Linux and xp

[Christopher Covington]

> Is there a way to have fedora core and windows xp installed on the same
> machine?

Yes, you just need to partition the hard drive(s) properly.

> Could you please help me with this? What shall I install first for
> example?
> Can you give me some guidelines on how this should be done?

While you can install either operating system first, much of what I
read when I was asking the same question recommended that Windows be
installed first. I've done it the other way around and the only issue
that pops up is a useless entry in the Windows bootloader to try to
boot the foreign operating system it detects. You can safely delete
C:\boot.ini to get rid of that junk. If you do install Windows first,
you will need to boot into linux (via a bootable cd or floppy) and run
the grub installation again. This might not be well documented for
Fedora but it's part of the standard Gentoo installation procedure [1]
(the instructions should work on most *nix systems).

As for special considerations when installing two operatings systems,
just make sure you know which operating system belongs on which
partition. I recommend using hda1 (*nix) a.k.a. C: (Windows) a.k.a.
hd0,0 (Grub) as your main Windows partition. Mistaking partitions
during the second installation could result in reformatting all the
work you put into the previous installation.

> I also need to know how I shall invoke the xp installation without
> booting from the cd.

Windows XP can be installed from a set of bootable floppies, but you
still need a cdrom drive--you're just not booting from it [2]. If you
have a cdrom drive and just can't boot to it, a multitude of linux
floppies exist that you could boot from and probably consequently
start the Fedora cd from.

I hope all this helped. Good luck!

Chris Covington

[1] http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-x86.xml?part=1&chap=10
[2] http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=55820edb-5039-4955-bcb7-4fed408ea73f&displaylang=en