Making respins with custom configs and files

[Jeroen van Meeuwen]

Hi Yaakov,

the Fedora Advisory Board may not be the most appropriate list to 
discuss Fedora 9 or Revisor features, more appropriate maybe is the 
Revisor development or user discussion list[1], and the 
fedora-livecd-list[2].

However looking at what it is you are trying to solve, have you tried 
working with copy_dir maybe? Revisor uses that setting to copy all 
contents from that location onto the live or installation media. With 
Live Media these files are copied onto "/" which is to become the root 
filesystem once you boot up the Live Media, and with Installation Media 
it copies it into the files/ directory in the tree (so that during the 
installation you can use it in %post).

If this has any short-comings on solving the scenario's you are 
addressing, please let me know because I think these are perfectly valid 
use cases.

Kind regards,

Jeroen van Meeuwen
-kanarip

[1] Revisor mailing lists:
http://lists.fedoraunity.org

[2] Fedora Live CD List:
http://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-livecd-list

Yaakov Nemoy wrote:
> Hey List,
> 
> I've come out of my coding ban (till finals are over) to work on a
> small side project.  It's a tool that lets you pick a set of files
> from a running system, they could be anything, config files, random
> non-free fonts installed to /usr/share/fonts/, grub splash screens,
> etc..., and lets you make an RPM out of them.  Since some of these
> files might clash with other packages, it doesn't install them
> directly to the root, but hidden away in /usr/share.  There is a
> second tool that then deploys these lumps of files.  It solves the
> following use cases:
> 
> Scenario 1
> Tim is a power user.  He has a system heavily configured, with a
> custom set of packages, from five repos, and all sorts of other things
> he found on online on deviantart.  He wants to make a respin of his
> computer using Revisor, so he can pop a CD in the brand new machine,
> use it to install Fedora, and be up and running in under 30 minutes.
> Since a large number of files that are not in his /home partition are
> just as important still require time setting up, he would rather tell
> Revisor where to look, and have it copy all these files automatically.
>  He's also given a package full of files that he could drop into a
> private repo if he ever finds the time to set one up.
> 
> Scenario 2
> Kim is a computer science student.  She's been given an assignment
> that involves a complicated build and runtime environment.  In her
> proprietary-software centric school, ensuring that her code will
> compile and run cleanly when she submits it for a grade is a huge
> chore.  She would rather give the professors a Live CD saying 'run
> this', that drops them into a stripped down Gnome environment, with a
> terminal, and all her programs sitting on the desktop.  She gets an A,
> and her professor starts considering incorporating Linux into the
> curriculum for its ease of use.
> 
> Scenario 3
> Jim is a technician for Megacorp and is configuring a bunch of
> machines.  He knows how to make RPMs, but it is a lengthy process
> since he is not familiar with it.  He has a set of files he wants to
> include with every system he configures, that include corporate
> branding on every spot available.  The list of files is large, but the
> only thing he needs to do is copy them to specific places.  He would
> rather just give  a command a list of files that spits out a spec file
> and a tarball that he can add to an automated system.  The packages
> will then be deployed the next time he schedules an update.
> 
> 
> Right now, I have two working scripts.  There are a couple of minor
> bugs, and I have some SELinux questions.  Is this something people
> want to see in Fedora 9?  Would it be useful to the revisor/respin
> crowd?  Or am I completely off the mark here, and someone has a better
> idea?
> 
> Cheers,
> Yaakov
> 
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