Redhat Lite

[Jef Spaleta]

Martin Stricker wrote:

> Actually we did, several times even. The thread as more about the high
> RAM requirements of the installer, but we (well, the most work was done
> by Michael Fratoni) also slimmed down the base installation. Go to
> http://www.rule-project.org/en/index.php for more informations and
> downloads.

Sigh....totally not what i'm talking about...im talking about the
previous discussion in THIS beta phase last month...
http://www.redhat.com/archives/rhl-beta-list/2003-August/msg01207.html
http://www.redhat.com/archives/rhl-beta-list/2003-August/msg01216.html

Now rule, maybe be useful and have its place(though its place might not
be part of the core rhl distro)..I'm more interested in making the
standard eye-candy bloated installer more bone-headed modern hardware
using user friendly. The better minimal install comps file Mr. Anderson
teased this list with doesn't really do that. But, a better minimal
install option out of the box(well out of the iso) for the existing rhl
installer means possibly more space for a more bone-head user friendly
rescue environment on the first disk.  The open question is....is there
room in the comps file to reduce the number of minimal "firewall/router"
packages so that you can get a minimal install with just the first disk
and leave enough room on the first disk for a more advanced rescue mode.
This of course means moving some packages that are on the first disk now
back out to a 3rd or even a 4th iso. 

The discussion as to whether or not its worth making room for a better
rescue environment is another discussion entirely. But looking into my
crystal ball....i really don't think a 4th iso is such a big deal moving
forward since there are no box sets. What you want moving forward...if
you can get it...is  2 stage install...where the 1st stage install off
the first cd gives you just enough of a base system so you can reboot
and do  second stage install. The 2 stage install gives you access to
either a cd based install...or network install options for additional
files (think quarterly fedora iso images to be used as additional 2nd
stage install media). But forgetting the 2 stage idea for the
moment....the question is, is having a better rescue environment on the
first disk worth creating a 4th iso image for right now?

A better question for the future would be...how different would a rescue
environment be from the base environment a 2 stage installer would be
placing on the system? Is there some slick way to take an image of an
advanced rescue environment and place it on the system, so you can boot
into it and do the 2nd stage part of an install. Would such a clever
imagining of a rescue environment to disk, save you any space or
resources during the 1st stage of a 2 stage install?

There is a lot of room for rhl community to explore more advanced rescue
environments without ripping the rhl installer to pieces.  But there
isn't much room for an advanced rescue environment on the first disk
right now. Since RedHat lackeys have repeatedly stated there is a
preference  to burn development hours for featuritis that helps the
non-technical user instead of burning manhours for the %1 of the power
users...the idea of making the rescue environment more non-technical
user friendly probably holds some lackey's casual interest, maybe more
than casual interest.   

-jef

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