On 08/02/11 06:58 AM, Daniel Baumann wrote: > if you need a cd sized image, you can always build one yourself, see the > live-manual at http://live.debian.net/manual/ for more information.
In particular, check out this example where the topic of size reduction is explored: http://live.debian.net/manual/en/html/examples.html#728 Ideally, if Debian wants to formally support CD-sized live images, we need cooperation from maintainers of the various desktops to provide us with 'tasks' that are produces images of that size (both for i386 and amd64 at least) and still have room for the live installer to be included on the same image. To be honest, because of the issues Daniel already mentioned, I don't think that's going to happen. However, I have discussed with some others on irc before that we would welcome another example in the manual if someone has a simple, easy to maintain configuration that produces a usable subset of packages for CD-sized media for one or more desktops. Without support from the desktop maintainers, I would not expect the Debian Live project to produce official CD images from this, but would maintain this in the manual for example purposes only. Also, being an example, it would not be guaranteed to always produce images of the desired size, since the archive does change over time. Some things to consider: The example should be instructive, with the intended audience being the user of live-build who wants to make such an image, *not* end-users of that image. I do not think simply disabling recommends is by itself good enough, as this has far-reaching consequences, removing lots of things that a user might need with no regard at all for how big they are. It also has high overhead for the developer trying to work around unwanted omissions by manually adding them back to the list. We present the idea of "blacklisting" packages via APT pinning at a negative pin priority here: http://live.debian.net/manual/en/html/customizing-package-installation.html#436 This could be useful for dropping some very large packages from the media. However, take care when selecting such packages about the tradeoffs you are making. For example, it is tempting to remove openoffice wholesale because it is huge, but many users expect an office suite to be there. That being said, it may be sufficient for demo purposes to include some subset of openoffice. And finally, take care about the other tradeoffs we could make that would give the user a different user experience with the CD-sized media vs. DVD. For example, --binary-indices false could save some space, but at the cost of the user having to update the indices before they can even do an "apt-cache search". And if they're demoing the live image offline this may be a major inconvenience! In conclusion, I'm not at this time interested in spearheading such an optimization effort, but as I said, I would welcome additions into the Examples section of the manual, provided the example is carefully thought out. Ben -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [email protected] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [email protected] Archive: http://lists.debian.org/[email protected]
