[pocket-linux] Some tools for taking poket linux to a hard drive...

[David Horton]

A couple days ago Daniel Noji asked if it was possible to use pocket 
linux to create a hard drive based install.  I have done this, but it is 
not well documented at all.  If anyone is interested in doing this, here 
are some things that I found helpful:

1. Use FHS (http://www.pathname.com/FHS) as your guide for deciding what 
to install.  Just like in the pocket linux guide, you can look at FHS to 
find the commands you need in the root fs then search for them on 
ibiblio, sourceforge or whatever.

2. For a more comprehensive list of files and utilities, look at the 
Linux Standard Base specification (http://www.linuxbase.org).  This has 
a lot of heavy information in it and I would suggest getting through the 
programs in FHS first.

3. When installing, try to make everything go into locations specified 
by FHS.  This keeps the root fs nice and tight.  Many programs will just 
spit all the files into /bin, /sbin or whatever.  Personally I think if 
it's not in the FHS document under /bin (/sbin) then it doesn't belong 
there.

4. Write a script to automate the building process for a particular 
package.  This will save a lot of time in typing if you have to build it 
again.  I have several of the scripts I used that can be found at 
http://my.core.com/~dhorton/linux/recipes.  The main file is called 
"chef" and it is responsible for setting variables and stuff and then 
calling one of the other "recipe" files.  Double-check these before 
using them so as not to hose your system.  They worked on my Slackware 
box, but I have not tried building on any other distros.

Please let me know if this info is useful to anyone and if you're 
interested in more stuff like this.

Dave