For the fun of it: how big is your distro installation?

[Deleted member 210773]

The descriptive statement in the docs on minios ultra edition is:


That's on the page here: https://minios.dev/docs/?lang=en#!./About-MiniOS.md

The packages in the ultra edition are shown here: https://minios.dev/docs/?lang=en#!././Packages.md

Basically, the ultra edition covers all bases. Firstly is a small desktop system with text editor, word processing (libreoffice), browsing (firefox), multimedia (vlc), file manager (thunar, mc), image apps (gimp, ristretto) and lots more. There's a surprisingly large number of packages really to cover the desktop field.

Secondly, in addition are a large number of tools for networking and system repair and recovery which can be used to work on troubleshooting other systems. The live minios can boot to RAM, mount drives of other systems and has heaps of tools to analyse issues (hdparm, smartmontools etc.), partitioning tools and tools to effect repairs. One could describe it as "pocket linux desktop and toolbox". There are other specialist live disks such as systemrescue that contain heaps of tools for repair and recovery, but minios has tried to additionally put together a relatively sophisticated desktop with those tools in the ultra version.

I would like to install miniOS on my computer hard drive but the installer do not support multiboot (I have two others Linux distribution on my hard drive).
I have tried to install miniOS with calamares installer (sudo apt install calamares) but without success because there is an error after I type sudo calamares on the terrminal, (calamares do not start)
I have tried for to solve initialization error with sudo nano /etc/calamares/settings.conf but I don't know what parameters I should to insert inside.
So for now I use miniOS with the USB drive, do you have some suggestion?

 

[Goatmilk]

Can only look at little Max right now:

root partition is 12.4 gb
home partition 118.9 gb
external drive about 750 gb

 

[osprey]

I would like to install miniOS on my computer hard drive but the installer do not support multiboot (I have two others Linux distribution on my hard drive).
I have tried to install miniOS with calamares installer (sudo apt install calamares) but without success because there is an error after I type sudo calamares on the terrminal, (calamares do not start)
I have tried for to solve initialization error with sudo nano /etc/calamares/settings.conf but I don't know what parameters I should to insert inside.
So for now I use miniOS with the USB drive, do you have some suggestion?

The following is how I was able to boot minios from the hard drive by selecting it from the grub menu.

The particular minios I used was this one: minios-trixie-xfce-ultra-amd64-5.0.0.iso, and the machine on which the installation occurred was running debian. For other distros, one can make the relevant adjustments. The steps taken to configure minios into grub were done in a terminal as root.

Basically, the issue is to do the following:

1. determine where the minios kernel and initramfs are in the minios filesystem;
2. write a grub menuentry entry using the info from 1. above
3. update grub

Some preliminary work that was done on the installed system was as follows:

To enable the grub menu to appear on screen for some time to consider it, the config for that function was altered in the file
/etc/default/grub to: GRUB_TIMEOUT=15. Then grub was updated. That means that grub in the installed system will keep the grub menu up for 15 seconds before booting the default kernel, unless the user selects one to boot before the 15 seconds is up. It gives the user time to read what's on screen and make a selection in an less hurried way.

Next, to find out where the kernel and initramfs in minios reside on the minios filesystem, and what their full names are, the minios .iso was mounted. To do that one can run as root:

mount minios-trixie-xfce-ultra-amd64-5.0.0.iso /mnt

Then, once it's mounted, one can navigate to /mnt and find the kernel (vmlinuz...) and the initramfs (initrfs...). The search was as follows:

[root@fen /]# cd /mnt

[root@fen /mnt]# ls -al
total 12
dr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 2048 Aug 23 21:49 .
drwxr-xr-x 20 root root 4096 Oct 23 19:54 ..
dr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 2048 Aug 23 21:49 .disk
dr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 2048 Aug 23 21:49 EFI
dr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 2048 Aug 23 21:49 minios

[root@fen /mnt]# cd minios/

[root@fen /mnt/minios]# ls -al
total 1674096
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root      2048 Aug 23 21:49 .
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root      2048 Aug 23 21:49 ..
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 333049856 Aug 23 21:29 00-core-amd64.sb
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 100540416 Aug 23 21:37 01-kernel-6.12.41+deb13-amd64.sb
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 148090880 Aug 23 21:38 02-firmware-amd64.sb
-r--r--r-- 1 root root  85438464 Aug 23 21:39 03-gui-base-amd64.sb
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 222769152 Aug 23 21:42 04-xfce-desktop-amd64.sb
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 745250816 Aug 23 21:48 05-apps-amd64.sb
-r--r--r-- 1 root root  79122432 Aug 23 21:49 06-firefox-amd64.sb
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root      2048 Aug 23 21:49 boot
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root      2048 Aug 23 21:27 changes
-r--r--r-- 1 root root      1100 Aug 23 21:49 config.conf
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root      2048 Aug 23 21:27 modules

[root@fen /mnt/minios]# cd boot/

[root@fen /mnt/minios/boot]# ls -al
total 28646
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root     2048 Aug 23 21:49 .
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root     2048 Aug 23 21:49 ..
-r--r--r-- 1 root root   716352 Aug 23 21:49 bootlogo.png
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root     2048 Aug 23 21:49 EFI
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root     4096 Aug 23 21:49 grub
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 16499829 Aug 23 21:49 initrfs-6.12.41+deb13-amd64.img
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root root     4096 Aug 23 21:49 syslinux
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 12101568 Aug 23 21:49 vmlinuz-6.12.41+deb13-amd64

The kernel in the minios filesystem is at: /minios/boot/vmlinuz-6.12.41+deb13-amd64
The initramfs in the minios filesystem is at: /minios/boot/initrfs-6.12.41+deb13-amd64.img

Now one needs to copy all the files and the filesystem of the mounted .iso to a directory on the hard drive that one creates for the purpose. In this case, the new directory was created by root as /iso:

mkdir /iso

To copy all of the minios mounted at /mnt, to /iso, the following command was used:

rsync -a /mnt/ /iso/

It takes a moment to copy about 1.7 gig. When the prompt returns in the terminal, it's wise to run: sync to make sure the buffers are cleared and the copy is complete:

sync

The next step was to write a menuentry entry for grub to add to its menu when booting. The menuentry was added, as root, to the file: /etc/grub.d/40_custom. It's contents looked like the following with the menuentry added to the existing default contents of the file:

#!/bin/sh
exec tail -n +3 $0
# This file provides an easy way to add custom menu entries.  Simply type the
# menu entries you want to add after this comment.  Be careful not to change
# the 'exec tail' line above.

menuentry "MiniOS (boot ISO from HDD)" {
linux /iso/minios/boot/vmlinuz-6.12.41+deb13-amd64 boot=live from=/iso/minios toram
initrd /iso/minios/boot/initrfs-6.12.41+deb13-amd64.img
}

One can see how the menuentry contains the paths to the kernel and the initramfs, and how the instruction: toram, will place the minios in RAM, and be usable from there.

The next step was to update grub:

update-grub

Now the mounted minios can be unmounted with the following command as root:

umount /mnt

When the machine was rebooted, there was a menuentry for minios, which was selected, and it booted into minios which functioned just as it did when booted earlier from a usb with the .iso file on it.

 

[BryantC]

Wow, that’s a lot of steps . I’m still really new to Linux and honestly a bit nervous about messing up my hard drive. Is there a way I could practice all of this safely on a virtual machine first, just to get the hang of it before trying it on my actual system? Would love some tips on how to set that up without breaking anything.

 

[Deleted member 210773]

Wow, that’s a lot of steps . I’m still really new to Linux and honestly a bit nervous about messing up my hard drive. Is there a way I could practice all of this safely on a virtual machine first, just to get the hang of it before trying it on my actual system? Would love some tips on how to set that up without breaking anything.

That's too many steps even for me and I've been using Linux for years.For this reason I tried to install Calamares installer (see my previous post) to perform a simple and clean installation in multiboot. Frankly I don't know if there is a way to install Calamares installer using the miniOS USB flash drive.

 

[osprey]

That's too many steps even for me and I've been using Linux for years.For this reason I tried to install Calamares installer (see my previous post) to perform a simple and clean installation in multiboot. Frankly I don't know if there is a way to install Calamares installer using the miniOS USB flash drive.

The issue with the calamares installer is apparent from this description of it taken from the apt package manager:

Description-en: distribution-independent installer framework
 Calamares is a distribution-independent installer framework.
 .
 It provides a graphical installer that can be used with nearly
 any distribution. This package is suitable for live media on
 Debian-based systems, and won't be of any particular use on
 an already installed system.
 .
 You will likely want to provide your own config files to match
 your distribution, reading the Calamares documentation will guide
 you through that process.

Calamares is usually integrated into the .iso file of the distro that it's going to install where it's configured to manage the particular environment that it's set in, hence trying to use it as an app to act upon an existing .iso is not likely to be useful. How to integrate it is described in its own documentation. Consequently, to use calamares with minios, one would best reformat the minios .iso itself to include the installer, but minios isn't primarily designed for that, rather it's the live disk aspect that it's focused on.

Minios on a usb usually becomes part of a boot menu on modern machines when the boot menu is activated by some relevant key on the computer. That looks sort of similar to a grub boot menu from which it can be installed as shown in post #43. However, whilst remaining on an ordinary usb, minios, or any live distro on such a usb, retains the disadvantages of that circumstance. The main aspect is that usbs are not designed to be used repeatedly and for long-term computing such as the drives: hdd, sdd, nvme, scsi etc. Usbs over time can become more unreliable and fail more regularly altogether if worked as intensively as standard internal drives. There are high quality usbs that can be used but I haven't used them, though it's a possible option I guess for a simpler solution to this particular issue.

Just a note on the minios installation described in post #43 ... it is entirely reversible in a straight-forward way. Minios, being located in its own directory, can be removed by deleting that directory, and the alterations to the /etc/default/grub file can be reversed by changing the configs back to default and updating grub again. Any files created by minios which have been saved to the installed drive would remain, but they can be treated by the user like any other user-created files. There don't appear to be any downsides to the enterprise.

 

[Deleted member 210773]

The issue with the calamares installer is apparent from this description of it taken from the apt package manager:

Description-en: distribution-independent installer framework
 Calamares is a distribution-independent installer framework.
 .
 It provides a graphical installer that can be used with nearly
 any distribution. This package is suitable for live media on
 Debian-based systems, and won't be of any particular use on
 an already installed system.
 .
 You will likely want to provide your own config files to match
 your distribution, reading the Calamares documentation will guide
 you through that process.

Calamares is usually integrated into the .iso file of the distro that it's going to install where it's configured to manage the particular environment that it's set in, hence trying to use it as an app to act upon an existing .iso is not likely to be useful. How to integrate it is described in its own documentation. Consequently, to use calamares with minios, one would best reformat the minios .iso itself to include the installer, but minios isn't primarily designed for that, rather it's the live disk aspect that it's focused on.

Minios on a usb usually becomes part of a boot menu on modern machines when the boot menu is activated by some relevant key on the computer. That looks sort of similar to a grub boot menu from which it can be installed as shown in post #43. However, whilst remaining on an ordinary usb, minios, or any live distro on such a usb, retains the disadvantages of that circumstance. The main aspect is that usbs are not designed to be used repeatedly and for long-term computing such as the drives: hdd, sdd, nvme, scsi etc. Usbs over time can become more unreliable and fail more regularly altogether if worked as intensively as standard internal drives. There are high quality usbs that can be used but I haven't used them, though it's a possible option I guess for a simpler solution to this particular issue.

Just a note on the minios installation described in post #43 ... it is entirely reversible in a straight-forward way. Minios, being located in its own directory, can be removed by deleting that directory, and the alterations to the /etc/default/grub file can be reversed by changing the configs back to default and updating grub again. Any files created by minios which have been saved to the installed drive would remain, but they can be treated by the user like any other user-created files. There don't appear to be any downsides to the enterprise.

I use miniOS from the USB and work very fine (but you must use at last a good USB 3.0).
For now I use an USB of 32 GB and I have setup 26GB of persistent storage.
Please can you say to me which it's better between the following Storage Modes?

• native - Direct filesystem storage (POSIX filesystems)
• dynfilefs - Expandable container files (FAT32/NTFS)
• raw - Fixed-size image files (any filesystem)