Episode: 4247
Title: HPR4247: Installing GuixSD--Part Deux
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr4247/hpr4247.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-25 22:01:22

---

This is Hacker Public Radio Episode 4247 for Tuesday the 12th of November 2024.
Today's show is entitled, Installing Guest Part 2.
It is hosted by Rowie, and it is about 29 minutes long.
It carries a clean flag.
The summary is Rowie and Records Installing Guest onto a Mac mini computer.
Hello, welcome to another episode of Hacker Public Radio.
I'm your host for today Rowie and today we will be installing Geeks SD Part 2.
I had to look back, I don't remember off the top of my head, but I've probably two years
ago now, maybe a little less.
I tried installing Geeks SD on my Mac mini.
At the time, I was actually going to try to install the Geeks operating system on an
external drive and then just drive it, you know, have the boot, the Mac mini off of
that.
If you listen to that episode, I won't give away the ending, but there is a part do.
So, today I've decided to try again.
I dusted off my handy-dandy R2 mini X1 keyboard that I used to connect to the Mac mini.
And I've got it hooked up in our basement.
Using our basement TV as our monitor, so it's nice and big, I don't need my glasses.
And so far, I've got everything connected, booted up, and I finally figured out, remembered
that you have to hold the old key or the option key so that you can pick your USB drive.
And once I remembered all those steps, it booted right into the Geeks SD install disk
or thumb drive, that's the case maybe.
And I am now on the first part of the install.
And like I said before, this is a very reminiscent of those early Debian installer days for me.
It's a very to-e-based with the DOS, well, I think of them as the DOS graphics, but the,
you know, your basic text graphics install kind of thing.
So it looks very nice, very fond memories, well, I'm not so fond, but here we go.
So we're going to try and pick English and choose territory for this language, scroll
down to the United States, inter, graphical install using eternal, terminal-based interface.
Yes, I just what I want, times, uh, America, I was right up at the top.
Enter, times, uh, scroll down to New York, I think of New York.
English under US, uh, keyboard there, and I'm just going to keep it simple.
I have hard enough time with this mini keyboard without adding international with all great.
Distinguished, yes.
Okay, enter a system, oh boy.
Actually, I may pause this and go, I didn't bring my laptop down, but I think I have a bunch
of stuff that I used for names set up.
And actually, I think I have some old passwords that I'm just going to reuse my old, I mean,
old as reuse as in the ones I used initially, just that when I was trying to set this up last time.
So I'm going to pause and I will be right back after I get those notes from the last time,
since I already have a system in place at some point in my head, I will try to recreate it.
Okay, and we're back.
I was a little longer than I'd be right back.
It's actually the next day, and I don't know if I've had some things to do last night.
I didn't look through my notes.
I found my passwords that I was going to use the last time, but they're just all listed under
Mac and eight geeks.
So, and then I listened to my previous podcast a little bit to see if I had picked the name.
Apparently, I'd come up with the exciting name back up.
So, I'm actually just going to go with Horde, since it would be a Horde of my digital artifacts.
And we're with you on.
Oops, okay, and we're waiting for internet access.
Substitute server discovery.
I think I did this last time, and there's no other server on my network.
It basically lets you sort of share binaries that are already been compiled in match.
I'll enable it anyway.
Please chew the root password, okay.
I'll go to my password, save root display, okay, let's figure out this keyboard.
Do you do?
Do you want me to edit this out, since it's, I really don't know what this keyboard
is.
These add at least one user.
Name,
two, two,
sort of how I fill stuff in.
They like when you put your name in, and it seems a real name for you.
If you've been modified, then you're home directory based on your user name.
But you can modify if you want, and now I'm at the entering the password fees.
Do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, that looks okay.
Enter, okay.
Okay, I've entered my at least one.
Oh, there are other people later.
I need to.
Okay, well, what desktop?
I really, that is a good question.
I'm not just using it as server, I don't really need a desktop.
And I am wanting to learn Geeks.
I think I'm going to skip this.
Hard to just give myself a command line interface.
And now you can select, I don't need, I do need, I do need, I do need, open SSH.
Do I want to be a tour, not a network router?
I don't know, almost with that later.
The Zilla NSS certificate for HTTP.
I guess I want those, since they were, I don't know, I'll leave that default.
Enter, okay.
We like many members manage your command man for Wi-Fi capable laptop.
The DHN, I don't really need those.
Don't need that.
Don't need, I mean, I guess I could, I don't know, I wanted to do it with the scheme Geeks way,
I guess. DHCP client, I was going to give this a static I address, which I actually didn't think about.
I need to, maybe I have that marked out somewhere, or not, I'll just click one.
Choose where you want to resume the install, you can also import it.
I don't, choose where you want to resume the install, you can also import, I don't want to do that.
I already did it at times, I didn't get that, I didn't have no name, I didn't have any services,
did I, no, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know,
services, please select, if you wish to install if you set hold, okay,
okay, I don't know, do I, I guess I have to pick one as far as, I've never used
cond man as these, choose not to diminish network connection, we recommend never manage
your cond man for Wi-Fi, take with the laptop, I think this Mechmini has Wi-Fi, I've never used,
I'll just do network manager because that's the one I, I know, okay, how do I, that's okay, so
this is a little weird, most of the others you select something and then there's like a,
you know, and okay, or, you know, cancel, but this I guess you have to select the one you want
and enter on why you've selected it because the only other option is to exit,
I think last time I exited thinking I was going to get away with doing nothing, but I guess I do need to
manage, configure the network, so let me just network manager, all right, now I've gone on
console services like miscellaneous service running your network time service,
I'll select that one, and GPM, mouse team and to use mouse on the console, yeah, because this has a
built-in touchpad, so I'm like nice to do that, okay, yes I do need cups and I will have to deal
with the, if it hasn't been fixed already, the CVE that was going to take down the world because
cup's printer service air, yeah, you know, hacks,
um, enter, please select the partitioning method, guided using the entire disk, guided using,
okay, I'm going to try this with encryption, hopefully this will work,
ATA half, yes, I'm just going to wipe out the hard drive this time and put it right on there,
oops, what was that, let's see, this is a proposed partitioning, it's so possible to
edit a bit back to install in you by pressing, you know, let me go back, because I think I
doubled tapped and just see what I missed, it's, you know, like done with partitioning,
and it is nice guided with encryption, Apple, everything is one partitioned separate home partition,
oh, that is a good question, I mean usually just do everything as one, what is the advantage,
I'm just going to do everything as one, okay, this is a proposed partitioning, it is still
possible to edit, go to, you can change this, okay, so it's suggesting there's a 200 megabit,
fat ESP boot, ESP boot, EFI system, and then 500 gigabit, EXT4, quick route, I was thinking about
trying to, okay, I'll give you options, I'm not going to mess with Ossets, EXT4 is good enough now,
okay, please enter now, now I'm going to get back to my passwords,
okay, so we've entered the disk encryption password, and now we're asking if we want to
format this, can I say yes, I just form adding, okay, so I should check it, it looks like this store
recording, good,
all right, yeah, full time, here's the actual hard disk ticking way, maybe not, you could sign up,
didn't come, okay, configuration file, we're now ready to proceed with the installation,
assistant configuration files from generated display below, this file will be available in
Etsyconfig.sem, and it shows me the configuration file in all its S, um, no boy,
and the brain clock this morning, S expression glory, there we go,
and it looks okay to me, I won't bore you with all the details, but it just lists everything,
that you're going to install, not the boot loader and stuff, it's not that long,
um, okay, let me get to the okay, it looks okay, it's in here,
Shepard Service Geeks Demon has been started,
okay, oh boy, it's been so long, because I did actually update the Substitute HTC Geeks,
downloading up, we're getting it downloaded, hey, fun, fun, I can't remember how far it's been
so long, because I did actually look it up, and I don't remember, it was probably released maybe
in September, I didn't look on my post page, but I did look in my files, and it was like September
2021, when I recorded this the first time around, so it has been a couple of years,
now it's just downloading all the various packages,
um, so as we wait, uh, my cup of coffee, hopefully be a little more coherent,
yeah, I can't remember if I got this far, and then it just would never boot correctly,
I think that was my biggest issue, oh, so,
but it is nice to see something scrolling across the screen,
it looks like a Python 3.9.9,
so some maybe wondering why Geeks, that is a good question,
one, I just thought it was an interesting concept, I've always sort of like,
been interested in, um, Lisp, and SS, SS expressions, um, and Scheme,
and Guile, I ran across Guile, probably back in the 90s, um, the only really Lisp-ish
programming I ever did was write a couple, um, plug-ins filters for Guimp,
back, sometime in the 2000s, um, that just, it was kind of neat, one was a way to help make, um,
animated gifts, just taking like a symbol and making it rotate, um, and you could pick how many times
you wanted it to rotate, and it would generate the layers, and, that you needed, and rotate the image
automatically, and sorry, I can't, this turned into a little mini, uh, series, or a mini episode,
but that was about it, I did a couple different things with Guimp, so that was pretty cool,
um, even though I think most of them these days are now, I think Python is probably the biggest,
ungimp-image module making, uh, language,
and initializing operating system under mount, or root mount,
for now, to the root of the operating system.
But back to, uh, and I always liked Guile, I don't know why I just thought it was kind of
neat, but I was kind of caught up with, like, beginning operating system, and I always was hoping that, um,
uh, the herd would take off, not that I ever, like, guide good enough to actually,
I got to think I've got it running once or twice, and sort of messed with it, but I never,
it was back, you know, when I barely, like, could make my way around the Linux operating system,
and then, uh, on the command line, much less, like, understand enough, one, I guess,
half the population to really put the time in with everything else going on in my life to, like,
figure out how to make it work as much as it worked then, um, but it did introduce me to a lot
of different things, uh, Guile scheme being one of them, um, and so I just thought,
I really liked the concept of Geeks, and I do, I do strive along the path of
good new enlightenment, um, and definitely very pragmatic, you know, like, uh, Ubuntu, once, I
mean, I was a, uh, Debian was my first distribution, um, I used it for years, you know, messing with
ex-windows, and, uh, back, you know, even when you've had to set up your own, like, monitor
configurations and stuff like that, and, um, it was, it was great, I loved it, learned a lot,
but I have to admit there was a point once Ubuntu, I don't remember which version I started on,
but it was nice just to sort of load it and not mess with drivers and things just more or less
worked. I mean, there were times where you still had to mess with things, like, these days, I'm,
I definitely, I guess, more of a perk, pragmatic, uh, Gnu, uh, user, um, when it comes to certain
things, but I do strive to, uh, you know, I, I think copy-left is the best way to go. I think for
businesses, probably copy-left. I mean, everybody's like, oh, to freedom to do anything, and then,
oh, we can't build a business model well. I don't know, I know there's been drama lately with WordPress
and how that's going, and you can say, but still, I think those business CCs aren't going to touch
your code if you release it under, you know, copy-left. They don't, they don't want to see it,
and if you do a Pharaoh, if you're doing web services, well, if you can build your build a business
on the services and still give the code away, and, you know, I mean, the chances of somebody,
I mean, they might, if you particularly somebody big enough can just fight you in court. I mean,
it does become a legal battle at some point, at least under the way the US works, but I asked,
yeah, that's my evangelism for the copy-left, and particularly like the GNU licenses.
This is one of the reasons I'm trying geeks, another of the reasons.
And I did like the reproducibility that they're striving for, and being able to like,
and, you know, a particular software, to a particular version, and know that like, when you
build a year, you can get, I think, if not 100%, 99% of the way there, a reproducibility.
So I think that's pretty cool. Not really for the things I do that matter that much, but I have,
you know, thought about it, and, or if you were trying to build like images for the places you
were going to sell, or a system you were, you know, trying to create, it would be nice to know exactly.
Okay, this, I can just go back and rebuild this, and I know that there's not some weirdness that
may have changed that I'm not going to notice, even though everything seems to be, you know,
sort of the same, or should be sort of the same.
Let's see, boot letters, boot, loaders, successfully installed on boot EFI, command geek system,
in it, all back, and now it's succeeded. Press enter to continue. Let us continue.
Service geeks team management stopped, and congratulations installation is now complete.
You may remove the device containing the installation image and press the reboot.
Okay, let me grab the, well, okay, I have removed my thumb drive,
hitting reboot, and we shall see if we, I guess we have to put in the, I didn't really think
about that as far as the server goes. I guess I'll just have to remember to come down
and put the password in whenever there's a power outage. We don't get them too often, but let's see
what happens. All right. The magic blowing of the Mac Mini.
Welcome to Grub, attempting to decrypt the master key, enter passphrase for HD1.
Okay, yep, I don't really think about that as far as the server goes, I don't know.
I think about it. Well, I do point on putting all the backup data on the external hard drive,
so if I do end up wiping this because I'm tired of remembering to put in the decryption password,
oh, make a show about that. Okay, as I go to my password manager and put the password
in for it again, and the moment of truth.
Okay, interesting.
Be still my heart. I am now in the the Grub boot menu, and now it's, oh, I gotta do it again.
That's unhandy. Apparently you have to, it's now prompting me, I guess because that
would got me into the boot partition, and now I've got to get to the actual less partition
as I put the password in again for the encryption.
All right, I'm feeling optimistic.
Hey, it is booting. I think we may have the success here.
I don't think I'm going to blink.
And I'm not a login prompt because I should double check while we're here that I can actually log in.
I do need to figure out, so it's on my big television screen right now,
but it's like a lot of times I've found that's like the left half, the like,
a couple characters are cut off. It's like you need to do the screen adjustments.
I'm not going to bother with right now. What I really just want to do is get in, get
SSH configured. Actually, I can probably try that. Anyway, that might be another show,
but I'll just now test that I can actually log in with the password, user name and password
that I picked from. I mean, user and password.
And here I am at a command, ls, enter. There's nothing there, ls, dash,
a, dash, a, enter, dash, dot, profile, dot, hash, profile, dot, rc, dot, config, dot, gdb, int, dot,
kyle, dot, xg, faults, dot, z, profile. Okay, dokey. Well, we have successfully
installed geeks, sd onto a macmini. I'm very happy. I can now move forward. Actually,
one of the things I did when I went out last night was I have an external one terabyte drive,
which won't point out how am I ever going to fill this up. But I do hope to back up all the
HPR media and resources for the shows and all the audio and stuff. And I definitely needed
a bigger drive to hold that and all my own personal backups. So I went out and kind of
feels like a good price on an external, another Cgate external drive that's eight terabytes.
So I shouldn't have any issues for at least a year as far as data back, because
all right, everyone. Well, thank you for hanging with me while I installed geeks sd on my macmini.
And I hope you've enjoyed this episode of Hacker Public Radio.
You have been listening to Hacker Public Radio at Hacker Public Radio does work. Today's show was
contributed by a HPR listener like yourself. If you ever thought of recording broadcast,
you click on our contribute link to find out how easy it really is. Hosting for HPR has been
kindly provided by an honesthost.com, the internet archive, and our sync.net.
On the Sadois status, today's show is released under Creative Commons,
Attribution 4.0 International License.