CentOS Minimal Installation Configuration

Using the minimal install option for a CentOS or other Redhat derived distro can leave a lot to be desired. It really is a minimal installation. That’s actually why I prefer it for production server builds. The end product only contains the minimal set of software I need to run my applications. Here are some amendments I make to turn this minimal installation into a workable LAMP/server platform.

During the setup process you should configure networking – it’s much easier using the gui now than later. But if you forget you can do this:


vim /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0

IPADDR=x.x.x.x
BOOTPROTO=none
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
GATEWAY=y.y.y.y
DNS1=y.y.y.y
DNS2=y.y.y.y
USERCTL=yes
HWADDR='your mac address'

If you need to find your mac address you can look in a couple of places:


grep eth0 /var/log/messages

or


dmesg | grep eth0

Both of these will reveal the mac address.

Next, edit the network config file and add the gateway address:


vi /etc/sysconfig/network

Adding the line:


GATEWAY=y.y.y.y

Now restart the network interface:


/etc/init.d/networking restart

From here you should be able to ping your router:


$ ping y.y.y.y

Adding EPEL repo and Additional Packages

Now that your server is connected to the network it’s time to run updates and then add additional repos and packages. First start by running updates:


# yum update

Next add the EPEL repository. CentOS comes with an RPM package to install the repo which makes things easy.


# yum install epel-release

Now add the following packages to round out the installation:

openssh-clients
rsync
rsync man
wget
postfix
vim-enhanced
x11-xorg-apps
x11-xorg-xauth
ntp
ntpdate
bind-utils
crontabs
firefox


# yum install openssh-clients rsync man wget postfix vim-enhanced \
x11-xorg-apps x11-xorg-xauth ntp ntpdate bind-utils crontabs firefox
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