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University Computing Service

Help & Support

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server in the University of Cambridge

UPDATE

We have been informed that the site licence only covers the use of SLES when it is to support Netware/OES servers/services. That means that depending on what you are doing your SLES installation may not be licenced. It is possible to licence SLES with the same (non existent) level of support for about 16 pounds/year (correct as of 9/9/2011).

Licensing

The University of Cambridge has a Novell Site License which should, as of March 2005, cover 32-bit SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server, SLES for short. This licence covers SLES 8 and 9 (32-bit x86 only) and as of September 2006 SLES 10 for the following architectures:

  • 32-bit x86 (i386)
  • AMD64/Intel 64-bit (x86_64/em64t)
  • Power PC 32-bit/Power PC 64-bit/IBM Power (ppc/ppc64/power)
  • Itanium (ia64)

This means you are allowed to use SLES on servers within the University of Cambridge.

Installing

Using CD Media

You will need the CD media.

If you do not have them already, you can download the SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server .ISO images. (Access limited to *.cam.ac.uk or Raven login.)

Once you have downloaded the .ISO images, you need to burn them to CDs or DVDs.

You can then boot the computer you are going to install SLES on using CD1/DVD1.

Either follow the on screen instructions to install SLES or for SLES 9 you can read the SUSE Provided SLES 9 Installation and Administration Guide. If you prefer you can download the printer friendly PDF version.

Using the Network

You will need the first installation CD or DVD. See above for where you can download CD1/DVD1.

For SLES9 i386 you can also use floppies. To do so you will need to download the floppy images and use those to create the floppies (instructions).

You can then boot the computer using CD1/DVD1 (or the floppies).

At the SUSE Linux boot menu that appears proceed as follows:

If running SLES 10 press F4 and if running SLES 9 press F3. Choose HTTP and press enter. Then type in 131.111.8.10 for the server and SLES9-i386 if running SLES 9 i386 for the directory. For SLES 10 SP4 suse-install/SLES10-SP4-ARCH for the directory where ARCH needs to be substituted with your architecture. Thus you would use:

  • SLES10-SP4-i386 for Intel 32/AMD 32 bit
  • SLES10-SP4-x86_64 for AMD 64/Intel EM64t
  • SLES10-SP4-ppc for PowerPC, PowerPC 64, IBM Power
  • SLES10-SP4-ia64 for Itanium

Finally press enter to return to the boot menu.

Select Installation from the boot menu (do NOT press enter yet).

Type in (it will appear in the boot options) hostip=IPADDRESS netmask=NETMASK gateway=GATEWAY where IPADDRESS needs to be the IP address of the computer you are installing onto, NETMASK is its netmask and GATEWAY is the gateway to the internet.

Finally press enter to begin the installation.

From there on, either follow the on screen instructions to install SLES or for SLES 9 you can read the SUSE Provided SLES 9 Installation and Administration Guide. If you prefer you can download the printer friendly PDF version.

Keeping the System Up-to-date

See the Suse Update section of our web site.