This IBM® Redbooks® publication describes the basic installation processes of Linux for z SystemsTM on an IBM zPDT® base. It is intended for readers who are not familiar with IBM z Systems or with the zPDT product. This book assume the reader is familiar with Linux on Intel-compatible platforms. This book provides basic introductions to necessary z Systems and zPDT topics, and proceeds in a cookbook manner. This book is not intended for readers who are already familiar with these topics.

This IBM® Redbooks® publication provides all the messages that are associated with IBM System z® Personal Development Tool (IBM zPDT®) operation in a single reference source. This edition is intended for zPDT Version 1 Release 6 (commonly known as GA6), but should be useful for all zPDT releases.

This IBM® Redbooks® publication introduces the IBM System z® Personal Development Tool (zPDT®), which runs on an underlying Linux system based on an Intel processor. zPDT provides a System z system on a PC capable of running current System z operating systems, including emulation of selected System z I/O devices and control units. It is intended as a development, demonstration, and learning platform and is not designed as a production system. This book, providing specific installation instructions, is the second of three volumes. The first volume describes the general concepts of zPDT and a syntax reference for zPDT commands and device managers. The third volume discusses more advanced topics that may not interest all zPDT users. The IBM order numbers for the three volumes are SG24-7721, SG24-7722, and SG24-7723. The systems discussed in these volumes are complex, with elements of Linux (for the underlying PC machine), IBM z/Architecture® (for the core zPDT elements), System z I/O functions (for emulated I/O devices), and IBM z/OS® (providing the System z application interface), and possibly with other System z operating systems. We assume the reader is familiar with the general concepts and terminology of System z hardware and software elements and with basic PC Linux characteristics.

This IBM® Redbooks® publication is Volume 2 of a five-volume series of books entitled The Virtualization Cookbook for IBM Z®. This volume includes the following chapters: Chapter 1, "Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux on LNXADMIN" on page 3, describes how to install and configure Red Hat Enterprise Linux onto the Linux Administration server, which performs the cloning and other tasks. Chapter 2, "Automated Red Hat Enterprise Linux installations by using Kickstart" on page 37, describes how to use Red Hat's kickstart tool to create Linux systems. This tool is fundamentally different from cloning in that an automated installation is implemented. You can try kickstart and cloning. Understand that these applications attempt to accomplish the same goal of quickly getting Linux systems up and running, and that you do not need to use both. Chapter 3, "Working with subscription-manager, yum, and DaNdiFied" on page 47, describes how the Red Hat Network works. It provides centralized management and provisioning for multiple Red Hat Enterprise Linux systems. Kickstart is an easy and fast way to provision your Linux guests in any supported Linux platform. It re-creates the operating system from the beginning by using the kickstart profile configuration file that installs the new operating system unattended. It also sets up the new guest according to the definition that was set up in the kickstart file. Usually, Linux is administered by the same team that manages Linux on all platforms. By using kickstart, you can create a basic profile that can be used in all supported platforms and customize Linux profiles, as needed. Cloning requires a better understanding of the z/VM environment and z/VM skills. It is a fast process if you enable the IBM FlashCopy® feature in advance. It clones the disks from a golden image to new disks that are used by the new Linux guest. The process can be automated by using the cloning scripts that are supplied with this book. It is recommended that you start with The Virtualization Cookbook for IBM Z Volume 1: IBM z/VM 7.2, SG24-8147 of this series because the IBM® z/VM hypervisor is the foundation (or base "layer") for installing Linux on IBM Z.

"This IBM® Redbooks® publication introduces the IBM System z® Personal Development Tool (zPDT), which runs on an underlying Linux® system based on an Intel® processor. zPDT provides a System z system on a PC capable of running current System z operating systems, including emulation of selected System z I/O devices and control units. It is intended as a development, demonstration, and learning platform and is not designed as a production system. This book, providing specific installation instructions, is the second of three volumes"--Resource description page.