Linux Starter Script

Automates the initial setup of a fresh AlmaLinux 8/9 server so you don't have to type the same repetitive commands every time you provision a new machine.

What this repo is for

After provisioning a bare AlmaLinux server, this script:

1. Updates all existing packages to the latest available versions.
2. Installs the EPEL (Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux) repository so that additional community packages are available.
3. Refreshes package metadata after adding EPEL.
4. Installs a curated set of essential command-line tools.

The script is idempotent — it is safe to run multiple times without causing errors or unintended side effects.

How to run

Security note: The one-liners below pipe a remote script directly into bash. Before running on a production server, review the script at the URL above to verify its contents.

Log in to your server as root (or prefix commands with sudo) and run one of the following one-liners:

Using curl

bash <(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wausin/Linux-starter-script/main/setup.sh)

Using wget

bash <(wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wausin/Linux-starter-script/main/setup.sh)

Manual download

curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wausin/Linux-starter-script/main/setup.sh
chmod +x setup.sh
sudo bash setup.sh

What gets installed and why

Tool	Why
htop	Interactive process viewer — easier to read than plain top
wget	Non-interactive network downloader for files and scripts
nano	Beginner-friendly terminal text editor
git	Version control — required for cloning repos and managing code
tar	Archive utility for .tar, .tar.gz, and .tar.bz2 files
curl	Data transfer tool supporting many protocols (HTTP, FTP, …)
unzip	Extract .zip archives

Requirements

• AlmaLinux 8 or 9 (or any RHEL-compatible distro that uses dnf)
• Root access or sudo privileges