Best Linux Distro to build LFS on top of
 

I'm having a hard time trying to choose a linux distro to build lfs on since the lfs Live CD is no longer supported on the latest edition of the LFS book.:banghead:

I do have certain requirements though:

*WiFi support specifically for the WUSB54GC Ver 3. although i can add this myself by copying the driver from ubuntu minimal 12.04 (i discovered that ubuntu minimal is the worst distro to build LFS on)

*Trident Cyberblade XP 1024 x 768 support. most distros force this to 800 x 600, why? idk.

*GUI. It doesn't have to have one but it'd be nice.

*LFS compiler support. Run the Host Sys Requirements script pls!

*Firefox. My fav browser.

*One cd! A small, lightweight distro would be best! DSL won't boot.

*Fast Boot. I'm running on a 750mhz toshiba with 384mb ram.

*HD Installation. Also it can't require too much space.

*And finally, It can't be based off of Ubuntu Minimal or Fedora. Obvious reasons.

Distros i've tried:

*Arch Linux. I liked to use this one but it has confusing wifi support which i cannot figure out. and it didnt boot quick enough.

*DSL: Won't boot. :Pengy:

*Ubuntu Minimal 12.04: i installed this BEFORE i found out that it wasn't good for LFS. :doh:

Thanx in advance! ;)

Most of your requirements are not related to building LFS----for that, I'm not sure that any distro has an advantage.
I don't have any wifi issues with Arch (I use WICD as the network manager). I also find the boot time quite fast, but: Who cares?? I leave the computer running all the time, and only re-boot to (rarely) run Windows or (also rarely) to fix a problem.

What was the problem?

Hi

I have built a few lfs using ubuntu as well, as long as the host is compliant.

My suggestion : Knoppix
It is LiveCD, contains all development tools, plus full graphical desktop enviourment.

I was thinking about Knoppix. I haven't tried yet but I will soon.

I had a hard time finding WICD in arch.

Now i've burned the Ubuntu 12.04 (not minimal) to a disc and it won't even let me boot into that. I think it has something to do with Ubuntu Minimal still being on the partition (which is btw at 5.5GB cause i have a 20GB hd) thus i am about to wipe that partition to see if it works, i need to if i'm going to build lfs on it anyways. I don't have a problem with wifi anymore, i have a copy of the driver from ubuntu 12.04 that works and i can put that in any distro. Oh and arch was actually slow to boot up, it is always slow on "Probing EDD", I've had this problem on a number of distros. And obviously you can see why i want to build my own. I was also thinking about going really in depth about my own distro by taking a desktop UI (i.e. GNOME, xfce, etc.) and building a whole new one after i get lfs in a working state. ;)

Oh and i was also taking a look at CDLinux which ran very well although did not have a very good boot time.

The problem i had was that i was using minimal, which for some reason didn't meet up to the LFS compiler requirements.

EDIT: Alright Ubuntu is out. And now i'm in even more trouble. The only version of ubuntu that boots is 12.04 now. and since i reformated the 2nd partition (Linux) i messed grub up too! Now i can't even boot into windows xp again. :| Anyway with ubuntu 12.04 it is so slow that i can't do anything productive. So i figured i'd try other versions, 6.10 won't boot, 10.04 won't boot, 10.10 won't boot, 11.04 won't boot. I'm stuck! I have to use another distro other than ubuntu.

try zenwalk

I think most of the fasion distros are OK. For example, I used slackware to build LFS serval times( Xorg included).
:)

I've been toying around with Arch to create an LFS install using a secondary HDD. All you need is the base and base-dev packages for Arch and you're good to go.

Although I am slightly biased, sabayon runs great as a live cd. It takes about a minute to boot, but after booting, it runs nearly as fast as if it was installed (unlike ubuntu live cds).

i'm now moving the project to another computer that has lower specs but more hd space to work on.

its still a pentium 3 but at 450mhz and 128mb ram and a 8mb graphics card. but a 60gb hard drive though! same wifi card though.

thanks for all the suggestions! i'll try em all out if when/if i can! again, thanks!

Umm.. Slackware? :)

I used slax running from a USB. That is pretty minimal, and you can add what you want to it when you download it.

I have started a working LFS 7.2 system using VirtualBox, a 100GB vhd virtual disk, Windows Server 2008 R2, PuTTY, and bcdedit.

I plan on eventually booting LFS 7.2 straight off the VHD as a normal hard disk.

I'm currently using a 20GB vhd of ArchLinux to do all the work with the lfs.vhd mounted to /mnt/lfs. Arch for me works best because all the packages through pacman are easily accessible, and meet the requirements for the temporary system. I'm also using PuTTY via Windows to copy and paste the exact scripts into the console to speed up building by a huge factor..

Didn't want to double post, but, no avoiding it now.

Slackware 13.37 is also a good foundation system also. All the necessary foundation is there for everything to build with.

If you have a Windows 7 system you can easily use the BCDEdit tools or EasyBCD to boot off of a VHD drive. Just create and mount it under VirtualBox and then build it under a Virtual system. If need to power down the PC, use VirtualBox's Save System State and simply resume the session when you boot up next time.

IMHO Slackware, that comes with all the necessary.