Aaron Seelye wrote:
Hello,
I'm new to the linux world (long time FreeBSD user), and I'm wondering if there's an easy way to install CentOS 5 without the GUI and unnecessary services? I see there's a server cd for CentOS 4, but I didnt see anything like that for CentOS 5. Am I looking in the wrong places, or is it just necessary to manually select the minimal set of packages?
Firstly, I want to clear up this misconception that people have that the ServerCD is a minimal install. Well, its not. Its a typical Server install, which is - trust me - very far from being a minimal install.
Secondly, the best way to do a minimal install is to just get the netinstall iso from the 5.1/isos/ directory, run a normal graphical install, and deselect all options from the 'Tasks to install' screen, select customise now option, then deselect everything from the next screen as well. It should give you a minimal install, with just enough packages to have a booting system, network and a functional sshd server. Once installed, you can then carry on adding packages with yum.
Finally, I believe this is FAQ number 1, check wiki.centos.org's FAQ section for CentOS-5