sda2 / ext4 noatime 0 1
/dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom auto noauto,user 0 0
Step3: Portage & Kernel
Installing a portage snapshot
A Portage snapshot is a collection file that inform portage what software title are availabe to use, which profiles the adminintractor can select, etc.
root # emerge-webrsync
root # emerge --sync
Configuring the Kernel
First installing the source:
root # emerge gentoo-sources
We use genkernel to configure the kernel to automatically build the kernel right here, and more information and knowledge about kernel will be following chapter.
root # emerge genkernel
root # genkernel all
Step4: Bootloader
The bootloader is responsible for firing up the Linux Kernel upon boot-without it, the system would not know how to proceed when the power button has been pressed.
GRUB2 is provided through the sys-boot/grub package:
root # emerge grub efivar
Next, install the necessary GRUB2 files in /boot/efi, which is separate partition with fat32/fat16 filesystem. Assuming the first disk is /dev/sda, the following command will do this :
root # grub2-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/boot/efi
Final, generate the final GRUB2 configuration, run the grub2-mkconfig command:
root # grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg
Reboot directly, and add you UEFI path manually or automatically.
root # reboot
Step5: Desktop
At first, we should install X-server. Xorg is the X Window server which allows users to have a graphical environment.
root # emerge xorg-drivers
root # emerge xorg-x11
Xfce is a fast lightweight but full-featured desktop environment.
xfce
root # emerge xfce4-meta xfce4-notifyd xfce4-panel xfce4-terminal
lxdm loginer
lxdm is one of the login manager, Simple Login Managert.
root # emerge lxde-base/lxdm
Making lxdm / xfce autoboot
root # vim /etc/conf.d/xdm
Set DISPLAYMANAGER as lxdm, and add xdm to autoboot list:
root # rc-update add xdm default
Install dbus and set it autoboot, otherwise slim can't wake xfce up.
root # emerge dbus
root # rc-update add dbus default
root # /etc/init.d/dbus start
Final make lxdm launch xfce, specify the configurations file of lxdm.
Following are some necessary settings of /etc/lxdm/lxdm.conf
session=/usr/bin/startxfce4
autologin=cyno
Step6: Add non-root user
root # useradd -d /home/cyno -m cyno
root # passwd cyno
root # usermod -G wheel,audio cyno
root # gpasswd -a cyno wheel
root # chmod +s /bin/su