From alexl at redhat.com Fri Apr 1 09:02:52 2005 From: alexl at redhat.com (Alexander Larsson) Date: Fri, 01 Apr 2005 11:02:52 +0200 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Fedora Live CD project "kick off" In-Reply-To: <200503311454.27333.sgrubb@redhat.com> References: <200503311454.27333.sgrubb@redhat.com> Message-ID: <1112346172.6641.36.camel@greebo> On Thu, 2005-03-31 at 14:54 -0500, Steve Grubb wrote: > I have recently integrated the scripts with the Rookery Build system so that > people can create Live CD's easily. The Live CD kit can be found at: > www.web-insights.net/rookery. You can use pre-built rpms such as Fedora's. I > am actively working on the scripts to make them better. If no one else has > Live CD creation scripts available, I'd like to offer this as a starting > point. A while ago I worked on the stateless linux project, and as part of this i wrote the mklivecd script in the readonly-root package. Its pretty simple as live cds go, it just creates a bootable zisofs image from a stateless linux root. The actual work to make a livecd work was part of the standard stateless linux work were everything runs with a readonly filesystem. I don't currently work on this anymore, but I'll hang around here and see if there is anything i can do to help out. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Alexander Larsson Red Hat, Inc alexl at redhat.com alla at lysator.liu.se He's a world-famous flyboy astronaut who hides his scarred face behind a mask. She's a mentally unstable wisecracking detective who dreams of becoming Elvis. They fight crime! From swhiteho at redhat.com Fri Apr 1 09:02:40 2005 From: swhiteho at redhat.com (Steven Whitehouse) Date: Fri, 01 Apr 2005 10:02:40 +0100 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Fedora Live CD project "kick off" In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1112346160.31470.606.camel@quoit> Hi, On Thu, 2005-03-31 at 14:25 -0500, Greg DeKoenigsberg wrote: > > So. To get the ball rolling, how about some introductions? I'll start. > I'm in the slightly strange position of being a Red Hat contractor who does various odd jobs (mostly relating to GFS, since I worked for Sistina in the past). When I'm not working for Red Hat, my main job is running ChyGwyn, better known as The Linux Emporium, a well known supplier of all things Linux related but most famous for supplying various distributions on cheap CDs. As such I'm always keen to see another distribution made available for me to duplicate and sell :-) Also, this year the UKUUG Linux conference comes to Swansea, UK which is where I'm based. I'm considering doing a tutorial on Linux networking and a Live CD would provide a very useful basis for this I think. I wrote most of the kernel side of the Linux DECnet networking code, so this remains an area of interest for me. My main constraint is the time I can spend on this project bearing in mind my other commitments. I am a python programmer (amoung other things) and its the one scripting language which has tempted me away from C and kernel development, but I'm still not so keen on the internals of anaconda :-) I don't think it would be of great help for a Live CD anyway and the initscripts are an area I think would need a number of changes compared with the "standard" Fedora distribution. One area I'm concerned about is the speed of booting and it would be interesting to see what might be done to address that. Steve. From byte at aeon.com.my Mon Apr 4 03:32:34 2005 From: byte at aeon.com.my (Colin Charles) Date: Mon, 04 Apr 2005 13:32:34 +1000 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Fedora Live CD project "kick off" In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1112585554.8582.643.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> On Thu, 2005-03-31 at 14:25 -0500, Greg DeKoenigsberg wrote: > So. To get the ball rolling, how about some introductions? I'll > start. I'm Colin Charles, general all-rounder on The Fedora Project. My interst in making a LiveCD is so that Fedora can get spread far and wide, and that I can also use it for the United Nations LiveCD that I was doing (still am doing). It is currently Ubuntu based because Casper actually "just works" I didn't want it Stateless based because of the fact that during the pre-FUDCon discussions and just hanging out with most of the @redhat's, they figure Stateless is not really a viable option. Xen/anaconda might be what is its replacement, just minus LiveCDs So, lets figure it out and get working on it. I've also been talking to Steve Grubb about the Rookery system which I've been meaning to fiddle with Regards -- Colin Charles, byte at aeon.com.my http://www.bytebot.net/ "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." -- Mohandas Gandhi From n.richter at qut.edu.au Tue Apr 5 13:46:50 2005 From: n.richter at qut.edu.au (Neville Richter) Date: Tue, 05 Apr 2005 23:46:50 +1000 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Fedora Live CD project "kick off" In-Reply-To: <1112585554.8582.643.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> References: <1112585554.8582.643.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> Message-ID: <425296CA.70705@qut.edu.au> Colin Charles wrote: >On Thu, 2005-03-31 at 14:25 -0500, Greg DeKoenigsberg wrote: > > >>So. To get the ball rolling, how about some introductions? I'll >>start. >> >> > >I'm Colin Charles, general all-rounder on The Fedora Project. My interst >in making a LiveCD is so that Fedora can get spread far and wide, and >that I can also use it for the United Nations LiveCD that I was doing >(still am doing). It is currently Ubuntu based because Casper actually >"just works" > >I didn't want it Stateless based because of the fact that during the >pre-FUDCon discussions and just hanging out with most of the @redhat's, >they figure Stateless is not really a viable option. Xen/anaconda might >be what is its replacement, just minus LiveCDs > >So, lets figure it out and get working on it. I've also been talking to >Steve Grubb about the Rookery system which I've been meaning to fiddle >with > >Regards > > Hi, Neville here, I have some ideas that I would like to see implemented by the Fedora Live CD project. I think you should aim to be at the top of the pack so the Fedora Core live CD should really be a step up from what is currently available. The various Knoppix boot CDs are at the cutting edge and you need to release something far superior to draw people to your products. As a boot CD builder I have used cloop and squashfs and I would hope that someone would add squashfs to the standard Fedora Core kernel distribution before starting this project. This will allow for the Fedora livecd to have a lot more files. The ADIOS boot CD, which I have been developing is currently based on Fedora Core 3. ADIOS uses the busybox/uclibc/isolinux startup which then performs a pivot_root to the real filesystem this works fine but I had to modify the filesystem so that /usr was read-only squashfs and the read-write files are all moved into /var which is a RAM drive (or disk partition). The Xendemo boot CD is a better model, it uses copy-on-write filesystems and I think that including Xen would also make the Fedora livecd very attractive to Educational Institutions, which want to teach networking and security. I would like to see most of the services that are needed to complete the RedHat Certified Engineer (RHCE) course on the Fedora livecd. And maybe some of the promotional material associated with obtaining the RHCE. Lastly why not a Fedora live DVD which would support as many languages as possible on startup, as there seems to be a huge non-English following of RedHat Fedora Core. Using squashfs you will have plenty of room to have both the RPMS and the SRPMS on the DVD as well. ---- Myself and Mark Huth are about to start rebuilding the busbox/uclibc software in preparation to building the the next ADIOS boot CD based on Fedora Core 4. We have plans to do most of the above but would be happy for RedHat to do the work, although we could also help with ideas and coding. For comparison you can download the current ADIOS boot CD version 4.11 from http://dc.qut.edu.au/remote/adios4 username: adios password: 12qwaszx Start with run option 1 first, you also need the username adios and password 12qwaszx to login. The FAQ is on the CD but if you don't get that far go to http://dc.qut.edu.au/adios -- regards Neville ----------------------------------------------------------------------- email: n.richter at qut.edu.au room: S745 Gardens Point phone: +61 07 3864 1928 fax: +61 07 3221 2384 web: http://dc.qut.edu.au/sedc/staff/neville_richter.html Neville Richter, Senior Lecturer School of Software Engineering & Data Communications Faculty of Information Technology Queensland University of Technology Box 2434 Brisbane 4001 AUSTRALIA From sgrubb at redhat.com Tue Apr 5 13:00:32 2005 From: sgrubb at redhat.com (Steve Grubb) Date: Tue, 5 Apr 2005 09:00:32 -0400 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Fedora Live CD project "kick off" In-Reply-To: <425296CA.70705@qut.edu.au> References: <1112585554.8582.643.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <425296CA.70705@qut.edu.au> Message-ID: <200504050900.32373.sgrubb@redhat.com> On Tuesday 05 April 2005 09:46, Neville Richter wrote: > As a boot CD builder I have used cloop and squashfs and I would hope > that someone would add squashfs to the standard Fedora Core kernel > distribution before starting this project. ?This will allow for the > Fedora livecd to have a lot more files. You don't have to do it like this. You can use mkzftree during the last stages to create compressed file system that the kernel knows how to read. Reading from the squashfs page, they use gzip so isn't it the same? I looked at cloop and decided there was no gain from mkzftree. >?ADIOS uses the busybox/uclibc/isolinux startup which > then performs a pivot_root to the real filesystem this works fine but I > had to modify the filesystem so that /usr was read-only squashfs and the > read-write files are all moved into /var which is a RAM drive (or disk > partition). This is more or less normal for livecds. > The Xendemo boot CD is a better model, it uses copy-on-write filesystems > and I think that including Xen would also make the Fedora livecd very > attractive to Educational Institutions, which want to teach networking > and security. Right. This is an improvement in terms of memory space. I also include /etc in tmpfs because networking stuff wants to write there. -Steve Grubb From netdxr at gmail.com Wed Apr 6 00:42:50 2005 From: netdxr at gmail.com (Tom Lisjac) Date: Tue, 5 Apr 2005 18:42:50 -0600 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Fedora Live CD project "kick off" In-Reply-To: <200504050900.32373.sgrubb@redhat.com> References: <1112585554.8582.643.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <425296CA.70705@qut.edu.au> <200504050900.32373.sgrubb@redhat.com> Message-ID: <863ff4520504051742245309ed@mail.gmail.com> On Apr 5, 2005 7:00 AM, Steve Grubb wrote: > On Tuesday 05 April 2005 09:46, Neville Richter wrote: > > As a boot CD builder I have used cloop and squashfs and I would hope > > that someone would add squashfs to the standard Fedora Core kernel > > distribution before starting this project. > You don't have to do it like this. You can use mkzftree during the last stages > to create compressed file system that the kernel knows how to read. That's an interesting approach that I thought about using on another project. As a comparison I built the same CD using both zisofs and cloop. IIRC, cloop ended up providing 10 to 15 percent better compression. Unfortunately cloop has it's problems too. One of them has been keeping the Debian oriented sources compiling against the Fedora kernels. I like Neville's suggestion of having squashfs support in the kernel. This would provide both the convenience of zisofs and the compression advantages of cloop. -Tom From n.richter at qut.edu.au Wed Apr 6 02:40:03 2005 From: n.richter at qut.edu.au (neville) Date: Wed, 06 Apr 2005 12:40:03 +1000 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Fedora Live CD project "kick off" In-Reply-To: <863ff4520504051742245309ed@mail.gmail.com> References: <1112585554.8582.643.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <425296CA.70705@qut.edu.au> <200504050900.32373.sgrubb@redhat.com> <863ff4520504051742245309ed@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <42534C03.7010905@qut.edu.au> Tom Lisjac wrote: >On Apr 5, 2005 7:00 AM, Steve Grubb wrote: > > >>On Tuesday 05 April 2005 09:46, Neville Richter wrote: >> >> >>>As a boot CD builder I have used cloop and squashfs and I would hope >>>that someone would add squashfs to the standard Fedora Core kernel >>>distribution before starting this project. >>> >>> > > > >>You don't have to do it like this. You can use mkzftree during the last stages >>to create compressed file system that the kernel knows how to read. >> >> > >That's an interesting approach that I thought about using on another >project. As a comparison I built the same CD using both zisofs and >cloop. IIRC, cloop ended up providing 10 to 15 percent better >compression. Unfortunately cloop has it's problems too. One of them >has been keeping the Debian oriented sources compiling against the >Fedora kernels. > >I like Neville's suggestion of having squashfs support in the kernel. >This would provide both the convenience of zisofs and the compression >advantages of cloop. > >-Tom > >-- >Fedora-livecd-list mailing list >Fedora-livecd-list at redhat.com >https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-livecd-list > > Hello again, I would hope that the COW filesystem technology used on the Xendemo CD becomes the standard way of starting the Fedora live-CD. My current problem which will also be a problem for the Fedora live-CD is that Schools and Universities are all moving towards wireless laboratories. The problem is that wireless vendors seem to cater primarily for MS Windows and you then have to use software that runs these DLLs. Also the licence agreements for the wireless software do not extend to distributing vendor software with boot CD. -- regards Neville ----------------------------------------------------------------------- email: n.richter at qut.edu.au room: S745 Gardens Point phone: +61 7 3864 1928 fax: +61 7 3221 2384 web: http://dc.qut.edu.au/sedc/staff/neville_richter.html Neville Richter, Senior Lecturer School of Software Engineering & Data Communications Faculty of Information Technology Queensland University of Technology Box 2434 Brisbane 4001 AUSTRALIA From alexl at redhat.com Wed Apr 6 08:04:05 2005 From: alexl at redhat.com (Alexander Larsson) Date: Wed, 06 Apr 2005 10:04:05 +0200 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Fedora Live CD project "kick off" In-Reply-To: <863ff4520504051742245309ed@mail.gmail.com> References: <1112585554.8582.643.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <425296CA.70705@qut.edu.au> <200504050900.32373.sgrubb@redhat.com> <863ff4520504051742245309ed@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1112774645.8904.97.camel@greebo> On Tue, 2005-04-05 at 18:42 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > On Apr 5, 2005 7:00 AM, Steve Grubb wrote: > > On Tuesday 05 April 2005 09:46, Neville Richter wrote: > > > As a boot CD builder I have used cloop and squashfs and I would hope > > > that someone would add squashfs to the standard Fedora Core kernel > > > distribution before starting this project. > > > You don't have to do it like this. You can use mkzftree during the last stages > > to create compressed file system that the kernel knows how to read. > > That's an interesting approach that I thought about using on another > project. As a comparison I built the same CD using both zisofs and > cloop. IIRC, cloop ended up providing 10 to 15 percent better > compression. Unfortunately cloop has it's problems too. One of them > has been keeping the Debian oriented sources compiling against the > Fedora kernels. > > I like Neville's suggestion of having squashfs support in the kernel. > This would provide both the convenience of zisofs and the compression > advantages of cloop. The best way to get this done is to try to get squashfs into the upstream kernel. There has been some motion on this recently: http://www.ussg.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0503.1/2040.html =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Alexander Larsson Red Hat, Inc alexl at redhat.com alla at lysator.liu.se He's an unconventional Catholic astronaut possessed of the uncanny powers of an insect. She's a man-hating communist femme fatale with a birthmark shaped like Liberty's torch. They fight crime! From netdxr at gmail.com Sun Apr 10 17:44:46 2005 From: netdxr at gmail.com (Tom Lisjac) Date: Sun, 10 Apr 2005 11:44:46 -0600 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... Message-ID: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> At this point, it might be helpful to try and define the goals for the project a little more clearly... for example, what are we planning to deliver? Is the goal to create a generic build system for generating customized Fedora bootable CD's... or are we trying to assemble a "one size fits all" release with a flexible set of startup options? How about a project website, cvs and download mirrors? Is this a good candidate for SourceForge or is Red Hat thinking about providing this support? Last but not least, leadership. Is there a "benevolent dictator" at this point? :) -Tom From byte at aeon.com.my Sun Apr 10 21:43:56 2005 From: byte at aeon.com.my (Colin Charles) Date: Mon, 11 Apr 2005 07:43:56 +1000 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> On Sun, 2005-04-10 at 11:44 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > At this point, it might be helpful to try and define the goals for the > project a little more clearly... for example, what are we planning to > deliver? Is the goal to create a generic build system for generating > customized Fedora bootable CD's... or are we trying to assemble a "one > size fits all" release with a flexible set of startup options? Seen casper? I think a generic "build system" for generating customized Fedora LiveCDs is what the aim of this project is. There is never going to be a "one size fits all"; thats not The Fedora Core goals either ;-) > How about a project website, cvs and download mirrors? Is this a good > candidate for SourceForge or is Red Hat thinking about providing this > support? I think all this can happen in due time. The website, is something that can happen sooner than later (I don't mind being on task for that), cvs/download mirrors, well, more work needs to be done first AFAIK, The Fedora Project will be providing support to this and it doesn't need to get hosted at SourceForge > Last but not least, leadership. Is there a "benevolent dictator" at > this point? :) No, aptly described, its anyone "that get's shit done"; while waiting, Greg is probably the default man for the job :) -- Colin Charles, byte at aeon.com.my http://www.bytebot.net/ "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." -- Mohandas Gandhi From hp at redhat.com Mon Apr 11 04:12:27 2005 From: hp at redhat.com (Havoc Pennington) Date: Mon, 11 Apr 2005 00:12:27 -0400 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1113192747.3984.106.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Sun, 2005-04-10 at 11:44 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > At this point, it might be helpful to try and define the goals for the > project a little more clearly... for example, what are we planning to > deliver? Is the goal to create a generic build system for generating > customized Fedora bootable CD's... or are we trying to assemble a "one > size fits all" release with a flexible set of startup options? To me the most important thing is to be sure a live CD can be cut from rawhide, or any test release or final release (modulo bugs of course). In other words the really important goal is to have a "convert this Fedora to Live CD" system rather than a one-off fork at a given point in time. I personally think that for a variety of reasons all packages should be changed to work fine by default on a read-only filesystem, and detection of hardware should all be dynamic, so essentially the live CD changes should all be able to go "upstream" (into the standard packages) eventually. But doing that in the first cut probably isn't realistic. > Last but not least, leadership. Is there a "benevolent dictator" at > this point? :) Whoever does the work ;-) Havoc From netdxr at gmail.com Mon Apr 11 08:19:15 2005 From: netdxr at gmail.com (Tom Lisjac) Date: Mon, 11 Apr 2005 02:19:15 -0600 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> Message-ID: <863ff4520504110119327a465b@mail.gmail.com> On 4/10/05, Colin Charles wrote: > On Sun, 2005-04-10 at 11:44 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > > How about a project website, cvs and download mirrors? > > ... cvs/download mirrors, well, more work needs to be done first >From my experience, the work tends to get done when there's a place for posting and sharing results. Since some of the largest components of this project currently exist, the release early, release often stuff could potentially start as soon as some basic architectural decisions are made. > > Last but not least, leadership. Is there a "benevolent dictator" at > > this point? :) > > No, aptly described, its anyone "that get's shit done"; That model seems to work pretty well when a project starts with a single idea or a blank page... but that's not the case here. Neville has a complete (and excellent!) FC3 based CD and build system available right now. Steve has offered his Rookery Build system that looks very promising. I've also developed an architecture called EpikBuilder for creatiing CD, UML or disk images from rpm repositories: http://theseus.sourceforge.net/index.php?wiki=EpikBuilder ... and I'll bet there are probably others on this list who have some great code and ideas to offer. The other GPL'ed live CD implementations are also available to borrow ideas and code from: http://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?resource=cd So IMHO, most of the hard work has already been done. What's needed now is a unifying spec or wishlist that can be used to pick, choose and merge the best parts of all this good stuff into a Fedora specific build system. I'd be willing to draft a strawman spec for you all to laugh at if one doesn't already exist. :) -Tom From alexl at redhat.com Tue Apr 12 07:33:24 2005 From: alexl at redhat.com (Alexander Larsson) Date: Tue, 12 Apr 2005 09:33:24 +0200 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <863ff4520504110119327a465b@mail.gmail.com> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <863ff4520504110119327a465b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1113291205.6433.72.camel@greebo> On Mon, 2005-04-11 at 02:19 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > > So IMHO, most of the hard work has already been done. What's needed > now is a unifying spec or wishlist that can be used to pick, choose > and merge the best parts of all this good stuff into a Fedora specific > build system. I'd be willing to draft a strawman spec for you all to > laugh at if one doesn't already exist. :) It might be interesting if the people who have done live cds could list what changes they have done to make them work. Then we can take these changes and try to get them all into the distro. When everything needed for the live-cd is in the core distro, all that is required is a fedora-livecd-creator package with some script to create a live cd from a fedora core tree. Some changes needed: * squashfs This would be nice, zisofs is included in fc and works, but squashfs would perform better. * init script changes There are likely a few init script changes needed. The stateless linux changes added some stuff to /etc/rc.sysinit that could be used. (The /etc/sysconfig/readonly-root stuff). Maybe some more changes are needed, we should then try to get them in. * Additional packages Does the live cd need some package not currently in the distro. If so, we should try to get it in. (I guess this means both packages needed on the live-cd and packages needed to build it.) What other changes do we need in order to make a script that can generate a live-cd from a random rawhide snapshot? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Alexander Larsson Red Hat, Inc alexl at redhat.com alla at lysator.liu.se He's an unconventional native American cat burglar with a passion for fast cars. She's a chain-smoking kleptomaniac safe cracker from aristocratic European stock. They fight crime! From n.richter at qut.edu.au Wed Apr 13 00:02:19 2005 From: n.richter at qut.edu.au (neville) Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 10:02:19 +1000 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <1113291205.6433.72.camel@greebo> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <863ff4520504110119327a465b@mail.gmail.com> <1113291205.6433.72.camel@greebo> Message-ID: <425C618B.2060204@qut.edu.au> Alexander Larsson wrote: >On Mon, 2005-04-11 at 02:19 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > > >>So IMHO, most of the hard work has already been done. What's needed >>now is a unifying spec or wishlist that can be used to pick, choose >>and merge the best parts of all this good stuff into a Fedora specific >>build system. I'd be willing to draft a strawman spec for you all to >>laugh at if one doesn't already exist. :) >> >> > >It might be interesting if the people who have done live cds could list >what changes they have done to make them work. Then we can take these >changes and try to get them all into the distro. When everything needed >for the live-cd is in the core distro, all that is required is a >fedora-livecd-creator package with some script to create a live cd from >a fedora core tree. > >Some changes needed: > >* squashfs >This would be nice, zisofs is included in fc and works, but squashfs >would perform better. > >* init script changes >There are likely a few init script changes needed. The stateless linux >changes added some stuff to /etc/rc.sysinit that could be used. >(The /etc/sysconfig/readonly-root stuff). Maybe some more changes are >needed, we should then try to get them in. > >* Additional packages >Does the live cd need some package not currently in the distro. If so, >we should try to get it in. (I guess this means both packages needed on >the live-cd and packages needed to build it.) > >What other changes do we need in order to make a script that can >generate a live-cd from a random rawhide snapshot? > >=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= > Alexander Larsson Red Hat, Inc > alexl at redhat.com alla at lysator.liu.se >He's an unconventional native American cat burglar with a passion for fast >cars. She's a chain-smoking kleptomaniac safe cracker from aristocratic >European stock. They fight crime! > >-- >Fedora-livecd-list mailing list >Fedora-livecd-list at redhat.com >https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-livecd-list > > Hello all, another two cents worth, I think it would be wise to choose at least one compression technology and also use copy-on-write filesystems as this will allow maximum useability and least change to the installed distribution. It would also be nice if the distro image generated for the CD was part of the Fedora installation processes, the workstation image is not suitable. A custom distro image should developed which includes some of the workstation and server set of RPMs and could be called the fedora demo or live cd image. The Xendemo CD is a good starting point as this would the CD start multiple copies of Linux as well. The startup scripts are easy to understand and writing a new set of scripts for the Fedora livecd will not take long. -- regards Neville ----------------------------------------------------------------------- email: n.richter at qut.edu.au room: S745 Gardens Point phone: +61 7 3864 1928 fax: +61 7 3221 2384 web: http://dc.qut.edu.au/sedc/staff/neville_richter.html Neville Richter, Senior Lecturer School of Software Engineering & Data Communications Faculty of Information Technology Queensland University of Technology Box 2434 Brisbane 4001 AUSTRALIA From alexl at redhat.com Wed Apr 13 07:40:40 2005 From: alexl at redhat.com (Alexander Larsson) Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 09:40:40 +0200 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <425C618B.2060204@qut.edu.au> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <863ff4520504110119327a465b@mail.gmail.com> <1113291205.6433.72.camel@greebo> <425C618B.2060204@qut.edu.au> Message-ID: <1113378041.6433.93.camel@greebo> On Wed, 2005-04-13 at 10:02 +1000, neville wrote: > Hello all, another two cents worth, > > I think it would be wise to choose at least one compression technology > and also use copy-on-write filesystems as this will allow maximum > useability and least change to the installed distribution. > > It would also be nice if the distro image generated for the CD was part > of the Fedora installation processes, the workstation image is not > suitable. A custom distro image should developed which includes some of > the workstation and server set of RPMs and could be called the fedora > demo or live cd image. > > The Xendemo CD is a good starting point as this would the CD start > multiple copies of Linux as well. The startup scripts are easy to > understand and writing a new set of scripts for the Fedora livecd will > not take long. This is an interesting idea. I know anaconda can run in a test mode where it just installs into a chroot. You could use that to have a super-easy graphical way to select what you want on your live cd. Like a graphical installer that installs onto a live-cd. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Alexander Larsson Red Hat, Inc alexl at redhat.com alla at lysator.liu.se He's a gun-slinging small-town werewolf on the hunt for the last specimen of a great and near-mythical creature. She's a sarcastic winged widow fleeing from a Satanic cult. They fight crime! From alexl at redhat.com Fri Apr 15 18:08:32 2005 From: alexl at redhat.com (Alexander Larsson) Date: Fri, 15 Apr 2005 20:08:32 +0200 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <863ff452050414233774b31cf1@mail.gmail.com> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <863ff4520504110119327a465b@mail.gmail.com> <1113291205.6433.72.camel@greebo> <863ff452050414233774b31cf1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1113588512.6433.134.camel@greebo> On Fri, 2005-04-15 at 00:37 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > On 4/12/05, Alexander Larsson wrote: > > > > It might be interesting if the people who have done live cds could list > > what changes they have done to make them work. Then we can take these > > changes and try to get them all into the distro. > > > > What other changes do we need in order to make a script that can > > generate a live-cd from a random rawhide snapshot? > > One essential component for a live CD is automatic hardware > configuration. Has anyone developed a comprehensive package to handle > this? > > For EpikBuilder, I adapted Klaus Knopper's scripts, ddcxinfo and > hwsetup utilities. I also used his version of kudzu hwdata because > Knoppix supported both the XFree 3.3.6 and 4.x drivers at that time. > This provided compatibility with older graphics cards that were > dropped in RH9. The whole thing worked well but was difficult to > maintain since any updates Klaus made to the Debian scripts had to be > manually reviewed and applied to my RH version. > > Of possible interest is a project that Ren? Rh?aume started in July of > 2003 to maintain the Knoppix auto-detection system for Red Hat and > Mandrake: > > http://freshmeat.net/projects/knx-autoconfig-ports/ > > His last update for RH was a year ago... but it might be worth looking > at if nobody else has a packaged solution. For the stateless linux livecd i just used kudzu (kudzu -q I think). I see no reason why the live-cd hardware detection should be any different from the automatic detection of another (non-cd) fedora core installation. Having a special hardware detection system for the live-cd just means double the maintenance burden, because the non-live-cd fedora core should also automatically detect as much hardware as possible. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Alexander Larsson Red Hat, Inc alexl at redhat.com alla at lysator.liu.se He's a benighted bohemian grifter moving from town to town, helping folk in trouble. She's a cosmopolitan belly-dancing opera singer with a flame-thrower. They fight crime! From netdxr at gmail.com Sat Apr 16 06:02:48 2005 From: netdxr at gmail.com (Tom Lisjac) Date: Sat, 16 Apr 2005 00:02:48 -0600 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <1113588512.6433.134.camel@greebo> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <863ff4520504110119327a465b@mail.gmail.com> <1113291205.6433.72.camel@greebo> <863ff452050414233774b31cf1@mail.gmail.com> <1113588512.6433.134.camel@greebo> Message-ID: <863ff4520504152302785cf8bf@mail.gmail.com> On 4/15/05, Alexander Larsson wrote: > On Fri, 2005-04-15 at 00:37 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > > > > One essential component for a live CD is automatic hardware > > configuration. Has anyone developed a comprehensive package to handle > > this? > > > > For EpikBuilder, I adapted Klaus Knopper's scripts > > For the stateless linux livecd i just used kudzu (kudzu -q I think). I > see no reason why the live-cd hardware detection should be any different > from the automatic detection of another (non-cd) fedora core > installation. I see two different requirements here with error free autodetection being much more critical for the bootable CD. If a hard disk install doesn't pick something up correctly, it can be interactively fixed and life goes on. With a failed CD boot, the user is out of business on that machine. If the current Knoppix autodetection works a lot better on a wider variety of hardware, then migrating the improvements into the Fedora implementation should be considered... otherwise we'll be building a nice new system that doesn't work as well as the currently available Knoppix derivatives. The question is: is Knoppix actually better... and if so, by how much? Has anyone had a chance to actually do some comparisons on variety of hardware? -Tom From hp at redhat.com Sat Apr 16 13:14:31 2005 From: hp at redhat.com (Havoc Pennington) Date: Sat, 16 Apr 2005 09:14:31 -0400 Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Project goals and infrastructure... In-Reply-To: <863ff4520504152302785cf8bf@mail.gmail.com> References: <863ff45205041010447a29df7@mail.gmail.com> <1113169437.4917.164.camel@arena.soho.bytebot.net> <863ff4520504110119327a465b@mail.gmail.com> <1113291205.6433.72.camel@greebo> <863ff452050414233774b31cf1@mail.gmail.com> <1113588512.6433.134.camel@greebo> <863ff4520504152302785cf8bf@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1113657271.31154.13.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Sat, 2005-04-16 at 00:02 -0600, Tom Lisjac wrote: > I see two different requirements here with error free autodetection > being much more critical for the bootable CD. If a hard disk install > doesn't pick something up correctly, it can be interactively fixed and > life goes on. With a failed CD boot, the user is out of business on > that machine. What you're saying is true for the average Linux enthusiast, but for a broader audience it's really the same for CD and hard drive. Either the hardware works or not, if not they can't do anything to fix it. If the Knoppix setup is better, why wouldn't we use it in the stock hard drive install? Havoc