[ug-bosug] reg Solaris Build 70 installation issues
Moinak Ghosh
Moinak.Ghosh at Sun.COM
Sun Sep 23 22:30:11 PDT 2007
Sivasubramanian Muthusamy wrote:
> Dear Moinak,
>
> Base on all that you have said, a small footprint solaris that will
> support WiFi access and browser with support for Active X is a
> not-too-distant achievement.
>
> On your suggestions of disk compression to further reduce the
> footprint - I am sure if I am technically righ in saying this - disk
> compression of the O/S footprint would merely minimise the space
> required for installation, but for the O/S to operate, the installed
> footprint may have to be decompressed, which means that additional RAM
> would be required.
>
Not really. The decompression is done on-the-fly. Required blocks are
decompressed as and when they are required. Unused decompressed
blocks are returned to the cache and are re-used later. So additional RAM
is not required.
BeleniX uses this technique and can happily operate a GUI Xfce desktop
with 256MB RAM.
However the decompression does add a bit of CPU overhead due to the
usage of Zlib (gzip) compression . If CPU usage is a concern then a much
more lightweight compression technique called lzjb present in the
OpenSolaris
kernel can be used. It gives less compression than Zlib but uses far
less CPU.
Regards,
Moinak.
> The idea of a small footprint is not only to minimise disk space, disk
> space, from a commercial point of view is not expensive to expand. The
> cost difference between a 128MB flash/diskspace and a 256 MB diskspace
> wouldn't be all that insignificant.
>
> The idea of the smallest possible footprint is to minimise the
> hardware resources required as also to minimize the demands or stress
> on the processor. Besides a small footprint O/s would also minimise
> the power requirements ???
>
> Based on these considerations, is disk compression a good idea? Disk
> compression would make a 256 MB footprint LOOK LIKE a 128 MB foot
> print, but it does not become a 128 MB footprint, so to speak.
>
> Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
>
>
>
> On 9/23/07, Moinak Ghosh <Moinak.Ghosh at sun.com> wrote:
>
>> Sivasubramanian Muthusamy wrote:
>>
>>> Dear Moinack,
>>>
>>> Thank you for the detailed technical insight into the problem.
>>>
>>> I have not assumed that it is a technically easy task. It is indeed
>>> complex and would require a large team of technical experts to work on
>>> it for weeks, perhaps months.
>>>
>>>
>> Not - that - complex either unless one is looking at code
>> modifications in the kernel
>> to strip down functionality for fitting in embedded devices. That is
>> a different ball
>> game.
>>
>>
>>> But what is the maximum that can be QUICKLY shedded or stripped from
>>> the lowest available footprint ? For instance if one Solaris expert
>>> examines the list of packages in the most recent Belenix or any other
>>> sub 1 GB flavor and strips the MOST OBVIOUS unnecessary packages
>>> leaving the essential components of the GUI and the essential browser
>>> components, how small can it IMMDIATELY and EFFORTLESSLY get ?
>>>
>>> If it can come down to 400 - 600 MB, it is still fine. I am thinking
>>> of a proof of concept prototype, and would proceed on the belief that
>>> it it can effortlessly get down to 400 - 600 MB, it can get down to
>>> sub 128 MB with concerted efforts, coordinated and funded research.
>>>
>>>
>> Sub-400 footprint is not too difficult to achieve. Others have
>> already tried that per the
>> links sent out earlier. What I was thinking of was something similar
>> to FreeNAS
>> http://www.freenas.org/ . This will require compression on the disk
>> to further reduce
>> the footprint.
>>
>>
>>> I have two boards, one with a more 'powerful' processor of 500 MHz, an
>>> AMD Geode dubbed Geode 800 (this one with a generous DDR II ? 1 GB
>>> Ram) , and another a more demanding 333 MHz Geode processor board with
>>> a DDR I 256 MB ram. On both these boards the hard drives are generous,
>>> the 500 MHz board has a 40 GB hard disk, entirely unused, but for this
>>> purpose we will set aside a 512 MB partition or use a 512 MB USD drive
>>> as a hard disk. And on the 333 Mhz board a 512 MB USB can be used as
>>> hard drive. I hope both these boards can take a 400 - 600 MB foot
>>> print, lower if it can get lower effortlessly.
>>>
>>>
>> Solaris can boot on the AMD Geode. You might want to consider booting
>> off a
>> Compact Flash rather than a harddisk to save power.
>>
>>
>>> Ethernet has to work, Wifi has to work, and if Wifi can't work
>>> immediately with the present level of work done on WiFi, it is stil
>>> Ok, for a proof of concept, we can take it forward further after
>>> initial success on this level, on these boards.
>>>
>>> The concept of the device in question is an Internet Access handheld,
>>> possibly with a 8.5" LCD screen, running solaris ( ultimately ) on 128
>>> MB Ram and 128 HDD, accessing internet by wire and by wifi, with a
>>> browser with graphic componnets such as Flash / Active X. I understand
>>> that Active X is not supported by Solaris, we will come to that later.
>>> Good Audio is needed, so we may have to think of Open Sound.
>>>
>>> WiFi is under development, Wi Fi can wait till the project moves on to
>>> the next level of research.
>>>
>>>
>> Wifi will work if you use one of the supported chipsets like Intel
>> PRO/Wireless.
>> http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/laptop/wireless/
>>
>> It should be possible to support ActiveX using Wine and the Crossover
>> Plugin,
>> though I have not tried it. Wine does work on Solaris however:
>> http://freshmeat.net/projects/crossover/
>>
>> Regards,
>> Moinak.
>>
>>
>>> Thank you Moinak, for being interactive.
>>>
>>> Sivasubramanian Muthusamy.
>>>
>>>
>>> On 9/23/07, Moinak Ghosh <Moinak.Ghosh at sun.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Sivasubramanian Muthusamy wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> Dear Moinak,
>>>>>
>>>>> That was a good guess that I did not understand what this is all about.
>>>>>
>>>>> I thought that you have arrived at a version of Solaris that is
>>>>> stripped down from the 3.5 GB+ install size down to 70 MB.
>>>>>
>>>>> There was an earlier post on this subject with a valuable response
>>>>> from Ananth Shrinivas that led to
>>>>> http://blogs.sun.com/szhou/entry/build_a_minimal_solaris_image and
>>>>> http://solaristhings.blogspot.com/2006/07/how-small-can-you-make-open-solaris.html
>>>>> . I thought that Solaris 70 is a work in that direction.
>>>>>
>>>>> If Solaris 70 is not exactly that, then I am looking for a minimal,
>>>>> bare minimal, stripped down version of solaris with just the basic
>>>>> files needed to boot the GUI to have a minimal browser running.
>>>>>
>>>>> Apart from the response from Ananth Shrinivas I have some more leads
>>>>> on this, and am ready with two minimal boards and some interesting
>>>>> hardware to try a minimal installation. Can I ask installation help
>>>>> from Open Solaris ?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> What you are looking at requires quite a bit of work. The
>>>> OS image must be configured to exactly handle one piece
>>>> of controlled hardware. It will only contain drivers specific
>>>> to that hardware. You will also need to tune to your use
>>>> case. If for example one is building a storage box then it
>>>> will need to have all the storage and networking related
>>>> software: ZFS, NFS, iSCSI, Samba, Rsync etc.
>>>> If you want GUI then you need Xorg. However just Xorg
>>>> alone in it's entirety is about 170MB. So you will have to
>>>> strip the Xorg setup as well. Remove all headers, docs,
>>>> drivers. Have only the video driver for the video card
>>>> you are using. Remove all unused libraries - depends on
>>>> what apps you want to run on your minimal system.
>>>>
>>>> And all these cannot only be tackled by reducing the
>>>> number of packages installed. Some of the tuning needs
>>>> to go down to sub-package granularity. Essentially you
>>>> will have to deal with understanding the purpose of
>>>> individual files and deciding whether you need them
>>>> or not.
>>>>
>>>> There is a plan to prepare a minimal image of BeleniX
>>>> which can be tailored to fit vaious needs. For eg. the
>>>> Storage/NAS thing I just mentioned. It is possible to
>>>> prepare very minimal GUI desktop experience, but
>>>> needs a predetermined video card and controlled set
>>>> of apps.
>>>>
>>>> Regards,
>>>> Moinak.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> Thank you.
>>>>> Sivasubramanian Muthusamy.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On 9/22/07, Moinak Ghosh <Moinak.Ghosh at sun.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> Sivasubramanian Muthusamy wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Dear Shivakumar,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Thank you for this response. This will help me get started.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>> Siva, are you expecting a version of OpenSolaris that uses
>>>>>> 70MB of space after installation or runs in 70MB of RAM ?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> By 70MB, I indicated that the install process will block up
>>>>>> 70MB of RAM and use some more for running the processes.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Regards,
>>>>>> Moinak.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On 9/21/07, S h i v <shivakumar.gn at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On 9/21/07, Sivasubramanian Muthusamy <shiva.madras at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Dear Moinak Ghosh,
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> I am attempting to install a small foot print solaris on a AMD Geode
>>>>>>>>> 700 board as also on a phone. Could you please tell me when this 70 MB
>>>>>>>>> foot print solaris experss is expected?
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> As per Moinak's mail above the first beta is expected sometime in Oct
>>>>>>>> "It will be possible to do this once a Slim Install beta release is available,
>>>>>>>> sometime in Oct...."
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> The second release will be in March.
>>>>>>>> http://www.opensolaris.org/os/project/caiman/Slim_Install
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Also see
>>>>>>>> http://www.opensolaris.org/os/project/caiman/Slim_Install/uiroadmap
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> The below thread provides some details as to what goes into each of
>>>>>>>> these 2 releases
>>>>>>>> http://www.opensolaris.org/jive/thread.jspa?threadID=38317&tstart=0
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> regards
>>>>>>>> Shiv
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
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