This guide provides steps to add the GNOME desktop to a CentOS minimal installation without the X Window System. It instructs to use yum to install various desktop packages like GNOME, X Window System, and fonts. It also explains how to change the boot target to launch GNOME instead of the command line interface. Finally, it mentions additional applications can be installed through the Add/Remove Software GUI after logging into the new GNOME desktop.
This guide provides steps to add the GNOME desktop to a CentOS minimal installation without the X Window System. It instructs to use yum to install various desktop packages like GNOME, X Window System, and fonts. It also explains how to change the boot target to launch GNOME instead of the command line interface. Finally, it mentions additional applications can be installed through the Add/Remove Software GUI after logging into the new GNOME desktop.
This guide provides steps to add the GNOME desktop to a CentOS minimal installation without the X Window System. It instructs to use yum to install various desktop packages like GNOME, X Window System, and fonts. It also explains how to change the boot target to launch GNOME instead of the command line interface. Finally, it mentions additional applications can be installed through the Add/Remove Software GUI after logging into the new GNOME desktop.
by Jeff Hunter, Sr. Database Administrator Contents Introduction CentOS 6 About the Author Introduction In most instances, the Linux servers I setup are used to host the Oracle database software and only require using the Command-Line Interface (CLI) for the OS. This is beneficial because I only need to perform a minimal installation and can add only those required Linux packages (RPMs) needed to support the database. However, there are situations where I need to access a graphical desktop in order to install or run certain Graphical User Interface (GUI) applications. This guide provides the steps needed to add the GNOME Desktop to a CentOS minimal installation where the OS was installed without the X Window System. CentOS 6 In this section, the GNOME desktop will be added to a new server running CentOS 6.2 (x86_64) after performing a "Minimal" install. Install Desktop Packages # yum -y groupinstall "Desktop" "Desktop Platform" "X Window System" "Fonts" You can also install the following optional GUI packages. # yum -y groupinstall "Graphical Administration Tools" # yum -y groupinstall "Internet Browser" # yum -y groupinstall "General Purpose Desktop" # yum -y groupinstall "Office Suite and Productivity" # yum -y groupinstall "Graphics Creation Tools" Finally, if you wanted to add the K Desktop Environment (KDE). Managing Physical and Logical Volumes http://www.idevelopment.info/data/Unix/Linux/LINUX_AddGNOMET... 1 of 3 28/04/2014 13:01 # yum -y groupinstall kde-desktop When using yum groupinstall, the groupinstall option only installs default and mandatory packages from the group. There are times when you also want to include optional packages within a group. I have not figured out (yet) how to control which package types to install (group package "policy") from the command-line using yum. The only method I know of to also include optional packages is to edit the /etc/yum.conf file and add the following to the [main] section: group_package_types=default mandatory optional The reason I mention this is because I wanted to install "Terminal emulator for the X Window System" (xterm) which is under the group "Legacy X Window System compatibility". xterm happens to be an optional package and did not get installed until I added group_package_types=default mandatory optional to /etc/yum.conf. # yum -y groupinstall "Legacy X Window System compatibility" I did find a plug-in for yum that allows users to specify which package types within a package group should be installed when using yum groupinstall. http://projects.robinbowes.com/yum-grouppackagetypes/trac Enable GNOME Since the server was previously running on CLI mode, we need to change the initialization process for the machine to boot up in GUI mode. Open /etc/inittab using a text editor and change following line: id:3:initdefault: To: id:5:initdefault: After making the change, reboot the machine. # init 6 Note that you can switch from GUI to CLI mode manually by using following method: GUI to CLI: Ctrl + Alt + F6 CLI to GUI: Ctrl + Alt + F1 Installing Additional Applications After logging in to the GNOME Desktop, you can now go to System > Administration > Add/Remove Software to manage application in CentOS. By using this wizard, you can install various applications similar to yum but through a GUI. Applications installed using this method will appear in the Application menu list. Managing Physical and Logical Volumes http://www.idevelopment.info/data/Unix/Linux/LINUX_AddGNOMET... 2 of 3 28/04/2014 13:01