live cd/usb projects?
in [Debian]
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From: Geoffrey Lane on 27 Nov 2009 15:30 Will try to make long story short here, I know I probably just need a larger drive to accommodate a full distro but I can't afford to right now. I have been reading but unsure of the outcome, being pulled into other directions. I also wanted to ask somethings before I start. I've been looking around to find a good desktop replacement style live cd. I know I need to just spend some more money on a larger usb thumbdrive but in this economy who can blame me for trying to get most bang for my buck? My thumbdrive is a biometric (as in fingerprint reader) 2gb drive. It partitions the "safe" data aside from public files. I want to repartition it to allow roughly 512-768mb for Linux - in this case less is better! Perhaps I'm picky and I'll be the first to admit that. My ideal is of course Debian and apt-get/deb. The Debian/xfce live cd is ok @ 400mb but I'd like to shrink it or keep it same size with my preferred apps. The remaster guide is straight forward - similar to my knoppix (except back then it was cloop). I have also looked at other live cd scripts like the one slax uses [http://www.linux-live.org/] and the ones listed in Debian repo. I'm cautious because the Debian scripts (SEEM) to be no longer maintained, and the slax scripts are designed for Slackware I wonder first how many has done what I'm looking to do? Are there some people using linux-live script to make one, or another method? Am I making things to difficult? I mean are my expectation on size too much? Are there projects like this (maintained)? My ideal cd is a "desktop replacement", I could use xfce, openbox, fluxbox, e17 - ANYTHING. I want things like internet apps (web, email, ftp, irc, im, torrent), picture and documents, archive maker/extractor and if possible multimedia (music, video). A few Linux apps like vnc, gparted or rescue apps, console would be nice but not necessary -- (why I want apt-get) Any help, comments are welcome. If there are some discussions elsewhere please let me know or if you want to chat with me off list. I'm sorry the size of the email but I wanted to "show my work", I have looked around and read some sites about this. Thanks for reading Geo -- "'Bill Gates can't guarantee Windows, so how in the HELL can you guarantee our safety!' --John Crichton (Farscape)" -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-REQUEST(a)lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster(a)lists.debian.org
From: Jiří Paleček on 27 Nov 2009 18:10 On Fri, 27 Nov 2009 21:30:02 +0100, Geoffrey Lane <freeballer(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Will try to make long story short here, I know I probably just need a > larger drive to accommodate a full distro but I can't afford to right > now. I have been reading but unsure of the outcome, being pulled into > other directions. I also wanted to ask somethings before I start. [ snip ] > I wonder first how many has done what I'm looking to do? Perhaps many. > Are there some people using linux-live script to make one, or another > method? I am using dfsbuild (not really maintained, had to patch it) to make a similar (in extent, not in purpose) live CD. It contains some 5 kernels, gcc, gdb, cmake, some -dev packages, web browser (opera), emacs. You may also have a look at the KDE Four live CD, and how they make it. > Am I making things to difficult? I mean are my expectation on size too > much? Difficult but not unattainable. But you'll probably have to use compression somehow (on the CD I use zisofs). > Are there projects like this (maintained)? My ideal cd is a "desktop > replacement", I could use xfce, openbox, fluxbox, e17 - ANYTHING. I want > things like internet apps (web, email, ftp, irc, im, torrent), picture > and documents, archive maker/extractor and if possible multimedia > (music, video). A few Linux apps like vnc, gparted or rescue apps, > console would be nice but not necessary -- (why I want apt-get) I'm not sure about the office apps, but I'm sure you can fit the rest on a CD, which is about the size you need. Regards Jiri Palecek -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-REQUEST(a)lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster(a)lists.debian.org
From: Rob Owens on 27 Nov 2009 21:40 On Fri, Nov 27, 2009 at 04:07:45PM -0400, Geoffrey Lane wrote: > Will try to make long story short here, I know I probably just need a > larger drive to accommodate a full distro but I can't afford to right > now. I have been reading but unsure of the outcome, being pulled into > other directions. I also wanted to ask somethings before I start. > > I've been looking around to find a good desktop replacement style live > cd. I know I need to just spend some more money on a larger usb > thumbdrive but in this economy who can blame me for trying to get most > bang for my buck? > > My thumbdrive is a biometric (as in fingerprint reader) 2gb drive. It > partitions the "safe" data aside from public files. I want to > repartition it to allow roughly 512-768mb for Linux - in this case less > is better! > > Perhaps I'm picky and I'll be the first to admit that. My ideal is of > course Debian and apt-get/deb. The Debian/xfce live cd is ok @ 400mb but > I'd like to shrink it or keep it same size with my preferred apps. The > remaster guide is straight forward - similar to my knoppix (except back > then it was cloop). I have also looked at other live cd scripts like > the one slax uses [http://www.linux-live.org/] and the ones listed in > Debian repo. I'm cautious because the Debian scripts (SEEM) to be no > longer maintained, and the slax scripts are designed for Slackware > > I wonder first how many has done what I'm looking to do? Are there some > people using linux-live script to make one, or another method? Am I > making things to difficult? I mean are my expectation on size too much? > Are there projects like this (maintained)? My ideal cd is a "desktop > replacement", I could use xfce, openbox, fluxbox, e17 - ANYTHING. I want > things like internet apps (web, email, ftp, irc, im, torrent), picture > and documents, archive maker/extractor and if possible multimedia > (music, video). A few Linux apps like vnc, gparted or rescue apps, > console would be nice but not necessary -- (why I want apt-get) > I currently use Debian Live. I create my own images for USB using the live-helper scripts. The latest one I made came in at just over 700MB. Here's the list of packages I specified to include (not all the dependencies are listed): lxde lxlauncher desktop-base xfonts-mathml gnome-icon-theme hicolor-icon-theme gnome-extra-icons gnome-icon-theme-blankon gnome-icon-theme-dlg-neu gnome-icon-theme-gartoon gnome-icon-theme-nuovo gnome-icon-theme-suede gnome-icon-theme-yasis wm-icons inkscape virtualbox-ose virtualbox-ose-source fluxbox fbpanel feh vorbisgain flac audacious audacity grip vlc gnome-alsamixer iceweasel swfdec-mozilla adblock-plus iceweasel-greasemonkey iceowl ekiga rsync evince openoffice.org less vim-full xterm gimp imagemagick feh openssh-client conky gkrellm gkrellm-volume ntp nmap dnsutils iftop gnomebaker cdw wine cabextract If you need pointers on how to do this yourself, let me know. If you want to give me a list of apps and have me make an image for you, I can do that as long as you have a way for me to get it to you (rsync server, ftp server, etc). Note that I use fluxbox as my window manager, but I install LXDE as well because brings in a lot of apps that I find handy. Plus I intend to experiment with using LXDE...someday. -Rob -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-REQUEST(a)lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster(a)lists.debian.org
From: T o n g on 28 Nov 2009 14:00 On Fri, 27 Nov 2009 21:34:56 -0500, Rob Owens wrote: >> . . . My ideal is of >> course Debian and apt-get/deb. The Debian/xfce live cd is ok @ 400mb >> but >> I'd like to shrink it or keep it same size with my preferred apps. . . . >> > I currently use Debian Live. I create my own images for USB using the > live-helper scripts. @Rob, I'm interested in how you do that. I found that the Debian Live/ live-helper manpage, web, & wiki are just way too unfriendly for me to digest. @Geoffrey, you can also check out http://grml.org/grml-live/, at least it is much much more well documented than Debian Live. And IMHO, easier to use too. But personally, I use http://grml.org/grml-debootstrap/, because I like simple solutions. -- Tong (remove underscore(s) to reply) http://xpt.sourceforge.net/techdocs/ http://xpt.sourceforge.net/tools/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-REQUEST(a)lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster(a)lists.debian.org
From: Rob Owens on 28 Nov 2009 21:00
On Sat, Nov 28, 2009 at 06:57:41PM +0000, T o n g wrote: > On Fri, 27 Nov 2009 21:34:56 -0500, Rob Owens wrote: > > >> . . . My ideal is of > >> course Debian and apt-get/deb. The Debian/xfce live cd is ok @ 400mb > >> but > >> I'd like to shrink it or keep it same size with my preferred > apps. . . . > >> > > I currently use Debian Live. I create my own images for USB using the > > live-helper scripts. > > @Rob, I'm interested in how you do that. I found that the Debian Live/ > live-helper manpage, web, & wiki are just way too unfriendly for me to > digest. > I also found the manual to be a little tough to follow sometimes. It's actually pretty straightforward. Here's what you have to do. All of this is done as root. 1) aptitude install live-helper 1a) optional, but recommended: Get the latest live-helper from testing. The boot menu is improved in this version. http://packages.debian.org/squeeze/all/live-helper/download 2) You will now have a directory called /usr/share/live-helper/lists. These are pre-configured package lists. You can create your own customized one and put it in this directory (I'll pretend you've called it "mylist"). 3) mkdir live1 4) cd live1 5) lh_clean 6) Do either 6a or 6b: 6a) Configure live-helper to make an image suitable for USB on an i386 type machine, using the "lxde" package list: lh_config -a i386 -b usb-hdd -p lxde 6b) Configure live-helper to make an image suitable for USB on an i386 type machine, using the "mylist" package list, which will not automatically log in a user (it will stop at GDM or whatever login manager you have installed), is persistent by default, and has a hostname of "mylivedebian": lh_config -a i386 -b usb-hdd -p mylist --bootappend-live "noautologin noxautologin persistent" --hostname mylivedebian 7) lh_build 8) wait a while 9) With your USB drive inserted and not mounted: (replace "X" with the proper letter for your device) dd if=binary.img of=/dev/sdX 10) Create a partition for persistence in the extra space on your USB drive: fdisk /dev/sdX p (print the existing partition layout) n (new partition) p (primary partition) 2 (partition #2) enter (accept default start of partition) enter (accept default to use all remaining space on the device) w (write the partition table) 11) Create a filesystem for the peristence partition: mkfs.ext2 -L live-rw /dev/sdX2 (the label of "live-rw" is important!) 12) Boot from your USB stick! 13) Add users, customize the system, install software, etc. I like to give myself sudo rights and take sudo rights away from the user "live". -Rob -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-REQUEST(a)lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster(a)lists.debian.org |