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#1 2009-06-14 00:33:08

leo2501
Member
From: Buenos Aires, Argentina
Registered: 2007-07-07
Posts: 658

Arch way, FreeBSD stable,Tiny Core distro... Toughts

Today i get really but really annoyed by this entire xorg + intel graphic drivers thing, (which is worst for some and not so for others...) but it is for me, the only thing that i tryed that actually worked perfectly, was a total downgrade of the xorg & related/dependent packages, from which i learn something for sure... im still looking for something out there, something that empowers my hardware, but don't get angry with me... arch was and is perfect for my needs, is this specific problem i'm having that makes me think of these i will throw here...

So apart of these problems and workarounds im looking, today i come across Tiny Core Linux, this is a very (you bet) "Tiny" distro, (like damn small linux, slax), that loads entirely in RAM, it weights 11mb, and has a couple of apps by default, and you can add "extensions" to it, to run from RAM too or to run from the usb drive or hard disk, i tryed it, it loads fast and its INSANELY fast, but for us, archlinux-way lovers is not the way we love things, it has no pacman like package manager, one default window manager, no (at least not so) easy to find config files to edit, but it recognizes my ethernet connection that i have with a router, not even slax and arch do that, i have internet connection with this RTL8101E ethernet card, that impressed me...

So now i cant stop thinking... is this kind of small distro's, one possible future for all the operating systems? i mean, one operating system, veeery lightweight (yeah, like arch Core) with an easy way to add apps to it? (yeah, again, like pacman/abs/AUR, you name it) but that you can run entirely from ram? one thing i surely like is the tinyX thing, instead of a fat xorg thing, so maybe, someone can point out some way to run a stripped down arch Core (2009.02-core is about 330mb, compared to 11mb tiny core, obviously are different things... but this is the point) that can be installed to HD or to another USB, and can install from there, maybe with some ABS like method and not so rolling release, but could always update the programs you actually NEED to be updated, and don't upgrade all the system, because it's just a "pacman -Syu" and im bleeding edge, sometimes latest version is not a better version, and if you need some specific new feature of program X, you research about it's possible problems and only update that program, with an easy way to get back to the older version... surely this can be made with arch, i have no doubts, but i wanted to share this so all can tell me your toughts on this smile and i know about freebsd and their ports system, its something like im talking about, so my general point will be something like:

Arch Linux --- Arch-way... easy to configure via config files & scripts, core system you begin with, pacman/ABS/AUR, but no rolling release
FreeBSD --- Stability... stable releases, install & update only what you need, ports system
Tiny Core / Damn Small Linux --- Speed / Portability... run from RAM, ultra minimalism, tinyX and such, netbook ready

Some links smile

:: Tiny Core Linux ::
http://tinycorelinux.com/welcome.html

:: Damn Small Linux ::
http://www.damnsmalllinux.org


Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

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#2 2009-06-14 00:35:50

cardinals_fan
Member
From: /dev/null
Registered: 2008-02-03
Posts: 248

Re: Arch way, FreeBSD stable,Tiny Core distro... Toughts

Give SliTaz a shot.  TinyCore is a semi-derivative that is more focused on sheer tinyness but less mature and featureful.


Segmentation fault (core dumped)

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#3 2009-06-14 00:43:33

leo2501
Member
From: Buenos Aires, Argentina
Registered: 2007-07-07
Posts: 658

Re: Arch way, FreeBSD stable,Tiny Core distro... Toughts

The only thing i see in it is that it has a bunch of default apps, i don't know yet if you can install apps to it the old fashined way or with the tazpkg package manager and install to HD but run from ram, surely will look into it


Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

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#4 2009-06-14 03:52:37

leo2501
Member
From: Buenos Aires, Argentina
Registered: 2007-07-07
Posts: 658

Re: Arch way, FreeBSD stable,Tiny Core distro... Toughts

with a little research i feel that what im describing in the post it's more like tiny core than slitaz, slitaz feels more mature as you point out, but it has a lot of defaults programs built in, not like a "arch live cd" installed to HD but running in ram. so i can build the system from there...

I will try Tiny Core a little more tomorrow, because in it's forums http://tinycorelinux.com/forum/index.ph … 1#msg10511 linus72 told me this...

OK, I made my usb using this cool article here thanks to member's here-thanks gang
( http://natureheals.info/linux/tiny/instau.html )
and I have made it a little easier by pre-making some stuff for 1.4.3 usb
including making "flavors", one of which is "compilr", which is for compiling
ok, so the 1.4.3 usb works on either ext2/3-grub or fat32/syslinux, either way, it's already setup
all you gotta do is copy everything in download to usb, disconnect hd!!, and install grub to
usb(must do this with a linux livecd-i also have one of those too)
If using fat32 usb, just put the download on usb, install syslinux to usb and your set, don't gotta disconnect hd.
( http://multidistro.com/downloads/tc_fla … avors.html )
And, just download 1.4.3-usb and compilr flavor, stick compilr flavor in "flavor" folder(included)
and if using syslinux/fat32 usb edit "flavors.cfg" to point to your usb device
and that's it, it is setup to look for "sda1" so edit if yours if different.
also, Compilr flavor will decompress to like 500MB or something
Still working on 2.0 but it rock!:)

and roberts told me this...

Seems the MIS Wind and Dell Mini 9 share some of the same specs.
Tiny Core /Mico Core v2 work great on Dell mini 9.

Here are my Dell Mini 9 specs:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GME Express Memory Controller Hub (rev 03)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GME Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)
00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/GMS/GME, 943/940GML Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) High Definition Audio Controller (rev 02)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 02)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 2 (rev 02)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 3 (rev 02)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 02)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 02)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 02)
00:1d.3 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 02)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller (rev 02)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev e2)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801GBM (ICH7-M) LPC Interface Bridge (rev 02)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) IDE Controller (rev 02)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 02)
02:00.0 System peripheral: JMicron Technologies, Inc. SD/MMC Host Controller
02:00.2 SD Host controller: JMicron Technologies, Inc. Standard SD Host Controller
02:00.3 System peripheral: JMicron Technologies, Inc. MS Host Controller
03:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g (rev 01)
04:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8101E/RTL8102E PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller (rev 02)


To get native 1024x600 resolution you will need:
915resolution.tcz

To get your wireless up grab:

wireless-2.6.29-1.tinycore.tczm
wireless-tools.tczl
wl.tczm

Easy way to put Tiny Core on pendrive is via unetbootin or the syslinux way.
I am using unetbootin

Make a tce directory and place the above mentioned extensions there.

I share my tiny 4GB SSD with ubuntu and tinycore. I just copied two system files, bzImage & tinycore.gz adjusted grub menu to select. Added a tce directory. The SSD even my slow one is much faster than a pendrive.

With the above extensions the only configuration needed is the iwconfig for your wireless followed by the udhcpc -i eth1 to get an IP both can be edited into /opt/bootlocal.sh


Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

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#5 2009-06-14 06:42:08

sa
Member
From: boston ma
Registered: 2008-05-23
Posts: 127
Website

Re: Arch way, FreeBSD stable,Tiny Core distro... Toughts

SliTaz and Tiny Core look really cool. It would be really excellent if Arch had the option to run from RAM. Unfortunately KDrive (the new name of tinyX) is neither in the arch package list or AUR. I'll try it out on my machine and see if I can figure out how to get it in the AUR, maybe.

One easy way around the bleeding-edge system problem is run pacman -Syu to see what new packages there are, and then just pacman -S for the packages which you want to update wink

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#6 2009-06-14 11:44:41

bender02
Member
From: UK
Registered: 2007-02-04
Posts: 1,328

Re: Arch way, FreeBSD stable,Tiny Core distro... Toughts

By the way, you can always use vesa driver with arch's xorg to avoid problems with the intel drivers. At any rate that's what you get with these small distros.

I don't want you to discourage to try tinycore or slitaz (I actually use tinycore sometimes). What's usually problematic is upgrading - you usually need to replace the whole thing by a newer one (that's the nature of running from memory: the way it works is that a compressed image of a filesystem is created in advance; on boot it's read to memory and mounted. So there's no reasonable way to update except for replacing this compressed image by a newer one.) Of course some customizations can survive an upgrade (because customized files are saved in another place - this is usually called "overlays" or "session saving"), but it's usually not without slight problems.

By the way, there's are versions of arch that run straight from memory: faunos, and archiso-live.

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#7 2009-06-14 21:25:44

leo2501
Member
From: Buenos Aires, Argentina
Registered: 2007-07-07
Posts: 658

Re: Arch way, FreeBSD stable,Tiny Core distro... Toughts

yes, for example today, i reinstall with the 2008.06 image, pointed the repos to Arch Rollback Machine, and then installed all the apps i need, then added a lot of xorg deps to pacman.conf's IgnorePkg and now i pointed to the updated, normal repos and update everything, this way i can choose to not install xorg and aaaaaaaall it's deps, someones i already have because are older smile so i can install apps depending on them smile

And I realize today that this small distro's are for little tasks, and not to run 24/7, i see them as perfect for a netbook, that powers on in a couple of secs, and then you have a bunch of default apps, a web browser, a little office suite, a small media player... all ready to use, with a default config, and with awesome speed... but are not yet ready to use as a desktop replacement distro... but who knows, maybe next-gen netbooks come with 8+gb RAM (and hopefully another xorg-trouble-free video card) and we can run our entire Arch install from RAM big_smile or maybe all with fast as ram SSD's big_smile


Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

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#8 2009-06-14 21:38:48

cardinals_fan
Member
From: /dev/null
Registered: 2008-02-03
Posts: 248

Re: Arch way, FreeBSD stable,Tiny Core distro... Toughts

^ TinyCore is currently a bit tough to use full-time, and quite frankly I am more comfortable with an installed system than one in RAM.  But SliTaz installs like any other distro, offers some pretty decent little repos, and can be updated with a quick command.  Anyway, I like it and use it full-time.

/soapbox


Segmentation fault (core dumped)

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