[svlug] Building a rootfs from scratch

[Alvin Oga]

hi ya larry

> Larry Colen wrote:
> 
> I'm trying to build a rootfs from scratch. The goal is to support the
> telnet demon which is dependent on virtual terminals and psuedo
> terminal devices. Can anybody point me to good documentation on the
> subject. 
 
lots of good documentation on how to build your own rootfs
	- google or yahoo is your friend
	( linux rootfs scratch )

if you need this type of help, are you willing to put in the time
to make it work ?? .. a couple hours to couple days or weeks or 
couple months

- when is the drop dead date ... before you cannot keep adding 
  more and more things ... it will keep growing ...

- can you, are you making a bootable standalone floppy or usb stick or 
  compact flash or bootable standalone knoppix/slackware style cd
	- slackware bootable live cd is better 

- why not use something already existing ??
	- in my case, i want something smaller and less bloatware
	and can charge for lots of customizations and user apps

	- if the user apps doesnt fit, it doesn't matter that
	everything else works

- if you "want" rootfs with telnet .... don't do that...

  they won't or shouldn't care if its ssh login instead of telnet
  other than that ssh is "better" in terms of overall security sanity

- if there is one tool to know, to build your bootable rootfs,
  what is the name of tool ... without it .. you'd be cluelessly
  as to why its not working  ( see below )

> Likewise, I'm trying to put X on the beast, and it's a lot more
> involved than just clicking "Add X" in the distribution installation
> program when you're doing yourself. Again, is there any good
> documentation on doing this from scratch?

to add X11 is trivial ... once the basic infrastructure for rootfs is done

it is non trivial if you are trying to squeeze the rootfs with X11
support into 16MB ... but it can be done

if you want kde/gnome.. you'd need say 256MB of rootfs

---- the magic tool you'd need to know/understand is ldd

---- other stuff is to know loopfs and/or ramdisk and the itty bitty
     gory details of grub or lilo or syslinux other ways to boot

---- last quarter's task was for me to buid a bootable freebsd media
    ( usb stick and CF and cd .. still on my to do list .. )

	- freebsd has other boot issues, its own bootloaders
	and more boot/install probelms on via's Luke (nano) cpus

--- collection of various howto ...

	Linux-Boot.net

c ya
alvin