Ubuntu ISO file size

[stevie pup]

Came across a comment someone made other day about the size of the ISO file for the latest Ubuntu, apparently it's well over 4Gb now. How on earth is it that big, what's it got in it? It's a while since I looked at Ubuntu in any detail but from what I remember I think it comes with a reasonable selection of software, but not what I'd call excessive. Somehow the word "bloated" springs to mind, but bloated with what I don't know.

The ISO for Linux Mint, which after all is based on Ubuntu, is little more than half that size. So have the Mint developers really left out some 40% or more from the Ubuntu base? Even the ISO for Emmabuntus isn't that big, and that comes with a vast amount of software, which some people do describe as excessive. Fair enough Emmabuntus is based directly on Debian which may make some difference, but even so.

Just asking out of sheer curiosity, and the fact I'm somewhat puzzled by it.

[mikewalsh]

@stevie pup :-

Hm. Notwithstanding the fact that Lubuntu is the official "lightweight flavour" of Ubuntu, I remember a few years back when the Lubuntu crowd started moaning about the fact that it would no longer fit on a CD (~700 MB). From the looks of it, this thing will now barely fit on a DVD..! (4.77.GB; Ubuntu is 4.6 GB......WHAT!!??!)

I'm going to take a look at this thing; see what's what, like. This is a definite eye-opener, and NO mistake. I remember my original 14.04 LTS (Trusty Tahr), in May 2014, was just under 1 GB (970 or 980 MB, summat like that)...

This is getting ridiculous.

Mike.

[amethyst]

Are the files in those iso's in a compressed format like Puppy? Depending on the compression format and ratio the new Puppys could be well over 1GB and close to 2GB uncompressed in size.

[wiak]

Just asking out of sheer curiosity, and the fact I'm somewhat puzzled by it.

I expect lots of Ubuntu-included apps will be huge snaps. I don't use snaps in KLU-jam though can be installed. I avoid such bloat.

[dimkr]

Decompress every Puppy SFS and you'll see that size is not very different, especially if you have a modern browser and a modern kernel.

Compression works, what can I say. It trades size on disk for CPU and RAM consumption. Does that make Puppy (or any other distro that uses compressed images) "lightweight"?

[mikewalsh]

@stevie pup :-

Well now. Having downloaded the current LTS .iso, mounted it, gone into /casper and extracted 'filesystem.squashfs' with UExtract, I can tell you this much:-

/usr/lib is approximately 3.4 GB in size. Out of that, x86_64-linux-gnu occupies 985 MB. In /usr/lib itself, /modules & /firmware take up almost 1.7 GB between them! That's just kernel-related stuff; this is almost double what the whole of Trusty Tahr occupied in total.....

Draw your own conclusions. There's actually very little in the way of snaps at all.....which surprised me, although the snapd framework takes up some 120 MB all by itself.

The times they are a-changing, kiddiwinks.

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@dimkr :-

You make a good point, mate. I've always maintained that this community has, in the past, been obsessed over ISO size.....forgetting that when unpacked, this invariably balloons by between 3 and 400%. Puppies have never really been quite as small as some would have you believe.....

Mike.

[wiak]

Just asking out of sheer curiosity, and the fact I'm somewhat puzzled by it.

I expect lots of Ubuntu-included apps will be huge snaps. I don't use snaps in KLU-jam though can be installed. I avoid such bloat.

Decompress every Puppy SFS and you'll see that size is not very different, especially if you have a modern browser and a modern kernel.

Compression works, what can I say. It trades size on disk for CPU and RAM consumption. Does that make Puppy (or any other distro that uses compressed images) "lightweight"?

@dimkr :-

You make a good point, mate. I've always maintained that this community has, in the past, been obsessed over ISO size.....forgetting that when unpacked, this invariably balloons by between 3 and 400%. Puppies have never really been quite as small as some would have you believe.....

Well let's see what might actually be true, instead of us all talking via our imaginations, so we can answer the OP with some proper technical analysis. Always a better idea I think than to rattle on with what can otherwise turn out to be nonsense:

I happen to have a copy of latest ubuntu-22.04.2-desktop-amd64.iso

I will compare it with KLU-jamFE.iso, which is based on, and fully compatitble with, the same ubuntu release. KLA-jamFE also contains a full copy of most recent Firefox browser.

Without more ado:

Both isos contain their filesystem in the form of squashed filesystems.

Here are the size comparisons overall:

Code: Select all

Ubuntu iso   : 4.6 GiB
KLA-jamFE iso: 611 MiB (i.e. less than one seventh the download size)

Ubuntu internal sfs file    : 2.5 GiB
KLA-jamFE internal sfs files: 583 MiB

We wouldn't normally uncompress KLA-jamFE sfs files, but we can actually do that with a FirstRib-based distro and thus use less CPU and get faster speed of operation (as well as 'pseudo full install' advantages), so to complete the comparison for uncompressed use

Code: Select all

Ubuntu main sfs uncompressed   :  7.14 GiB
KLU-jamFE main sfs uncompressed:  2.04 GiB (so still under 30% of the full Ubuntu size)

You may wonder why the uncompressed sfs figure isn't 'quite' so bad (it's still a huge difference) for official Ubuntu or the iso comparison itself. One reason is that KLU-jamFE does not contain doc files, Ubuntu full does - these types of file compress very well indeed, but are not in any case important to final distro running efficiency.

Obviously, Ubuntu official iso contains far more packages.

However, one major factor is, in fact, the included snap packages in that official iso.
The installed snaps have a total size of: 1.7GiB

The official Ubuntu iso without these snaps might thus have size closer to: 4.6 GiB - 1.7 GiB = 2.9GiB, with is still considerably more than KLA-jamFE iso size of 611 MiB!

Furthermore, some of the applications that are included as snaps would still have to be installed as normal large apps, such as Firefox, so even without snaps final Ubuntu iso would be larger than 2.9 GiB.
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SUMMARY

The claim has been made that size doesn't matter. In fact I have been generally arguing that point for years. If it is true then we are probably as well to simply use the bigger more fully equipped distros. Frugal install flexibility/functionality missing? Well, old weedogit showed that most all distros can be frugal installed using it and thus get all the same frugal install facilitiies and flexible save persistence mechanisms as the likes of KLU-jamFE anyway.

However, I believe there remains, nevertheless, a point still in making small, less full-blown versions of distros. Amongst these reasons are:

1. If anyone still wants to run 'from RAM', meaning after copying the sfs files into RAM, then of course the smaller the sfs root filesystem files, the less RAM gets wasted by that copied into RAM versions. However, personally I never use copy2ram and think it is a bad default.

2. Some like to use one or a number of Virtual Machines via the likes of QEMU. These can take up a lot of RAM, so the smaller the distro iso, generally the less RAM needed overall.

3. Many of the applications in full blown official Ubuntu, are probably never used by most people. Better therefore not to bloat the iso with them. Keeping it as small as possible conveniently reduces download size and time and Internet congestion. The trimmed down fully-compatible Ubuntu-based distros such as KLU-jamFE can simply install any or all of the other junk, if it is later required by anyone, via its fully-working without issues apt/dpkg official package manager.

4. Hard disk storage size can become an issue if a person likes to have several Linux distros stored on their system at the same time. You would soon use up your storage space with many full upstream distro installations.

5. A distro assembled in smaller size is arguably easier to find ones way around and understand in a learning environment, and with good frugal install facilities is excellent for trying new ideas (okay, so weedogit made that last benefit available to big distros too...).

[mikewalsh]

@wiak :-

'Kay. Now; I'm finding 22.04.2's /var/lib/snapd/snaps totals out at 839 MB. Out of curiosity, where are you finding the other 800+ MB-worth of snap-related files? I DID get one size slightly wrong; /usr/lib/firmware = 913 MB (check..?) And /usr/lib/modules is actually 612 MB...

I confess, I really don't know where snapd hides all this stuff, TBH.

Even so, just the snaps & kernel-related stuff totals over 2.3 GB (more than 3 GB if your snaps "total" is correct, yes?) It's still getting a wee bit OTT these days. According to 'Properties', the contents of the extracted 'filesystem.squashfs' comes to a grand total of 6,625 MB (call it 6.5 GB, close enough). I'm having a hard time figuring out how even a "mainstream" distro can justify that kind of size....

(Your point 5, above; yup, you've hit the nail on the head with that one. Absolutely, indisputably true, man.)

Mike.

[wiak]

@wiak :-

'Kay. Now; I'm finding 22.04.2's /var/lib/snapd/snaps totals out at 839 MB. Out of curiosity, where are you finding the other 800+ MB-worth of snap-related files?

Easiest way to show most of the whole of /var is snaps is to use graphical disk map inside the mounted main Ubuntu (inside casper folder) squashed filesystem. Simply hover over the GDM result in /var and you will find around 1.7 GiB are snaps. Different if you were to do an actual full installation since you wouldn't necessarily include all the snaps that are in fact included on the live iso.

Ah, I see what you are looking at: /var/lib/snapd/snaps, but you also have to take into account /var/lib/snapd/seed, which effectively means double the size of snap-related space.

And yes, the firmware and modules are large from official Ubuntu.

[ozsouth]

@mikewalsh - I'm anticipating the release of windux. The gap is narrowing.

[mikewalsh]

@wiak :-

'Kay. Now; I'm finding 22.04.2's /var/lib/snapd/snaps totals out at 839 MB. Out of curiosity, where are you finding the other 800+ MB-worth of snap-related files?

Easiest way to show most of the whole of /var is snaps is to use graphical disk map inside the mounted main Ubuntu (inside casper folder) squashed filesystem. Simply hover over the GDM result in /var and you will find around 1.7 GiB are snaps. Different if you were to do an actual full installation since you wouldn't necessarily include all the snaps that are in fact included on the live iso.

Ah, I see what you are looking at: /var/lib/snapd/snaps, but you also have to take into account /var/lib/snapd/seed, which effectively means double the size of snap-related space.

And yes, the firmware and modules are large from official Ubuntu.

Ah; okay. Uh-huh; yeah, I missed that one. Curiously, /seed is exactly the same 839MB as /snaps. Now where is the point of that? Jeez, that is getting crazy....

To hell with snaps, anyway. I've recently been looking at Nitrux. Only came across it the other day, but the whole thing is, apparently, based around support of my favourite "all-in-one" packages, AppImages. It's big(-ish); 2.9 GB. Don't know if I'll investigate it, but I AM leaning that way ATM....

We'll see.

Mike.

[mikewalsh]

@mikewalsh - I'm anticipating the release of windux. The gap is narrowing.

@ozsouth :-

Hee-hee! Ah, you've given me a good chuckle with that one, Oz. Mind you, I reckon you're not so far off the truth there, y'know; Shuttleworth has made it quite clear that he's seeing Ubuntu as a direct competitor to whatever Windows' current flagship offering of the moment happens to be. I get the distinct impression that more than a few other mainstream distros are tacitly agreeing with him....sizes in general are steadily ballooning. And it can't ALL be blamed on RedHat's influence...

It's definitely getting more than a little ridiculous now.

Currently, I'm having a play with Porteus v5.0, the KDE edition. Far more svelte, and much more to my taste, since Porteus is another frugal-type install (with persistence).

Mike.

[rockedge]

We wouldn't normally uncompress KLA-jamFE sfs files, but we can actually do that with a FirstRib-based distro and thus use less CPU and get faster speed of operation (as well as 'pseudo full install' advantages), so to complete the comparison for uncompressed use

I run KLV-Airedale quite a bit with uncompressed SFS's, it runs great that way. KLV-Airedale-rc11 ISO is 779 mb. Uncompressed the 07KLV-airedale_rootfs is around 1.5 gb I think.
The F96-CE_1 ISO is 544 mb, which is really fair in my opinion.

My target goal is to be able the ISO on a single CD-ROM. I have never burned KLV. Probably the alpha's and beta's fit but currently at 799 I am not 100% sure it will fit........should test that out.....

[amethyst]

Have to compare apples with apples. If you take the bigger distro's and remove all the applications apart from the small applications that Puppy use, there may not be such an enormous size difference. The main advantage of Puppy has always been the frugal nature being a read-only operating system packed in compressed read-only format. That's a big selling point in my view and the main reason I love Puppy. The smaller size is an added advantage for the low-key, average computer user. Really perfect for most who only want to do the basic stuff like internet browsing, playing media, etc. No fancy frills, "I never use that bloat" stuff.

[wiak]

I suspect, in a few years time at most, the likes of snaps and flatpaks will make small distros (aside from very simplistic ones) a thing of the past. Developers don't have time to keep up with all the various distro lib versions and changes - technology advances and we'll be into 3D imaging big time and flat 2D stupid non-AI stuff will be for cavemen (like some members here maybe). Once we have a few hundred MB and more of RAM, with fast internet, and huge storage, the issue will cease to matter. Except rockedge will need to start an Elephant Linux Discussion Forum, which might be slightly slimmed down compared to the Blue Whales upstream.

[amethyst]

If you want to go all new and glamorous with all bells and whistles, why not just use one of the beautiful big shiny distro's? I would, if I fell in that category. Puppy will always have an appeal for the very basic computer user. I use Puppy as a basic system. Got better and more pressing things to do than playing with computers whole day. Waste of precious time.

[BologneChe]

https://news.itsfoss.com/ubuntu-mini-is ... r0e-8MLuGI

[rockedge]

@BologneChe Interesting.....I wonder how often those guys stop by this forum looking over, DebianDog, FirstRib and woof-CE.

I bet I can come close to building a 140 mb Ubuntu by using FirstRib and a custom PLUG recipe to produce really slim base KLU's.

@wiak's KLU series already does a lot of this and in a way way more flexible system structure than official Ubuntu

From the FOSS article:

They already have a prototype ready and are trying to build it using the official infrastructure.

"Welcome to the club" is my reaction...been there and doing that....plus more.

[fredx181]

I think this "mini" Ubuntu iso will be more or less an "installer" (netinstall) not a live cd like Puppy, so, I expect that in the end the resulting install size will be still very big.

[BologneChe]

I think this "mini" Ubuntu iso will be more or less an "installer" (netinstall) not a live cd like Puppy, so, I expect that in the end the resulting install size will be still very big.

It probably is. A good thing anyway! But it can't be better than full ISO.

[stevie pup]

Well I never imagined there would be this much response to what I originally thought was a simple question to post on a Sunday afternoon. Thank you to you all.

It is evident from the replies that the issue is somewhat more complex than I realised, although it does look as though the Snap packages account for at least some of it. and I know Snaps have their critics.

The whole thing about "included software" is one of those things were you'll never keep everyone happy. If a distro comes with a lot of software someone, somewhere will call it "bloated". Whereas if you have a more bare-bones distro with very little included software someone else will say it's "lacking" or "sparse" or something like that.

Never had an issue with it myself. If there's a load of stuff that I neither use, need nor want I remove it. On the other hand if there's something I do want that isn't there to start with I install it. Hardly rocket science is it?

Thank you to everyone again.

[Clarity]

.... it runs great that way. KLV-Airedale-rc11 ISO is 779 mb. Uncompressed the 07KLV-airedale_rootfs is around 1.5 gb I think.
The F96-CE_1 ISO is 544 mb, which is really fair in my opinion.

My target goal is to be able the ISO on a single CD-ROM. ...

Couple of observations:

• The distros are all built for PCs manufactured since almost 20 years ago

• The worldwide mandate for 64bit PCs went into effect in 2006-2007

• Excepting for the 'bastard' technology of Netbooks, world's PC manufacturers since 2006 have manufactured only x86-64bit PCs

• DVD drives have been the main optical media drives replacing CD drives for over 20 years

Note: I wouldn't worry too much about people and the CD-DVD question as most all have both writable discs that will work in the drives of PCs over the past 2 decades.