Clean Linux Install

These notes are a brief guide for installing Linux fresh on a new machine.

An assumption is made that a ‘friendly’ distro is being used that comes with a lot already set up, including a desktop environment etc. with these commands being more of a focus of getting everything needed for use in a working environment.

Here we assume openSUSE with the zypper package manager, but distro-specific commands could be adapted.

• Install from bootable USB
• Set up SSH key

  1	ssh-keygen

  • To allow access to another machine copy the contents of ~/.ssh/id_<type>.pub on this machine to ~/.ssh/authorized_keys on the remote.
• Set up GPG key

  1	gpg --full-generate-key

  • To use on another machine run:

    1 2 3

    gpg --export-secret-keys --armor <FINGERPRINT> > ~/gpg-secret.asc gpg --export-ownertrust > ~/gpg-trust.txt scp ~/gpg-secret.asc ~/gpg-trust.txt <remote-machine>:~/

    and then on the other machine:

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    gpg --import gpg-secret.asc gpg --import-ownertrust gpg-trust.txt gpg --list-secret-keys

• Update and install packages
  • Check to make sure there isn’t a repo left over from the bootable USB:

    1	zypper lr -u

    If there is then remove with sudo zypper removerepo <name>
  • Refresh and update all packages:

    1 2	sudo zypper ref sudo zypper dup

  • Install useful developer packages:

    1 2	sudo zypper install -t pattern devel_basis sudo zypper install cmake

• Install password-store:

  1 2	sudo zypper install password-store git clone <password-store-location> ~/.password-store