how do you install linux mint?

[specmod0]

This installer is confusing.... I can't do anything http://yfrog.com/jtscreenshotpanp

[specmod0]

is there anyway to use the Debian installer? is it still on here?

[dawgdoc]

It looks like you are attempting to install to an empty 80 Gb hdd which as a 3 Gb Extended partition and no Primary partition. You must have at least one Primary partition in addition to the extended partition. At the point you are now you would click on the <Edit Partitions> in the bottom right of the dialog window to proceed. This opens GParted, a partition manager.

Are you planning to only have the one OS on the computer or several? With one OS only, you do not need the extended partition.
I would suggest reading THIS post first if you have not decided on how you want to partition your hard drive. Considerations before you install

[specmod0]

Is this right?? or what do i need to change?

[specmod0]

http://yfrog.com/3ufgffp forgot the photo..

[specmod0]

i don't have all night...... http://yfrog.com/3ufgffp

[dawgdoc]

Is this right?? or what do i need to change?

I wouldn't know if it is right until I know what you are trying to do, what your hardware setup is, and how you think you may be using the computer in the future.

Most people with a single hard drive and with intentions of having only one OS will have something like:

/sda1 / (your root partition)10 Gb
/sda2 swap (1.5 to 2x your Ram)
/sda 3 /home (the rest of your hdd)

This is what I would recommend to most but not what I do for myself.

[specmod0]

programs are installed into / ??? I play a lot of videos games. install a lot of programs? 10 gigs would fill up pretty fast... ?

I have a 80 gig hard drive... no 2ed os.

[specmod0]

http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/7831/s ... ot1agl.png

[specmod0]

what is /home for?

[vincent]

This is a must-read before you do any more partitioning, since it looks like you know little of what you're doing:
viewtopic.php?f=90&t=11872

[specmod0]

would this work better?? http://img299.imageshack.us/img299/626/screenshot2w.png

[stz*j]

Yep, looks ok. Just go ahead if you haven't already.

Basically, /home is where you keep your user(s) stuff, the settings, documents, etc. Not programs!! That's scattered around / partition.

It's very handy when you want to upgrade or if your system breaks, especially when you tweak too much. With a seperate /home partition, you normally just need to reinstall the / partition and keep the /home partition intact/unformatted. Still need to reinstall the programs though.

[randomizer]

You could even shave another 15GB off / and devote it to /home. Unless you have some program writing to logs like crazy you'll likely never use more than 15-20GB on /. Windows keeps lots of redundant copies of things so that's why it needs to have so much space. Windows programs are also typically quite large, often several GB. On Linux the programs are usually far, far smaller (often no more than 50MB, but some go up to 150-200MB), and they all share the same libraries. Most libraries are highly backwards compatible, so redundant copies aren't usually necessary. Compatibility usually only breaks when library rewrites occur, often when a new major version is released. For example, Python 3.x is so incompatible with Python 2.x (due to a core language rewrite) that the most basic console programs aren't going to work with both languages/interpreters.

[specmod0]

what about /boot? is that where grub is installed?

[asymmetros]

Of course you can have /boot in a separate partition but there is no need for this. You can try a basic scheme, a /root partition, lets say 25 gb max, 2-3 gb for swap (depending on your ram) and the rest as /home.
A good idea is to partition first your disc, by typing in the terminal sudo gparted while in the live cd (be careful to backup any data first) and then proceed to the installation. When it asks you for the partitions, you ll have them ready.

Try if you wanna the follow link
http://www.thegeekstuff.com/2010/09/linux-file-system-structure/

Gives some info (with graphs) about Linux file system,

[vincent]

You do not need /boot; if you don't specify a /boot partition, there'll be a /boot directory within your /root partition (and thus, most people go with a simple /root, /home, and /swap partition setup). You may ask, what's the point of having a /boot partition then?

1) It makes booting multiple Linux distros somewhat easier to manage.
2) If you want to encrypt your Linux partitions, you must have a separate /boot. Why? Grub can't read encrypted partitions; you can thus encrypt /, /home, even /swap (an encrypted /swap means no hibernation, unfortunately), but you must not encrypt the files that Grub reads on bootup, i.e. the stuff inside /boot, otherwise you won't be able to boot. So /boot has to be a separate partition and be unencrypted.
3) If you choose a filesystem that Grub can't read from, for your /root partition, you will need a separate /boot. Example: brtfs, the next generation Linux filesystem and ext4's successor, is now relatively stable and can be used, however Grub cannot boot from a partition formatted in brtfs. Thus, your /root partition can be in brtfs, but /boot will have to be in a separate partition and be formatted preferably with a filesystem from the ext family (a common pick for /boot is ext2).