I am(was) a great Microsoft Windows fan. One of the best things of Microsoft Windows is the sheer ease with which it can be installed. Over the years I have had to do it many times, especially since I keep getting this blue screen and I have to press the power button to get things going again. That and installing software that came on any magazine CD would have me formatting the disk every few months.

I was first introduced to Linux when I joined FreeOS. Actually they gave me no other options but to try it out – pretty mean of them. A few weeks of sweating it out with Linux and I thought I would try it on my home machine too. However, that was easier said than done. A few minutes into the installation and I was looking at obscure stuff like disk partitioning, mount points, root and swap…. oh well, let’s stick to good ol Windows. So life went on till one day this packet came in from Phat Linux containing just one CD. It looked pretty intriguing—a Linux distro that could be installed on Windows? And the CD said that neither had I to partition the hard disk nor had I to be a hardcore techie to install it. Sounded too good to be true. Anyway, no harm in trying it, I thought and headed for home with the CD.

Well, I was soon to find that Phat Linux is one of the most easy-to-install operating systems.

Phat Linux allows Windows users to run Linux while preserving their Windows9X partition. Installing Phat Linux is fairly simple. If you are in Windows 9x, then all you need to do is insert the CD and run setup.exe. It requires the VB6 Runtime files, which are included on the CD. Simply run install.bat to install them. If you are installing from DOS or Win3x, you need to run the following command from the CD:

unzip phatv33.zip -d c:phat

The install program then takes over and installation is completed in a few minutes. That’s all to it! No need to specify hardware type, partition the hard disk or any of that geeky stuff. Once the installation is complete, just run linux.bat and your Phat Linux is ready to be used. You can also install it on any other drive apart from C. Just mention your choice when starting the installation.

As Phat Linux starts, it will prompt you for a username and password. Key in 'root' for the username and the password is 'phat'. Once you have logged in, you can set your password with the 'passwd' command.