Though we concentrate on installation for CentOS (Linux), the software needed can be installed on other Linux distributions, MacOS, and Windows. However, I have no experience with this software on Windows, so you are a bit on your own if you use Windows.
CENTOS
CentOS is a standard Linux distribution used in the Department of Computer Science. To install on a PC, workstation, or laptop, you will likely need to download the ISO image and burn it on a DVD. Installation instructions are here.
Be sure to remember your root password and to create a user account for you to use.
Once installed, CentOS has numerous additional packages that can be installed over the Internet. CentOS uses the YUM package manager for this purpose and also to keep installed packages current. You run yum from the command line as root. You can try
ssh -l root localhost yum update
to keep your packages updated. The command
yum list installed
will tell you what packages are currently installed, while the command
yum list available
will tell you what packages are available but not installed. The command
yum install package_name
will install package_name.
OTHER LINUX DISTRIBUTIONS
The many other Linux distributions have their own installation procedures. These are typically easy to find and follow online. They each have their own package management system, similar to yum.
MACOS and windows
MacOS and Windows are typically already installed on your platform. It is a good idea to keep your installation updated with the newest versions.