[Fedora-livecd-list] Kadischi & Alternative Filesystems...

[Mohammed_Khan at Dell.com]

Dan,

I have been able to get the stuff inside squashfs.img to boot as
initramfs. You need to have a good amount of ram to pull this off
though... 

For example, the livced-minimal's initramfs is  ~265 MB uncompressed!
(all this has to go into ram), so you would need 512 MB or more to boot
just a minimal... I am not sure if there is a limit to how large an
initramfs can be... I would think not... I hav been able to do this w/
360 MB initramfs files. 

Here are the steps to pull this off once you have an iso...

On Fedora 7, in Directory w/ livecd-xxxx.iso made by livecd-creator:

	mkdir -p i j k l	# make some mount points
	mount -o loop livecd-xxxx.iso i -o loop	# mount livecd to i
	cp i/isolinux/vmlinuz .	# extract the kernel
	mount -o loop -t squashfs i/squashfs.img j #mount the squashfs
img
	mount -o loop j/os.img k # mount the os.img
	cp -a k/* l	# copy out he os.img contents
	umount i j k	
	rm -rf i j k	# cleanup
	cd l			# in os.img contents (extracted)
	ln -sf /sbin/init .	# link /sbin/init . (else you can say
init=/sbin/init as a kernel param)
	find . | cpio -o -H newc --quiet | gzip -9 > ../initrd.img
# make a cpio archive
	cd ..
	rm -rf l # cleanup

The above commands get you an initrd.img (initramfs) and a vmlinuz
(kernel) derived from a livecd that can be booted w/o need to mount a
root from cd / network etc, provided that you have enough ram to support
this.

Also, if desirable, it should be easy to add a switch to livecd-creator
to just build a kernel / (big) initramfs based livecd.

Thanks,

MFK

	

-----Original Message-----
From: fedora-livecd-list-bounces at redhat.com
[mailto:fedora-livecd-list-bounces at redhat.com] On Behalf Of HAWKER, Dan
Sent: Thursday, June 07, 2007 8:54 AM
To: fedora-livecd-list at redhat.com
Subject: [Fedora-livecd-list] Kadischi & Alternative Filesystems...



Hi All,

Apologies if this is completely off track, am scouting for
information...

Is it possible to use Kadischi with other filesystems apart from isos???

Reason.
We have an automated build system that creates custom FC distros for
some embedded devices. Presently uses Anaconda, Kickstart and PXE to
boot the device and install the distro. Works well enough.

There is a requirement to have the entire mini-distro use initramfs
which it pulls off of a CF card on the device.

As we already have the Anaconda and kickstart pieces in place and
working, I wondered if I could use Kadischi to fire the entire build
into a cpio archive for placement on the CF card.

I was looking at just using yum to pump the rpms in the right place and
then finish it all off from there, but Kadischi/Anaconda provides a few
extras which would hopefully reduce the *kludginess* of it all :)

I noticed in the list archives that this has been raised before, I just
wondered if it had gotten any further than that???

TIA

Dan

--

Dan Hawker
Linux System Administrator
Astrium
http://www.astrium.eads.net

-- 

This email (including any attachments) may contain confidential and/or
privileged information or information otherwise protected from
disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify the
sender immediately, do not copy this message or any attachments and do
not use it for any purpose or disclose its content to any person, but
delete this message and any attachments from your system. Astrium
disclaims any and all liability if this email transmission was virus
corrupted, altered or falsified.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Astrium Limited, Registered in England and Wales No. 2449259 Registered
Office: Gunnels Wood Road, Stevenage, Hertfordshire, SG1 2AS, England

--
Fedora-livecd-list mailing list
Fedora-livecd-list at redhat.com
https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-livecd-list