Tips for making WebDT Linux Distro - CUT DOWN THE FAT!
Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 8:28 pm
My tips, tricks and methods for making a distro on older hardware:
1. Disable unwanted gettys. Edit /etc/inittab and comment out the lines that say tty2 to tty6. 2 terminals are enough for a tablet PC�
2. Replace the default shell that users login with with pdksh, dash or some other shell. Dash and pdksh both are really light.
3. Remove unwanted Xorg drivers, or use Xvesa. Don't install Xorg with all the drivers! All you need is xorg-video-geode or xorg-video-vesa driver(s) for Debian distress, which saves Xorg from loading all the drivers at runtime.
4. Remove locales in /usr/share/locale and install your distro's base with the "C" locale. This just uses the compiled-in languages in apps. (localepurge is also very handy - it links in with apt-get to remove unwanted locales)
4. Remove docs (man pages?) in /usr/share/doc . You can save about ~10MB.
5. Remove aptitude in Debian, you can shed about 12MB.
6. Make a ramdisk - 32MB would be enough for userdata. You could, say, on boot, extract files from a userdata.zip file in the root partition to the ramdisk, and before WebDT shuts down, zip it up and replace it on the root partition. This would save the NAND write cycle cost.
7. Use a kernel with specific drivers for the hardware; generic kernels use way too much memory.
I use these methods to make my own distros on my old computers. I can get a base installation of Debian Lenny down to about 61MB without crippling anything.
If you'd like, I can provide you the slim version for you to base your new distros on, pop me a message and I'll send you links.
Cheers,
Coburn64
1. Disable unwanted gettys. Edit /etc/inittab and comment out the lines that say tty2 to tty6. 2 terminals are enough for a tablet PC�
2. Replace the default shell that users login with with pdksh, dash or some other shell. Dash and pdksh both are really light.
3. Remove unwanted Xorg drivers, or use Xvesa. Don't install Xorg with all the drivers! All you need is xorg-video-geode or xorg-video-vesa driver(s) for Debian distress, which saves Xorg from loading all the drivers at runtime.
4. Remove locales in /usr/share/locale and install your distro's base with the "C" locale. This just uses the compiled-in languages in apps. (localepurge is also very handy - it links in with apt-get to remove unwanted locales)
4. Remove docs (man pages?) in /usr/share/doc . You can save about ~10MB.
5. Remove aptitude in Debian, you can shed about 12MB.
6. Make a ramdisk - 32MB would be enough for userdata. You could, say, on boot, extract files from a userdata.zip file in the root partition to the ramdisk, and before WebDT shuts down, zip it up and replace it on the root partition. This would save the NAND write cycle cost.
7. Use a kernel with specific drivers for the hardware; generic kernels use way too much memory.
I use these methods to make my own distros on my old computers. I can get a base installation of Debian Lenny down to about 61MB without crippling anything.
If you'd like, I can provide you the slim version for you to base your new distros on, pop me a message and I'll send you links.
Cheers,
Coburn64
