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#1 2006-08-07 00:11:20

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

I have burned a dual-layer Live DVD of 7568MB taking 45minutes to burn.

It boots in 2 mins 25 secs to KDE desktop.

It includes 630MB of arch packages which include, openoffice-base, seamonkey,mozilla-firefox(inuse),opera,all of kde,cinepaint,the gimp, digikam,and many more.

I added many GB of video files and mp3 files which appear in the boot directory of the system when booted and can be utilized from that source.

This was done as an experiment to test my dual-layer DVD system Sony810A and to utilize the Larch scripts for an extended-size Live DVD.

I address this forum from the booted DVD.

Firefox took 17 secs to respond to selection the first instance, and subsequently 2 or three secs.

I have yet to try all elements including pacman for downloads.

I have my fingers crossed!!!

big_smile
Edit: This DVD was made with copy-to-ram(c2r) mode  generated by gradgrind and received by e-mail for these tests.  All activities after boot-up are in ram and the CD is ejected, free to utilize for other prurposes.


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#2 2006-08-07 23:53:46

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

Modified pacman.conf in Larch scripts to enable pacman to sync with the system.

Re-ran Larch's mkarch and mklive in 1 hour and 18 mins.  Burned in k3b a new disc of DVD+RDL of 7578MB with the pacman capability.

The disc has 630MB of arch pkgs and an added group of videos and mp3"s to total the .iso burn of 7578MB.

Loading this sized squashfs .iso taxed my 3GB memory to its limits but it finished the squashing with no problems.
The burn took 44 mins.

Boot time is about 2 mins 30 secs .

Ran :

pacman -Sy pacman and received the normal responses.  Answered yes to upgrade pacman and it created a cache file and upgraded.

Ran:

pacman -S mplayer....allowed pacman to upgrade mplayer which was completed.

The Sony 810A DVD performed correctly with Fujifilm DVD+R DL media.

I address this post with the system up in Larch with 7578MB in the DVD, some squished and some not!

Many thanks are due to gradgrind for his fine scripts! big_smile

A note of caution...gnome pkgs are not friendly to larch scripts...If attempting to run Larch, use the added packages provided and a few more but no gnome!!!

I hope that the gnome problem is solved soon for all the users of those pkgs.

Stay tuned for even more goodies!

Edit:  This detailed info was obtained while operating in copy-to-ram mode in Larch.


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#3 2006-08-08 02:06:37

grail
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Registered: 2005-02-22
Posts: 70

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

How did you get it to generate an image for a DVD instead of a CD or did you just burn the CD image to a DVD?

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#4 2006-08-08 02:35:57

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

grail;

The .iso image is generated by the larch scripts just as it sees the live_data.

To burn an image greater than 700MB (the limit for CD image size limited by the CD media) you select .....burn DVD iso image in "TOOLS" of k3b and it will burn a DVD sized .iso to the DVD media provided in the dvdrom.

There is no other special thing required.  If you desire, you can run a CD sized image into DVD media but I recommend it be DVD R/W so you can do it over as needed.  If using DVD R/W it is limited to 4X speed.

My effort was to test the limits of DVD Larch in the new media DVD+R dual-layer and load it to the limit.  Unfortunately, gnome pkgs seem to upset Larch params so I was limited to running only CD sized pkg lists and filled in the rest with video and mp3 files.
Those files were uncompressed because they aren't packages.tar.gz.

I expect a solution to the gnome problem will be found and then I can load the DVD dual-layer to full-sized compressed pkgs(if I can find enough!).  Probably can with community, current and extra and mebbe AUR, too.

DVD is required for images over 700MB and k3b knows if you try to run over 700mb in a CD media try and it also will not burn a dual-layer DVD media disc if the image is not greater than about 0.6 of the full size DVD.  You get a reject every time from k3b.

Awaiting gradgrind's return from vacation, mebbe next week to discuss how to troubleshoot the gnome problem.

Best to you with your larch efforts!


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#5 2006-08-08 02:54:37

benplaut
Member
Registered: 2006-06-13
Posts: 383

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

good god, man...

try that with unionfs... you can fit every single f*ing package in the repos 0_0

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#6 2006-08-08 03:02:32

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

benplaut;

Unionfs is a part of Larch as you probably know and it was utilized to download via pacman as I described in this thread.

I am not certain of the limits for unionfs in the larch setup since it uses tmpfs instead of ramfs which is the norm for unionfs.  If ramfs were used , it is limited to one-half of physical ram, 1.5GB  in my machine.

Thanks for the comment.

Be advised that the boot time I report is based on less than 700MB of packages and that 8GB on a dl DVD would not boot or perform as fast as a CD sized live DVD or CD.

I am hoping to get one compressed disc loaded fully and see what happens for myself!!!

Edit. This data is part of the copy-to-ram system generated by Larch using dual-layer DVD burn.


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#7 2006-08-08 17:44:36

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

Booted into LarchDVD as before.  Set up pacman cache as before.

Called :

pacman -S gnome-desktop................

Pacman downloaded all the gnome elements for the desktop, placed the pkg.tar.gz in pacman cache and the installed elements into /opt/gnome.

The download size was 16MB.

This was performed to test the pacman-gnome interface in Larch DVD.

My system is KDE desktop.


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#8 2006-08-09 15:15:49

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

The use of Larch in this manner with large memory may require a new  mangement technique for using pacman upgrade. Thusly managing the memory in use.

The pacman cache provided will grow with each download. 

It would seem prudent to break up the downloads into smaller upgrades and clear the cache between such downloads.

It is assumed (!) that the downloads applied via pacman within Larch are applied through unionfs, utilizing tmpfs in the process, and that they are R/W overlays.  I may be wrong on this point but Larch info ststes it explicitly.

Within the init script is a statement defining the size of tmpfs as a percentage of memory, physical memory.  This can be modified to increase the size of tmpfs as may be deemed necessary.

It would seem logical that a r/o package in the Larch installed system could be made R/W by upgrading it through the overlay process with pacman.

Other considerations seem likely for the Larch system.

Any suggestions are welcome.

EDIT:  This data is also copy-to -ram mode in Larch DVD.


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#9 2006-08-16 20:28:19

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

Recent elease of the latest Larch scripts by gradgrind which include copy-to-ram mode, prompted me to include edits to reflect the application of copy-to-ram which my thread has described.

I recently installed swap of 8GB in two partitions of a USB HDD for use in the larch DVD system.

With the added swap, I was able to perform operations exceeding the limits provided by the tmpfs file system(limits set up in init at 60% of memory).

I utilized ramfs to permit loading of several GB's of video and windows elements in a mounted directory as follows:

mkdir /ram1
mount -t ramfs none /ram1

I entered the video and windows data into /ram1 as well as mplayer and could click and drag the video to mplayer for execution.

My system has 3GB of memory and copy- to -ram  mode, with my 630MB of packages requires very close to 1GB of memory in boot-up , as shown in Ksysguard.  The remaining 6.5GB of material does not affect the memory use until it is mounted.  This can be accomplished by re-inserting the DVD, and mounting it.

The system can run pacman for downloads, will respond to  -Syu- and when so doing, runs the memory use up, thus, the swap may be utilized.  Pacman will load packages from the DVD(CD) with either of pacman -A  or ..pacman -U.  Packages thusly loaded are R/W and they can be packages already installed as R/O.

The DVD reaches KDE desktop in 2.5 mins, both X and KDE react very quickly in copy-to-ram mode,following the eject of the DVD.  Normal boot without the boot entries of swap and c2r takes much longer in X and KDE.

The system loads firefox to desktop in ~20 seconds on initial calls, in normal boot-up of the larch DVD.  In copy-to-ram it takes ~4 seconds for initial calls.

The system acts like it is 5 to 10 times faster in copy-to-ram mode on my machine, Athlon 1900+ with 3GB ram and 1600mhz cpu.

I have recently added a 1GB flash (SD) USB drive programmed for linux-swap so this DVD system has 9.4GB of swap memory and 3GB of physical memory.

I feel that a CD version with copy-to-ram would benefit from the use of swap memory to alleviate the need for physical memory greater than 1GB.  Less than 630MB of packages in the larch build will ensure less than 1gb. 

Following boot-up, pacman could add more packages utilizing swap via the Unionfs provided with larch.

Memory mangement would be a probable requirement in using such a system.

The CD could also load packages via pacman as well as the HDD, from the arch cache.

One last thought:  with a DVD disc it should be possible to generate multi-boot live OS'es
on a single disc...why, I don't know...........

Thanks again, gradgrind!

big_smile

Nero fiddles while rom burns!!!


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#10 2006-08-20 00:20:59

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

Continuing the experiment with Larch on a DL disc, I utilized swap and c2r to load the videos after boot-up into ram.

The technique I used was to.....mkdir /Ram1...and mount it....mount -t ramfs none /ram1.

Then re-insert the DVD Larch(which was ejected during boot) and open the PACKAGES folder.  Therin were several video files and an Mp3 file. I opened /ram1 directory.

I selected a 1GB video file and copied it to /ram1.  I monitored the transfer rate which varied from 13MB/sec to 15MB/sec while installing the video file.

I selected a second video file of 700MB and copied it at 13MB/sec.  During this transfer, the swap memory -in -use , indicated on Ksys guard kicked in at ~80% of the transfer and indicated 745MB in use.

Following the transfer, I found the system performed as normal and Ksysguard indicated ~500MB of free memory, following the umount of the DVD.

The video files thusly installed played in both Mplayer and noatun.  In fact, both could be played simultaneously but with audio for only one of the two.

I used a USB 1GB SD card, with linux-swap installed by qtparted, for this first exercise.  I removed the SD card for the next test.

I then connected the USB HDD loaded with two 4GB swap partitions and repeated the same exercise with the larch DVD in linux swap and c2r mode.  Performed the same transfer and obtained the same results with respect to swap in use.  The swap free was huge!

The tmpfs size indicated in Kdiscfree was 2.1GB with 1.4GB free at the start of this exercise and remained at those figures after the transfer.  This indicates that ramfs was performing the exercise.  It is normally limited to one/half of physical memory which in my machine is 1.5GB thus the need for swap with the video files of 1.7GB and the opened files while loading.

The transfer of video from the mounted Larch DVD was through the Sony 810A +dual-layer device which produced good transfer speed.

If additional data were to be transferred to ram , it is certain the system would not be able to function.  This was proven by trying to run another 1GB video into ram which loaded but the system could not call up internet nor console terminal.

Access to the system via the DVD/CDrom allows pacman to install from disc and will install R/W overlay via unionfs on any package already installed as well as new packages.  The dependencies would have to be installed separately in this case.  The normal pacman downloads are handled with unionfs as overlays and include the dependencies itemized by pacman.

As ststed previously, the -to-ram mode is 5 to ten times faster in system tasks than the normal larch install.
Gradgrind has released a later version of larch_all, 1.0.1, which has the c2r mode provided.  It requires two times the .iso size to load to ram and includes a swap option as well.
It's a kick to see ram to ram transfers of over 200MB/sec!!!!  Especially in a LiveDVD system boot.

"Nero fiddles while rom burns"


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#11 2006-08-24 05:41:12

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

I'm a glutton for punishment so I have continued to experiement with Larch DVD.

Instead of a "hybrid" of compressed-uncompressed I have put together a DVD with more than 1000packages.

The .iso is 3705MB and boots to 0.379GB with 2.7GB of memory free and 8GB of swap( from a HDD on USB-ide).

The loading of the packages and running of mkarch, mklive, and k3b took about nine hours due to conflicts and their resolution.

The DVD cannot be copied-to-ram due to the large size but it performs well in the normal larch boot-up.

I used 850 packages from community and approximately 230 packages from current and extra.  However, the real package count depends on the dependencies required.
I'm sure I don't need many of the packages I included but I am curious to see how the larch performs with such a load of material.
EDIT:.......>>>>>Package count in ...pacman -Q..=1625 Packages.

Initial loading of packages is slower than subsequent calls as reported before.

Kernel in use is kernel26beyond.

Just finished the task this evening and haven't timed the boot-up as yet.
EDIT:...>>>>>Boot-up time 2 mins 15secs to desktop Sound>>>>

I have a lot of strange programs on tap with this DVD so have a lot to search through!!

Burned on a DVD+RW disc in fifteen minutes @ 4x.

Should I exceed the 4GB size with additional packages, I could utilize the DVD dual-layer disc but it is not rewriteable and has a 2.5x limit.

Nothing like going "whole-hog" is there?

Those who dream of a "full-sized-system" might get something out of this.......

Must say that gradgrind has a good script for this purpose!!!  He has produced a usbstick version which is now available.  Those of you who use that mode might try it out!  He says it is pretty slick!


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#12 2006-08-24 06:04:22

Sigi
Member
From: Thurgau, Switzerland
Registered: 2005-09-22
Posts: 1,131

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

Interesting read.

lilsirecho wrote:

Must say that gradgrind has a good script for this purpose!!!

gradgrinds scripts are really nice!

lilsirecho wrote:

He has produced a usbstick version which is now available.  Those of you who use that mode might try it out!  He says it is pretty slick!

I'm playing around with this script already. Too bad I've got only a 256MB-USB-Stick available atm. My LiveUSB - if it's going to work - will be the opposite of your LiveDVD, regarding the overall size. IMO this shows how scalable larch is...


Haven't been here in a while. Still rocking Arch. smile

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#13 2006-09-05 07:29:40

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

The latest experiment involved using the PACKAGES= parameter to load a large volume of pkg.tar.gz...in fact, the entire /var/cache/pacman/pkg folder which has over 3000 pkgs in my system(pkgs and dependencies).

The addedpacks provided in the scripts was utilized using the kernel26beyond.  The config-larch had the PACKAGES=/var/cache/pacman/pkg entry.

The mkarch and mklive activities took 35 minutes to complete. 

The .iso was 6009MB but 5.4GB of that was provided in the packages folder containing the cache pkgs.tar.gz.

Therefore, the .iso size is for boot purposes ~6000-5400=~ 600MB.  The pkgs.tar.gz are not " squashed" in mklive.

Consequently, it will boot copy-to-ram providing speedier performance.

The burn on dual-layer DVD media took 35 minutes @ 2.5x speed.

The DVD is re-inserted into the DVDROM device to enable access to the "packages" folder and subsequent search and utilize packages.

Thus, the system can now be customized from the thousands of pkgs available on the dvd by using pacman: i.e.

       pacman -U (paste OPERA from cache listing).

Dependencies will be indicated when selecting a package and these must be handled(and provided in cache) along with the package selected.

This method allows pacman to be utilized in the standard form as well, downloading into the cache as normally done.  This allows the user to try out a pkg in the Live system perhaps to incorporate it into his archinstalled system.

A similar arrangement is possible with standard DVD media which limits the size to ~4+GB.

My system has 3GB of ram which permits the copy-to-ram to be utilized and has 1.6GB in use at present.

The Larch system of scripts performs well and, since I had the cache already filled, produced the DVD in one hour's time.

Other data can be included in PACKAGES= as well as the /var/cache, ....included within it, say.

The limit in my dual-layer media is about 8GB AFAICT for the additional uncompressed program material.

A small project performed on LABOR DAY, 2006!


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#14 2006-09-06 19:22:03

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

EDIT: My system boots copy-to-ram with a DVD dual-layer disc which has 700+MB of initial boot packages.  This info predicates the information following although may not negate the results.................................................................................
Tthe booted system can be modified by the use of USB flash containing .pkg.tar.gz data which can be used to customize the arch system in desired packages.

A single secure digital card can be set to ext3 in qtparted for example and the packages .tar.gz,with dependencies included, entered in folders .

Pacman is then utilized to install the desired packages.

This can be repeated at any time during the boot to change the installed packages.

This method performs the install very swiftly and can be modified to add new packages as desired.

A customizeable Live Larch DVD(orCD) changeable after booting through USB stick.

To those with USB boot option, the boot time with the stick should beat the CD/DVD boot time since it has 12MB/s speed in USB2.0.

All installed packages can be upgraded to R/W through unionfs just by calling pacman to upgrade the package.

All packages loaded via USB stick, after booting, are also R/W.

In utilizing this feature, the packages in the digital card are full package ID....pkg.tar.gz.

This information is probably not new to many users but may be of help to some in trying out the Larch scripts to produce a very versatile LIVE ARCH cd or dvd.

Enjoy!!


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#15 2006-09-12 17:22:23

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

My latest effort involves the use of the secure digital card in conjunction with a Larch dual-layer DVD of 6GB.

The secure digital card is a 1GB device and I have found that it performs nicely if it is connected without a hub to the computer 2.0 USB connector.

Technique I have implemented is as follows;

The DVD contains the packages for current,extra, and community in .pkg.tar.gz format.  I determine from pacman -Sy (pkg name) what dependencies are required and I copy the group of packages into a folder, say, /one.  This folder was installed in the digital card.

To install the selected pkgs, the technique I was advised to use via forum, involves the application of pacman as follows:

....    pacman -U /mnt/sda1_rmv/one/*.pkg.tar.gz......EDIT:.pkg.tar.gz probably not necessary with this cli......

The ID for the digital card on my system is ...../mnt/sda1_rmv.

The contents of /one is rapidly entered into the arch system.

Extension of this technique allows customized system arrangements after each boot-up in the larch Livecd/dvd.

Upgrades are also possible via pacman through the unionfs using the normal pacman calls.  The resultant install is useable for the duration of the session.

The boot-up time for my DVD in -to-ram mode is 2 mins to Kde since it does not install the entire 6GB of pkgs which remains available on the DVD disc which can be -reinserted, mounted and utilized if desired.  The minimum added packages list in Larch was utilized with a few additions.

This permits the independent install(rapidly)  of desired packages without requiring the pacman-internet downloads.

My system has 3GB of ram which permits considerable latitude in using live DVD discs with the Larch scripts.  Normal sized DVD boots will permit approximately 4GB of packages in this manner in the larch system.  The ram required for a larch install- to- ram with Kde and the added pkgs listed in larch is 1GB

System operation in ram is as quick as normal system boots and in some areas is faster.

Since my mobo does not boot from USB, I cannot report on that mode.  I expect it would be faster since the speed of USB is 6x that of the dlDVDrom(~2x).

I spent many hours in error-land until I realized the hub- connected
secure digital card would not perform correctly through the hub(powered).

I have utilized a normal boot of the DVD which performs much slower in all areas but performs correctly.  If the user employs ramfs, video can be performed in ram (with enough ram!) smoothly.

The secure digital card was formatted ext3 in qtparted very easily.

Thanks again for the support given in the forum to outline the pacman procedure which enabled the dependency packages to be included in secure digital card.

Gradgrind's Larch Kit performs every time and deserves wide useage by the arch community.
8)


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#16 2006-09-20 01:54:46

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

One factor in regard to the secure digital card is that it runs as USB 1.0 at 12MB/s maximum.

Use of a true 2.0 USB flash drive produces 20MB/sec with a mv command and ~200MB/sec with a copy command.

These are figures from my system using san disk secure digital card and a PATRIOT 2.0 USB flash drive 1GB each.

EDIT:  One additional item worth mentioning:

  After the Larch disk is read to ram, the disk is ejected.

   This allows the use of the cd/dvdrom to enter additional data.

   As reported previously, there are ~3000 or so packages included in the Larch disk I prepared.

   Thus, the following command is recognized:


         #pacman -Ud /mnt/hdc_cd/packages/mozilla-firefox-1.5.0.6-2.pkg.tar.gz

   This command collects the 53 packages for mozilla-firefox and loads, and installs the entire group in one second to root prompt.

   Thus,  listing the dependencies is not required as long as they exist in the packages folder.  The install is rapid due to the install in ram of all the elements involved.
EDIT:  Should the package being installed require dependencies not included in the cd, pacman can be utilized to retrieve such dependencies and they can be copied into the mounted cd from downloaded cache.  This will permit the install of the package with full dependencies for the session, being unavailable after reboot.

I have just performed this exercise before writing this edit while in larch copy-to-ram.

The Larch disk I booted this session with is a different DVD(~550MB .iso) than the Larch DVD (dual-layer) containing the large packages folder.  This boot-up included a change in the INIT script to increase tmpfs to 90% of memory, in my machine, that is 2.7GB.  EDIT 2.

I have installed sufficient data to cause the system to utilize over 1.5GB of swap in addition to the 3GB of physical ram, the swap being provided by a USB HDD with 8GB of linux swap partitioned.

It seems from experiments I have made, that a USB flash drive could be programmed to act as linux swap and provide read speeds of 200MB/second.  A full sized DVD video installed using swap would then have a negligible delay in reading as opposed to reading from a HDD swap file of large size.

Maybe I"m wrong?


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#17 2006-09-20 07:50:47

gradgrind
Member
From: Germany
Registered: 2005-10-06
Posts: 921

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

I believe it is not a good idea to use flash drives as swap, or anything else where many write operations are performed, as these devices only permit a rather limited number of write cycles before they 'curl up their toes and go to join the choir invisible ...'

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#18 2006-09-20 15:25:23

lilsirecho
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Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

Good to hear a word or two from the guru of Larch!!

I have a limited life as well so I can appreciate the shorter life span of electronic wonders as the clock ticks away the remaining time.

Was aware of the limitation of flash devices but the temptation to illustrate the use of such a speedy thingy was too great to resist!

Perhaps another day the flash device will be improved to really be a winner like Larch!

Thanks much for larch!!


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#19 2006-09-21 01:25:41

lilsirecho
Veteran
Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

Continuing the experiment with this added comment regarding the use of swap.

The intent of utilizing the flash drive as swap would be as follows:

   When requiring the use of greater than physical drive size, the /sbin/ swapon-a command would enable the flash drive to supply , say 4GB of additional memory.  This memory size enables most of a DVD video to be written to swap, a large file type of operation.  Thus, repeated writes to a particular sector of the flash device would not occur.

One principle of flash drives is the lifetime is increased with flash drive size.  However, if repeatedly employed as swap with repeated access to the same sector, would result in using up the life in less time.  Since the proposed application to utilize swap for large file use, usually video files, would not impact the lifetime of the flash drive to a great extent.

The swap in my system is never impacted until I load more than 2.7GB of data, including the  source files mounted in ram, (which produce the need for added swap memory) assuming it is Video of at least 1GB.  Thus, swap could be applied to a flash drive, after which the mounted source could be unmounted(memory managem,ent), reducing the memory requirements in situ.  The actual locale of the reduced memory is problematic AFAICT.  Perhaps there is a protocol for such manipulations.

It is felt that swap management in this context will be acceptable to extended use of flash drive as swap-on-call.  The expected result would be the increase of 4GB or more to the useable memory in my 3GB ram system.

The use of flash swap therefore enables a faster access to video files, almost zero delays, and the possible install of the complete DVD video in a swap-enhanced arch-Larch copy-to-ram system.

One question regarding the protocol when employing swap in this manner.  What is entered into swap, the newly entered material or otherwise?  Is it bump and run?

I anticipate an answer to that question 8)


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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#20 2006-10-01 23:25:21

lilsirecho
Veteran
Registered: 2003-10-24
Posts: 5,000

Re: Live Larch DL DVD 7.5GB copy-to-ram

Continuing the experiments:

Applied a change to tmpfs after loading the Live larch in copy-to-ram/swap, in order to utilize the 8GB of swap provided in the USB/IDE arrangement in my system.

  Began as follows;

        #mkdir /mytmpfs

Open .../mytmpfs

       Select....system:kwik disk

       Mount ....hda3...open in file manager.

       Select.../root/desktop/5.9GB.iso....click and drag to /mytmpfs, copy here.

        Copied at ~15MB/sec (speed lowered as 3GB of memory reached)

        Select ...root/desktop (from hdd) click and drag 1GB video, copy to /mytmpfs

        Select...root/desktop (from hdd) click and drag .7GB video, copy to /mytmpfs

       #pacman -S mplayer  ( install mplayer as R/W in memory via unionfs)

        Play 1GB video in mplayer.

It is playing as I write this post (240mb free in memory).  The .iso is the larch .iso which formed this boot into arch via dual-layer DVD.

A further test....open HDD and display graphics via kuickshow...

Graphics test performed full -size and movie video continued with sound in the background..multi-tasking, video, internet,graphics.

Expect the reboot of this setup will take much time to remove swap files.

Perhaps it will be lessened if I enter swapoff command before rebooting or shutting down.

End of experiment................


Prediction...This year will be a very odd year!
Hard work does not kill people but why risk it: Charlie Mccarthy
A man is not complete until he is married..then..he is finished.
When ALL is lost, what can be found? Even bytes get lonely for a little bit!     X-ray confirms Iam spineless!

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