diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index f47717519d..70cb1e50c7 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -19,6 +19,11 @@ However, initial development was done on GCE and so our instructions and scripts
 
         git clone https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/kubernetes.git
 
+5. Setting up a cluster requires the `htpasswd` tool in order to hash a randomly generated password for accessing the API server.  This is already installed on recent version of Mac OS X but on linux you need to install it yourself.  On Debian/Ubuntu you can do this with:
+
+        sudo apt-get udpate
+        sudo apt-get install apache2-utils
+
 ### Setup
 
 The setup script builds Kubernetes, then creates Google Compute Engine instances, firewall rules, and routes: