Installing Ubuntu Server 12.04 LTS

Installing Ubuntu Server is quick and quite simple and can make the start of a new mini-series. We will be looking at server rather than desktop as on the whole I work with servers more than desktops. The minimum requirements are quite low and in my lab I will use just 256MB of RAM and 4 GB disk.

Installing Server will give a text screen for the installation which is clean and simple to navigate. I will choose to have simple partitioning not using LVMs and I will install just the SSH server. We will see that we have access to the package manager after the install as well as where we can choose to install groups of software packages rather than each individual package. This is with the tasksel command:

• tasksel –list-tasks :: will list what is installed and what isn’t
• tasksel –task-packages :: lists each item in a package
• tasksel install mail-server :: will install postfic, dovecot, mutt etc which make up the mail-server package

Of course these commands are all prefixed with sudo as we will run as a standard account, raising privileges when required.