Another 2000-era GNU-Linux distro aimed at business users.

86Box Configuration

Motherboard: ADLink NuPRO-592

Processor: AMD K-2+ 366MHz

Memory: 256MB

Video: S3 Vision968 (Phoenix)

Sound: Ensoniq AudioPCI ES1371

Network: AMD PCnet-FAST III

Install

The install process looks just like a modern install, like the second part of the Windows 2000 install.

Preparing HDD, this will take a while depending on the storage size

A nice feature is whilst the installer is gathering information from you, it continues to install common components in the background, speeding up the install. At the end as game of Pac-Man is provided whilst the rest of the system installs.

After install

We are introduced to the desktop, and to the KDE user environment. Very similar to other distros of the time like Storm Linux, Mandrake 7 and Corel Linux. This presents a familiar Windows like interface to the user. Upon first boot we are greeted with a literal wizard, who will introduce you to the operating system elements.
On the desktop we have shortcut to Caldera’s website, along with removable drive shortcuts.
No other desktop environments are included, like GNOME.

Included Software

Adobe Acrobat is bundled to enable PDF files to be viewed out of the box. This appears to be the native Linux version instead of the Windows version running in WINE.

Running various applications: xEyes, KDE Earth, Mousepedometa

VIM version 5.5 comes included

Personal Time Tracker application for keeping track of your schedule? Seems you have to manually enter the times yourself, even after enabling the clock.

XV – Some sort of image editing application. Here you can manipulate images like crop them, rotate them or add text/effects.

WINE is also bundled with the operating system which should allow Windows applications to run, somewhat. A few that I tired simply causes the X Window system to fail, resulting in a slight reboot that takes you back to the logins scree.
Either WINE in this build is broken, or 86Box is causing issues with running Windows apps.

Xfig 3.2 – Vector drawing application, lets you create vector images like shapes which can then be exported to an image.

Kpackage – here you can view and modify packages that are installed on your system, and see the disk size they occupy.

The OS also comes with extensive documentation that explains the various core elements of Linux, and PC arictecture in general.

Third Party Software

Simcity 3000 – had to install this under the root account as the installed refused to install due to a permission issue. Eventually I was able to get this to install and run.

Quake 3 – Installed but refused to run, possibly due to a misconfigured 3DFX Voodoo card

Sid Mier Civ – Works perfectly, had to install it onto another hard drive since I was running out of space.

COAS

Caldera Open Administration System an add-on for the KDS Control Center that lets to manage and change distro specific options. Options appear to relate to the systems timezone , hardware options for the keyboard/mouse/monitor. Most of these options require root access, and you will be promoted for the root password for each option you choose.

System/Filesystems lets you view the different drives and volumes in use, and to mount additional volumes like another hard disk. This does not seem to work correctly as when I tried to add a new second hard disk it would just error out and displays a message to prompt to run fsck. I get they tried to make some tasks more simple to the user, but clearly this didn’t go according to plan.
Best way to do it was to create and partition using the cfdisk bash command that lets you create the partition, then add it manually to the etx/fstab file. By default the Caldera installer splits the drive into three, the swap partition, the root partition and the home partition.

The kernel option lets you view the modules that have been loaded, which is typically the device drivers used by the system. If you have added new hardware then you might need to add the relevant module used by the system. Unused modules can also be removed from here.

Shutting Down

Like other KDS distros of the time, you need to log out of the current user first before you can shut down the system. If ACPI is supported by the motherboard, the system will turn off.