Alpine linux, the most faster, how to install in 30 minutes

Either way, this describes, step by step, how to get and install usage of main setup-* alpine utilities, as well as explanations for a complete install on common computer BIOS or UEFI based, the Grub loader supports EFI base and GPT partitions indexing, a DELL Vostro 230 was used specifically for this document.

CAUTION: this procedure will assumed that your hard disk drive are complete wiped and used only for alpine linux. for more specific installation see https://wiki.alpinelinux.org/wiki/Alpine_newbie_install_manual

0. Source media

You will require of course a computer that can boot by USB or CDROM, and a media to install either USB drive to dump or CDROM disc to burn the media install source.

1. Get a USB drive or a CD/DVD blank disc, we recommend USB drive
2. A computer to install the Alpine linux with a minimal of 10G hard disk

First download a source media, from https://alpinelinux.org/downloads/, all the images will need network internet connection except extended due comes with minimal need packages but are x86 based only.

For all users no cares from what operating system comes or witch architecture, we recommended to use balena-etcher-electron of https://www.balena.io/etcher/ (there's packages for most used Linux as for mac and w32) for flashing USB drive from any system, of course, after install it you must be run as root or admin user.

• download the media image iso file
• download the balena-etcher-electron program
• run the balena-etcher-electron program as root under X session
• click on the icon of “select image” and open the image iso file downloaded
• plug in on the computer the USB drive, it will automatically show it
• umount but not eject the USB! be sure you backup all the files on the USB drive! cos will be wiped out all.
• after the program balena-etcher-electron show the SUB drive as “sdb” click on flash
• waith for a while and when finish, close and remove usb to plugin into install target computer

 

1. Installation

After flash the USB media or burn a CDROM media, put the media install on respective drive bay of the computer and turn on the computer.

Select proper boot media, on DELL Vostro always are the F12 key, press at the boot “Dell” screen and when menu shows select the proper media, on the VirtualBox software are same F12 key too, by hitting that key a boot selection media will be displayed, boot screen depends on each computer; in this case USB drive was used, rest of this document makes no sense which media was used.

When boot a linux prompt will be show, as due Alpine linux are in fact a live installed system and install procedure just parse all the files to disk with proper modifications depending of the future usage of them:

1.1. Installation from scrat

After boot media you can just login as root and no password will be asked, so directly will show the linux console inputs prompt for commands:

 

Next commands are the sequence show below, we setup a keyboard, later created a autoinstall file and then defined the sizes of the disk partitions that will be used; so we used the 3.10.3 images for install and run following commands:

setup-keymap us us-altgr-intl

cat > /root/autofile << EOF
KEYMAPOPTS="us us"
HOSTNAMEOPTS="-n alpine-test"
DNSOPTS="8.8.8.8"
TIMEZONEOPTS="-z UTC"
PROXYOPTS="none"
APKREPOSOPTS="-1"
SSHDOPTS="-c openssh"
NTPOPTS="-c chrony"
DISKOPTS="-m sys -s 4096 /dev/sda"
EOF

export BOOT_SIZE=500
export SWAP_SIZE=4096
export BOOTLOADER=grub

setup-alpine -f /root/autofile

Be care dont forget to made the "export" commands, and be care of the network questions and root password questions in the process due will be used later and must be mandatory.

This will make the disk layout as:

• /dev/sda1 as BOOT en 500Mb en /boot
• /dev/sda2 as SWAP en 4Gb
• /dev/sda3 as ROOT en 200Gb en /

but this will be only if the autofile its used and make it property.

1.2 Installation from upgrade

With this method if you already have a instalation from scrat, you can upgrade from previous version 3.X to lasted 3.11.3 version, only change your apk repositories with following commands, for later run the update and upgrade apk commands as:

sed -s -i -r 's|v$(cat /etc/alpine-release | cut -d'.' -f1,2)|v3.11|g' /etc/apk/repositories

apk update

apk upgrade -a

1.3 Post install setup

We need minimal important packages and setups for console and development, also some specific settings for remote connection from others linux, due today Alpine not have a good remote x11 software than x11vnc..

The most recommended it’s having a access user here named “remote” and normal general usage user here named “general” for convenience, in the next commands we will setup a very hardened limited environment for any new user and created those two users:

mkdir -p /etc/skel/

cat > /etc/skel/.logout << EOF
history -c
/bin/rm -f /opt/remote/.mysql_history
/bin/rm -f /opt/remote/.history
/bin/rm -f /opt/remote/.bash_history
EOF

cat > /etc/skel/.cshrc << EOF
set autologout = 30
set prompt = "$ "
set history = 0
set ignoreeof
EOF

cp /etc/skel/.cshrc /etc/skel/.profile

adduser -D --home /opt/remote --shell /bin/ash remote

echo "secret_new_remote_user_password" | chpasswd

adduser -D --shell /bin/bash general

echo "secret_new_general_user_password" | chpasswd

Before this if you have wired connection internet, we need to setup repositories and also remote management so then:

cat > /etc/network/interfaces << EOF
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
EOF

setup-interfaces -a

echo -e "\n" | setup-dns 8.8.8.8

rc-service networking restart

Now we need to added normal repositories, do not use edge or testing, due we will setup all for stable usage and daily use:

cat > /etc/apk/repositories << EOF
http://mirror.math.princeton.edu/pub/alpinelinux/v$(cat /etc/alpine-release | cut -d'.' -f1,2)/main
http://mirror.math.princeton.edu/pub/alpinelinux/v$(cat /etc/alpine-release | cut -d'.' -f1,2)/community
http://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v$(cat /etc/alpine-release | cut -d'.' -f1,2)/main
http://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v$(cat /etc/alpine-release | cut -d'.' -f1,2)/community
EOF

apk update

Now that repositories are set, we still need to property configure root, added minimal set of packages to provide similar behavior of other linuxes, and install some others need tools:

cat > /root/.cshrc << EOF
unsetenv DISPLAY || true
HISTCONTROL=ignoreboth
EOF

cp -f /root/.cshrc /root/.profile

apk del dropbear

apk add openssh

apk add attr dialog dialog-doc bash bash-doc bash-completion grep grep-doc

apk add util-linux util-linux-doc pciutils usbutils binutils findutils readline

apk add man man-pages lsof lsof-doc less less-doc nano nano-doc curl curl-doc

export PAGER=less

Now at this point we have a console linux (no desktop graphical session) ready, each console can be access with hitting at same time keys Ctrl+Alt+FX whre X can be 1 to 6 as we already know as function keys, by example, if we hit Ctrl+Alt+F3 we will see a TTY3 console with “login” prompt; where can input the username and later after hit enter input the user password, if both are correct a linux console prompt will display with $ symbol ready to receive commands inputs.