On Tue, 03 Feb 2009 16:36:39 +0000, Invisible wrote:

> Warp wrote:
> 
>>   A minimalist linux distro (without fancy graphical user interfaces,
>>   etc)
>> can be made so small that you can put it into a bootable floppy, and
>> boot from it.
> 
> Actually, I possess such a thing. ;-)
> 
> Obviously, it's a single-purpose tool though. It's never going to
> replace a normal Linux distro.
> 
> I was just wondering if anybody has ever build a distro taylored to
> removing all the parts that aren't necessary for running in a virtual
> machine (e.g., support for various hardware that a VM won't have).
> 
> I guess the ultimate would probably be to design a special VM and a
> special OS to run inside it... but by that point you've probably lost
> the advantages of having a VM.

Generally, you could do this, but hardware support (for example) is done 
using modules, so you could just remove the modules once the base OS is 
installed.

That said, I've been alpha testing SUSE Studio (http://susestudio.com), 
right now it uses a stock kernel, so the smallest system I've been able 
to build is still about 100 MB in size (74 MB is the kernel); the way it 
works, though, you could pretty easily clear out the cruft that's not 
needed for a VMware system by running your pre-built system in the test 
drive (which is a cool feature I haven't seen anywhere else - you don't 
have to download the system to test it, you test it on a server farm 
hosted by the site, with some significant networking restrictions) and 
can save off a list of changed files that can then be imported into the 
appliance.

Then you can generate a disk image, ISO for a LiveCD/LiveDVD, or a VMware 
virtual machine.

And I've just answered one of my own questions about customizing the 
system; we've got a CD image we use with a thin client for our practical 
exams that's built on DSL and is only something like a 13 MB download, 
great for remote parts of the world where bandwidth is a challenge.

I've been trying to duplicate what our ISO does with Studio, but can't 
shrink it enough.  Now I know how. ;-)

Jim

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