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Windows is the world’s most popular OS for the home user, but most commercial software runs on Linux. Linux is derived from an OS called Unix. So are Android, macOS, and iOS.
Windows and Unix-derived operating systems do the same things, but the specific commands you type and the way you set up your user environment differ between the OS families.
Jump to the section for your computer’s OS to get started.
Starting from Windows
For your personal computer, choose whichever Option works best. For a lab computer, you must use Option 2.
The options below install Ubuntu Linux, which will require 18-30GB of disk space. You are free to use any other Linux distribution that you are comfortable with. Ubuntu will provide a familiar experience to Windows users.
You are going to keep Windows on your computer. We are going to use virtualization tools to make Linux think that it is running on actual hardware, when in reality it is running “inside” Windows. The virtualization software passes OS commands from Linux to Windows, and Windows ultimately controls the hardware. But, Linux, in its virtual environment, will manage all the software running inside it.
Option 1 (preferred) - Windows Subsystem for Linux
You will enable a virtualization feature called the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) and install a Linux distribution.
Follow the instructions here (use Method 1): https://canonical-ubuntu-wsl.readthedocs-hosted.com/en/latest/guides/install-ubuntu-wsl2/
Option 2 - VirtualBox
If you cannot perform Option 1, you will have to install a program called VirtualBox to perform the virtualization. You must use VirtualBox on lab computer; it is already installed in CG 2055 and CG 2004.
Follow this tutorial https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/how-to-run-ubuntu-desktop-on-a-virtual-machine-using-virtualbox#1-overview. There are 5 pages in the tutorial.
- Important Note: In Step 2 of the tutorial, do not put create “machine folder” inside of folder that is backed up by OneDrive or Google Drive. Mine defaults to
c:\Users\laymanl\VirtualBoxVMs, which is fine.
Starting from Mac
You don’t need to do anything. macOS is derived from Unix, so everything we do in Linux you should be able to do in macOS. There will be a few minor differences.
Just don’t tell anyone that you’re using Linux on a Mac, because you are not! macOS is not Linux, but they speak the same language.