wiak wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2024 1:51 pm
fredx181 wrote: Thu Aug 08, 2024 4:59 pm
wiak wrote: Thu Aug 08, 2024 2:42 am
Yes that does work ....
...
Ok, it can work but is there a real advantage compared to a 'single' SFS module ?
I think it's only useful that way for very advanced users, not for the average user or beginners.
So, in other words, not user friendly at all IMO, unless there's a easy way included in the system to accomplish that . Big challenge to make that foul proof (not saying it's impossible though).
Well, as we all know, and I'm sure wanderer would agree, he is a real fan of tinycore linux and what he describes is always close to that distro build model. Now, I used to use tinycore a lot, back in the days I was also using old Puppy Linux 2.17. So I spent hours and hours configuring tinycore linux with all these tcz (sfs) addons, to get as close as I could to the operating system I wanted. Each time I gave up - the effort was ridiculous compared to simply booting up old Puppy Linux. Years later tinycore linux still fascinated my, so flexible and fun to assemble, but the pain... I agree that next to no-one who simply wants a flexible but easy to use distro would EVER use that multi-tiny sfs app approach (be they layered in or symlinked in) - it is just too much work. Great hobby though.
Great hobby, at least something positive to mention about Tinycore
I played with Tinycore too in the past, had some fun (and annoyance too), I would never use it as my main OS.
Btw, the big difference with Slax (and also with distros presented here) is that the 'sfs loading' IS the package management in TinyCore and it's well organized, every module has it's dependencies registered.
@wanderer First..., I do understand what you are up too and could be nice for your personal use.
But say you've built something like that, does it have value to share as an OS for everyone
.
A big how-to would be needed to make things clear about e.g. exchanging SFS's (including many warnings in red, don't do this !, don't do that! ... to prevent breaking the system).
EDIT: A simple example of how the system can break on Debian based system by e.g. using sfs's for each application:
Say you created A.sfs from package A (installed with apt) , dependencies are X, Y and Z .
(and all is nicely registered by the package management (in /var/lib/dpkg) )
Placed it in the frugal install folder, > reboot and appl. A works OK.
Next you make another one, B.sfs from package B installed again with apt or synaptic, dependencies are W and X
Dependency X will not be included in B.sfs because it's already registered as installed (in A.sfs).
Reboot with B.sfs added, all fine, appl. A and B work well.
Later you decide that you don't need appl. A , and remove A.sfs, > reboot.
Expecting that appl. B still runs, but... not, it's missing dependency X (it was in the removed A.sfs).
This can be repaired of course, but the user who does the above gets an unexpected result, and may complain with "Doesn't work" or "Bug found !" not knowing what happened exactly.
edit: A way to make it work without problems is to not include the packages registration (/var/lib/dpkg) in the created sfs's (that's what apt2sfs
does in debiandog).
But that has the disadvantage that dpkg doesn't know about the contents of the sfs's and will happily install packages that are in fact already included (in the sfs's) (which is waste of space then, it makes your save file/folder much bigger than actually needed).