[plug] Mac expert anyone?

[James Devenish]

In message <5.1.0.14.2.20031212085540.00aadec0 at mail.optusnet.com.au>
on Fri, Dec 12, 2003 at 08:58:15AM +0800, Tim White wrote:
> I ahve a few macs lieing around with the intention the get linux on them. 
> Some with cd drives and some without. The MAC that I have that is similar 
> to yours is in a non working state (I think the OS died)

Getting Linux working on old Macs can be hairy at times. But at least
you can grab copies of old Mac OS versions (e.g. System 7.5) from
various public FTP sites. Systm 7.5 comes with floppy disk-sized
installer images, so you can boot from the floppy drive to install Mac
OS. Only problem is that I'm not sure how much partitioning flexibility
you have in the System 7.5 installer. A useful partitioning programme
may be "Lido" (Google for '"surf city" lido'). You can put a copy of the
Mac OS System file and Lido onto a floppy disk and boot from that in
order to partition hard drives. If you have SCSI cables, though, you
could connect multiple drives and boot System 7.5 on one of them in
order to partition the other with Lido. Depending on the model of Mac,
you may need to boot Linux via Mac OS (so you must retain a small Mac OS
partition on the disk). With Debian woody, it may be easiest to install
Linux kernel 2.2 from the disk images and upgrade to 2.4 *after*
installation (i.e. I'm not sure how easy it is to install 2.4 in the
first place, because I think the boot images for 2.2 work better than
the boot images for 2.4, though it depends on the Mac model). A common
strategy is to download Debian base onto the Mac OS partition under Mac
OS, then boot into Linux and install from those files. Thereafter, you
can use the network to download packages, etc.