It is possible to install Linux on even less disk space than in the example above, but you will have to be really picky as to what you install.
For a larger available hard drive space, I nowadays (year 2002) consider the following setup (for a comfortable total of 15 GB dedicated to Linux):
mount point type size
/ ext2 800 MB
/usr ext2 5000 MB
/usr/local ext2 3000 MB
/home ext2 5200 MB
swap swap 1000 MB
Please note that the the mount points can reside on different physical hard drives. Linux agglomarates all the hard drive space into a single directory tree.
Another consideration when setting up the partitions on older computers (486?). Many older BIOSes have the restriction that the boot partition cannot extend beyond the 1024th cylinder on your first physical hard drive. To overcome this limitation, simply make the first (bootable) partition so that it ends before the cylinder number 1023 (this makes this partition max approximately 512 MB in size, which is plenty for the "/" root partition). Once Linux boots, the BIOS restriction does not matter any more because Linux takes over the hardware management and it can access the partition(s) beyond the cylinder number 1023.
When installing and using Linux, your drives appear as devices with the following names: hda--first IDE drive (stands for "hard drive a", i.e. the master drive on the first IDE interface), hdb--second IDE drive (i.e., the slave drive on the first IDE interface), hdc--third IDE drive (i.e. the master drive on the second IDE interface), hdd--fourth IDE drive (i.e. the slave drive on the second IDE interface). The numbers mean the partitions on the physical drives: "hda1" means the first IDE hard drive (hd a), first partition (1) ; "hda2" is the first IDE hard drive, second partition; "hda3"--the first IDE hard drive, third partition; (and so on if you have more than 3 partitions on the first IDE hard drive) ; "hdb1"--second IDE hard drive, first partition (or just "hdb" if it is the CDROM installed as a slave on your first IDE interface). "hdc1"--third IDE hard drive, first partition, etc. SCSI drives have analogous names but start with the letters "sd" (="SCSI drive"), followed by the letter indicating the SCSI interface and by the number indicating the SCSI device id. For example, "sda4" means "first SCSI interface, id number 4". If you have an external zip drive attached to your parallel port, it will appear as SCSI device "sda4" (zip drives work in a SCSI-emulation mode).
The listing of partitions that your Linux setup program presents to you during installation will include any MS Windows partitions which you have. For example, I have the following MS Windows partition:
mount point type size comment
[no mount] vfat 1200 MB ["Win C drive, hda1]
/mnt/dos_hdd2 vfat 1600 MB ["Win D drive, hdd2]
Don't erase these MS Windows partitions during your Linux installation if you want a dual boot. If you erase the MS Windows partition, MS Windows is gone from your system! If not sure, backup your data from your MS Windows
