Installing Oracle Linux 9.4 on Virtual Server

Hi,

To set up the environment in which we will install, we first need a virtualization software. At this point, we have two different options to set up our virtual server: VMware and Virtualbox. You can use this link to download VMware or this link to download VirtualBox. The rest of the article was prepared based on the VirtulBox environment.

In my first blog post, I will discuss how to install an operating system on a virtual server, which will form the basis of my future blog posts. Since I will install Oracle Database on this server in the future, I set the operating system to Oracle Linux. You can use a different Linux distribution depending on the situation.

After downloading the VirtualBox application, we need to download the ISO of the Oracle Linux 9.4 operating system. You can use this link to download the ISO file of Oracle Linux 9.4 operating system. After downloading the ISO file, we open our VirtualBox application. With the “New (Yeni)” button in the application, we open the screen where we will select the ISO file we downloaded.

On the screen that opens, we determine a name for the virtual machine we will install. Afterwards, we select the location of the ISO file we downloaded, select the "Skip Unattended Installation (Katilimsiz Kurulumu atla)" option and click "Next (Ileri)".

In the hardware window, we adjust the RAM and processor according to the features of our computer. You can adjust the hardware to be more or less depending on the features of your computer. Just make sure that the adjustment you make stays within the area marked in green and does not extend into the orange/red area. After setting the main memory (RAM) to 8GB and the number of processors to 4, we click "Next (Ileri)".

After making a 50GB space in the virtual hard disk window, we click "Next (Ileri)".

In the last window that opens, we review the settings we have made and if there are no problems, we complete the process in the installation wizard by clicking "Finish (Bitir)".

After completing the installation, our virtual server will start to be listed on the left. After selecting the server from this list, we select the “Settings (Ayarlar)” option.

After selecting the "Network (Ag)" tab in the window that opens, we update the "NAT" option in the "Plugged in (Suna takili)" option for "Adapter 1 (Bagdastirici 1)" with the "Bridge Adapter (Kopru Bagdastiricisi" option on the page that appears. Afterwards, after selecting the “OK (Tamam)” option, we start our server with the “Start (Baslat)” button to the right of the settings button.

We start the operating system installation by selecting the “Install Oracle Linux 9.4.0” option in the opened server window.

We select the language we want to use in the installation wizard in which we will operate during the installation.

We change the keyboard layout to avoid errors in our commands and texts on the server.

If the "Time & Date" section on the server is not "Europe/Istanbul timezone", you can update it to Istanbul or to suit your own location. Since it is already set to Istanbul, there is no need for any extra settings.

If the option in the “Software Selection” section comes with another option other than “Server with GUI”, we should update it to “Server with GUI”. Since we already have it this way, there is no need for any extra settings.

If the “Installation Destination” section appears as “Automatic partitioning selected”, we need to edit this field.

After selecting the "Custom" option for the "Storage Configuration" section in the window that opens, we proceed with the "Done" button on the top left.

On the new page that opens, “Click here to create them automatically.” We choose the option.

In default, we only have 2 disks: “/ -> 49GB” and “/boot -> 1024 MiB”. We need to make a few changes on these disks. First of all, we update the size of the “/” disk to “27 GiB” and select the “Update Settings” button. Then we add a new disk with the “+” option. We set this disk to “/home” and “18 GiB” and click “Add mount point”. We create our “swap” space with the remaining 4GB and set the “Desired Capacity” option to “4 GiB” and click “Add mount point”.

You can create disks with exactly the same size by checking the required quantities below. After the process is completed, we save our disk settings by clicking “Done”.

We complete our disk settings by selecting the “Accept Changes” option in the last confirmation window that opens.

Then, we check whether our internet connection is active or not by selecting the “Network & Host Name” option and set the host name of our server.

After setting the server host name, we apply it by clicking “Apply”. The host name we set should appear in the “Current host name” section. After completing the adjustments, we complete our process with the “Done” option.

As the last setting, we need to create 2 users on the server. One of these users will be the "root" user and the other will be our own user. We continue with the "Root Password" and then the "User Creation" options, respectively.

We have completed all the operations on the server. Now we start the installation of the operating system by clicking “Begin Installation”.

After the installation is completed, we restart our server by selecting the "Reboot System" option in the window that opens.

After the server is opened, we log in by entering the password of the user we created. Our virtual server is now ready for use.