I have gone all the way through this, #21584. What a tremendous resource.
Linux from Scratch
51–60 of 164 posts
Re: Linux from Scratch
#52Related: https://buildroot.org/
This basically allows you to make an OS that’s effectively a single application, right?
It will spit out a rootfs, or even a block image for a disk, which might make it _look_ like a single application. You will probably update your system by flashing that entire rootfs/image to your target device as if it was one application.
However, it is still Linux under the hood, so there is a kernel + whatever other applications you want running on there, all as separate processes.
You may also be thinking of busybox, which bakes an implementation of most of gnu coreutils into one file to save space. Many symlinks are often created to that sesame file, and when invoked the process can check what name it was invoked with to determine its behavior.
Re: Linux from Scratch
#53I really like the idea, really tried following the process several times. But each time it just turned into a copy-incomprehensible-commands-into-the-terminal exercise at some point, and I lost motivation. Did anyone experience the same?
It feels to me like you have approached this with a wrong mindset, like you focused too much on finishing the whole process.
With LFS you must put substantial amount of value into the journey itself. It's not about copy-pasting commands, it's about trying to actually understand what and, more importantly, why your are doing each step. My recollection is that LFS docs were good in helping with that. Or maybe it was coming from reading docs of the actual components as I went along? I don't remember, probably some mix of both.
I did set LFS system up once, I think it was 2001 or 2002. I specifically remember that it took many days (due to compilation times), was very interesting, and at the end I was putting final touches to my mutt and slrn configs. With a vague memory that I had some TODO for mutt that I didn't finish, still lingering in my mind, apparently! :)
All in all, great and satisfying learning experience.
I would not use such system as a daily driver, though. I think it's good only if you have time and want to learn. I'm curious if someone here is brave enough to have different approach.
Re: Linux from Scratch
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
This basically allows you to make an OS that’s effectively a single application, right?
No. It creates a root filesystem that follows your choices of what should be included and tries to be as minimal and small as possible by default. Very suitable for embedded devices and lightweight virtual machines. You can have it build a kernel as well. I use the ability to create a cpio archive for an initramfs on the Linux boxes.
I reckon you are already aware of this if you’re using it to generate an initramfs, but for those reading along, you can also use it as a docker image
Re: Linux from Scratch
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
it's better if you try to work out what the commands and options are doing. I did this a long time ago, and 15 years later, I realise that it gave me a big advantage over my colleagues who haven't done something like that. "missing xxxxx.so" - they don't even know what that means, whereas I'm already trying to find the so and putting it in ld_library_path to see if it helps.
In my experience, whenever a .so was missing it was either due to a missing package on the os package manager level, or a completely broken gcc or llvm setup. I never needed to explicitly add single .so files to a path. (Besides the use case where I specifically wanted to override a malloc implementation.) In which cases did/do you need to add individual files?
In my case, when I was a Slackware user before Slackbuilds was created, sometimes I wanted to try out programs for which there was no package. Usually they required a .so file that was not installed and a workaround was to put it manually from a package of another distribution compiled for the same architecture. When the .so file was there, but on another path, a symbolic link was sufficient. The ldd command was a good friend.
Of course that was not the best and cleanest solution, having things outside the package management system bothered, but it was enough to experiment programs and I kept track of the changes so I could have the prior state of things. Later on, the Slackbuilds project eased the work and I contributed by writing code to automate the creation of a few packages. I learned a lot from these issues.
Re: Linux from Scratch
#56This has been around for ages. I only read the contents briefly to know what the minimum components of Linux is, that too years ago. When you install any distro (even Debian) so much gets installed which newbies wouldn't even know exists or use.
Re: Linux from Scratch
#57I really like the idea, really tried following the process several times. But each time it just turned into a copy-incomprehensible-commands-into-the-terminal exercise at some point, and I lost motivation. Did anyone experience the same?
Last time I tried (probably well over 10 years ago) I struggled more with how long stuff took to compile. The main learning I remember from it was the chroot concept, which then later helped me grasp containerization easier
Re: Linux from Scratch
#58What's the fun in this? I once looked into it briefly and it's what I guessed: mostly about building and installing the required software individually. That's boring, I guess the fun would be in building an actual usable distro "from scratch".
Learning how things work under the hood is fun, and you should do this if your job revolves around Linux.
Re: Linux from Scratch
#59This brings back memories. I tried to do his (by using this exact site!) in college. Which, for reference, was 20ish years ago.
I wasn't able to get very far, mostly because I kept running into obscure compiler and linker errors and 18 year old me wasn't clear how to fix them. Would be fun to see how much is changed since then because it does appear to be at least partially maintained.
Re: Linux from Scratch
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep, basically. At some point you realise you could do it, but do you really want to go through it all... It's a slog. It is a fun experience though!
> It's a slog. It is a fun experience though! Aren't those two opposites?
You've never experienced effort as fun?
That is... not flattering.