[[PageOutline]] = Installing Debian = Nearly all May First/People Link servers and support team workstations are running [http://debian.org Debian Gnu/Linux]. We support Debian because the project has an [http://www.debian.org/intro/free ideological commitment to free software], organizes labor in a [http://www.debian.org/intro/organization transparent way], is volunteer-based and therefore not dependent on any single corporate entity, and is available on a wide variety of computers. MFPL administrators may want to [wiki:install_debian/server skip to quick and dirty directions for installing Debian on MFPL servers]. Anyone can install Debian! The installer is fairly well designed and most questions it asks of the user are ones most regular users can answer. The two hardest parts are: == Booting to a system from which to install Debian == The first step in installing Debian on your computer is to boot your computer into an environment from which you can install Debian. Read more about [wiki:install_debian/boot booting into an environment to install Debian]. Note: If you are installing Debian on a machine already running Microsoft Windows, you might be able to skip this step by installing the Debian windows installer from the [http://www.goodbye-windows.com/ goodbye windows web site]. FIXME: if you are installing onto removable media (like an external hard disk or a compact flash card) and you already have a working Debian system, you can skip this step and install using debootstrap. == Disk Partitioning == Unlike most Windows and Macintosh computers, with Linux you can divide your hard disk into partitions. Separate partitions can prevent one program from taking up all the space on your hard disk, allow you to dynamically create encrypted partitions, help you more easily manage virtual machines as well as providing many other advantages to a single disk partition. More information on disk partitioning is available on our [wiki:install_debian/partition partition page].