Mint Unix-like environment

Mint is build based on Unix-like processes, inter-processes communications and data structure. So Mint understands the Unix environment by default.

To complete the Unix-like environment in Mint, a Unix folder structure is required and the use of programs ported from Unix. Programs ported from Unix can then be easily download and installed. So this tutorial concern is to setup the very first Unix folder structure and some programs used in Unix such as the list command and the all-important Unix Shell (command shell).

1. Download the Unix bundle and tools

The Unix Environment bundle contains a folder structure and several Unix-like programs that can easily be installed on the Unix-like files system on your Mint. This is normally the Ext2 Filesystem which was setup on D: drive previously.

1. 1. 1. • The Unix bundle, root.zip, can be downloaded from here

         • The tools to decompress the bundle can be download from here

2. Transfer downloaded files to Ext2 file system partition

Copy the root.zip and the gzip_tar.lzh files to the root of the Drive D: (Assume that your Ext2 FS partition is Drive D:).

• 1. 1. • Unzip root.zip using STZIP. It will unzip to root.tar

        • UnLZH gzip_tar.lzh using LHZARC into the D: drive. Rename tar to tar.ttp.

3. UnTar the TAR file

A TAR file is an archive of folders and files along with the permissions of a Unix backup. To unTAR root.tar into your Drive D:, double click on the TAR.TTP and type in the text shown in the dialogbox below. The archive file will be untar into the Drive D: and you will see some folders in drive D: now.

4. Setting up the proper folder for your UNiX-like programs

Unlike GEM/TOS files, Unix files expects to work in an file system that does not have drive letters and starts from a root location ( that's denoted by the / ). Fortunately we can use the symbolic link to create such filesystem so that these Unix program are tricked into believing they are in a Unix system.

1. 1. 1. • Edit the MINT.CNF file to add in these sym links.

         • Find the section of the file that has some sln defined. Edit them to point to the correct folder location. In our case where we placed the Unix environment bundle in Drive D: which means it will be similar to the following

sln d:\bin u:\bin 

sln d:\lib u:\lib 

sln d:\etc u:\etc 

sln d:\home u:\home 

sln d:\usr u:\usr 

sln d:\tmp u:\tmp 

sln d:\var u:\var 

sln d:\sbin u:\sbin 

sln d:\root u:\root 

sln d:\opt u:\opt 

sln d:\mnt u:\mnt 

sln d:\boot u:\boot

1. 1. 1. • Reboot so that these settings are used by MiNT.

5. Running the Unix Shell

After the reboot, you are ready for some Unix like programs. To run the Unix Shell, from the GEM desktop open Drive D: and go into the BIN folder. Double click on tcsh and click OK if it ask you to enter a parameter (you don't need any). The Unix shell will come up in a Window.

You may want to change the color of the FONT by going to TOSWIN toolbar Options > Window settings. Follow this guide on changing colours in TOSWIN.

The normal command of cd (change directory) and ls (list directory) are included in the shell as built-in tools.

Note: if you don't have the tsch, you can download a SH.TOS instead from here.

6. Clean up

1. 1. You can now delete the file root.tar and tar.ttp as we do not need it any more.

   2. We still need the gzip_tar.lzh file later. So keep it.

The Unix shell allows you to run ported Unix application, of which you have a handful in the /d/bin folder. In order to have more ported Unix programs, it is necessary to install RPM that will allow you to install more ported Unix applications in a controlled way. You should install RPM next to exploit the full power of MiNT. 

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