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It cannot be installed on Windows or Mac OS X partitions. It may be able to share some partitions with other Unix systems, but that's not covered here. At the very least you will need a dedicated partition for the Ubuntu root filesystem.
As already mentioned, in addition to the hardware, a computer also needs a set of programs—an operating system—to control the devices. This page will discuss the following:
- There are different kinds of operating systems: such as Windows, Linux and Mac OS
- There are also different versions of these operating systems, e.g. Windows 7, 8 and 10
- Operating systems can be used with different user interfaces (UI): text user interfaces (TUI) and graphical user interfaces (GUI) as examples
- Graphical user interfaces have many similarities in different operating systems: such as the start menu, desktop etc.
When you can recognize the typical parts of each operating system’s user interface, you will mostly be able to use both Windows and Linux as well as e.g. Mac OS.
The role of operating system in the computer
An operating system (OS) is a set of programs which ensures the interoperability of the hardware and software in your computer. The operating system enables, among other things,
- the identification and activation of devices connected to the computer,
- the installation and use of programs, and
- the handling of files.
What happens when you turn on your computer or smartphone?
– The computer checks the functionality of its components and any devices connected to it, and starts to look for the OS on a hard drive or other memory media.
– If the OS is found, the computer starts to load it into the RAM (Random Access Memory).
– When the OS has loaded, the computer waits for commands from you.
Different operating systems
Over the years, several different operating systems have been developed for different purposes. The most typical operating systems in ordinary computers are Windows, Linux and Mac OS.
Windows
The name of the Windows OS comes from the fact that programs are run in “windows”: each program has its own window, and you can have several programs open at the same time. Windows is the most popular OS for home computers, and there are several versions of it. The newest version is Windows 10.
Linux and Unix
Linux is an open-source OS, which means that its program code is freely available to software developers. This is why thousands of programmers around the world have developed Linux, and it is considered the most tested OS in the world. Linux has been very much influenced by the commercial Unix OS.
In addition to servers, Linux is widely used in home computers, since there are a great number of free programs for it (for text and image processing, spreadsheets, publishing, etc.). Over the years, many different versions of Linux have become available for distribution, most of which are free for the user (such as Ubuntu, Fedora and Mint, to name a few). See the additional reading material for more information on Linux.
Mac OS X
Apple’s Mac computers have their own operating system, OS X. Most of the programs that are available for PCs are also available for Macs running under OS X, but these two types of computers cannot use the exact same programs: for example, you cannot install the Mac version of the Microsoft Office suite on a Windows computer. You can install other operating systems on Mac computers, but the OS X is only available for computers made by Apple. Apple’s lighter portable devices (iPads, iPhones) use a light version of the same operating system, called iOS.
Mac computers are popular because OS X is considered fast, easy to learn and very stable and Apple’s devices are considered well-designed—though rather expensive. See the additional reading material for more information on OS X.
Android
Android is an operating system designed for phones and other mobile devices. Android is not available for desktop computers, but in mobile devices it is extremely popular: more than a half of all mobile devices in the world run on Android.
User interfaces
A user interface (UI) refers to the part of an operating system, program, or device that allows a user to enter and receive information. A text-based user interface (see the image to the left) displays text, and its commands are usually typed on a command line using a keyboard. With a graphical user interface (see the right-hand image), the functions are carried out by clicking or moving buttons, icons and menus by means of a pointing device.
Larger image: text UI graphical UI
The images contain the same information: a directory listing of a computer. You can often carry out the same tasks regardless of which kind of UI you are using.
Text user interface (TUI)
Modern graphical user interfaces have evolved from text-based UIs. Some operating systems can still be used with a text-based user interface. In this case, the commands are entered as text (e.g., “cat story.txt”).
To display the text-based Command Prompt in Windows, open the Start menu and type cmd. Press Enter on the keyboard to launch the command prompt in a separate window. With the command prompt, you can type your commands from the keyboard instead of using the mouse.
Graphical user interface
In most operating systems, the primary user interface is graphical, i.e. instead of typing the commands you manipulate various graphical objects (such as icons) with a pointing device. The underlying principle of different graphical user interfaces (GUIs) is largely the same, so by knowing how to use a Windows UI, you will most likely know how to use Linux or some other GUI.
Most GUIs have the following basic components:
- a start menu with program groups
- a taskbar showing running programs
- a desktop
- various icons and shortcuts.
Partitioning your disk simply refers to the act of breaking up yourdisk into sections. Each section is then independent of the others.It's roughly equivalent to putting up walls inside a house; if you addfurniture to one room it doesn't affect any other room.
If you already have an operating system on your system(Windows 9x, Windows NT/2000/XP/2003/Vista/7/8/10, OS/2, MacOS, Solaris, FreeBSD, …)which uses the whole disk and you want to stick Ubuntu on the same disk, you will need to repartitionit. Ubuntu requires its own hard disk partitions. It cannot beinstalled on Windows or Mac OS X partitions. It may be able to share somepartitions with other Unix systems, but that's not covered here.At the very least you will need a dedicated partition for the Ubunturoot filesystem.
You can find information about your current partition setup by usinga partitioning tool for your current operating system, such as the integrated Disk Manager in Windows or fdisk inDOS.Partitioning tools always provide a way to show existing partitions without making changes.
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In general, changing a partition with a file system already onit will destroy any information there. Thus you should always makebackups before doing any repartitioning. Using the analogy of thehouse, you would probably want to move all the furniture out of theway before moving a wall or you risk destroying it.
Several modern operating systems offer the ability to move and resizecertain existing partitions without destroying their contents. This allowsmaking space for additional partitions without losing existing data. Eventhough this works quite well in most cases, making changes to thepartitioning of a disk is an inherently dangerous action and should only bedone after having made a full backup of all data.For FAT/FAT32 and NTFS partitions as used by DOS andWindows systems, the ability to move and resize them losslessly is provided both by debian-installer as well as by the integrated Disk Manager of Windows7.
To losslessly resize an existing FAT or NTFS partition from within debian-installer, goto the partitioning step, select the option for manual partitioning, selectthe partition to resize, and simply specify its new size.
Creating and deleting partitions can be done from within debian-installer aswell as from an existing operating system. As a rule of thumb,partitions should be created by the system for which they are tobe used, i.e. partitions to be used by Ubuntu should becreated from within debian-installer and partitions to be used from anotheroperating system should be created from there. debian-installer iscapable of creating non-Linux partitions, and partitions createdthis way usually work without problems when used in other operatingsystems, but there are a few rare corner cases in which this couldcause problems, so if you want to be sure, use the native partitioningtools to create partitions for use by other operating systems.
If you are going to install more than one operating system on the samemachine, you should install all other system(s) before proceeding withthe Ubuntu installation.Windows and other OS installations may destroyyour ability to start Ubuntu, or encourage you to reformat non-native partitions.
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You can recover from these actions or avoid them, but installingthe native system first saves you trouble.