installing mint
This guide walks you through installing Linux Mint Cinnamon on a kiosk computer. This is the first step in setting up a new kiosk.
- A USB stick (at least 4 GB)
- The computer you want to install Mint on
- A separate computer to download the ISO and flash the USB (or do this in advance)
- An internet connection
- Download the Linux Mint ISO from the official Mint website. Choose the Cinnamon edition.
- Download Balena Etcher — a tool for writing the ISO to a USB stick.
- Open Balena Etcher, select the Mint ISO file, select your USB stick, and click Flash.
- Plug the USB into the kiosk computer. Turn it on and press F10, F12, or F2 during boot to open the boot menu (the key depends on the computer brand). Select the USB drive or "Linux Mint Cinnamon".
- Once Mint loads from the USB, click the "Install Linux Mint" button on the desktop. Select English as the language.
- When asked about multimedia codecs, check the box to install them:
- For the installation type, select "Erase disk and install Linux Mint" (this wipes the hard drive and does a clean install). Click Install, then Continue. Select Jerusalem as the timezone.
- Enter a username and password for the computer. Select "Log in automatically" — this is important for a kiosk since nobody will be there to type a password on boot.
- Wait for the installation to finish. When it's done, remove the USB stick and click Restart Now. The computer will reboot into Linux Mint.
Now that Mint is installed, run the kiosk base setup script: Kiosk Base Setup