how to make an image of your system?
 

now that i have my media box working 100% the way it should id love to know how to make a set of CDs so i can repeat the process without having to install everything from scratch.

basic setup is debian-sarge distro with 2.4.27 kernel, had to custom compile it so the SIS5513 was set to yes, not modular, running KDE, kaffeine, xine, xmms, nvidia drivers, twinview, with a clone for s-vid out to a TV, smbfs, and sambaclient for connecting to windows shares via LAN, and vncserver so it can be configured at a higher res then 800x600.

i would like to be able to know if it is A. possible to make a bootable CD that will install a system running exactly the setup i have now. B. if not how close can i get it? C. what kind of software is needed for this project?

Partimage is what you need. Run it off Knoppix. You would also need spare hard drive space and tell it to write the image in 600MB chunks that could then be burnt to cd's. You would then be able to restore the image the same way by copying the chunks back to a hard drive and then restoring the system via the hard drive.

ok, would i then be able to take those CDs to other computers and after restoring them to the new system via knoppix i would have a new media box up and running?

assuming close enough hardware to not cause a kernel panic.

A good general kernel should have all the drivers you need for almost any system. More obscure peripherals may need additional drivers. If you want to implement such a system it would be wise to standardise the peripheral requirements on the recipient box before doing a restore. The most important point is to get fstab correct and make sure you also restore the bootloader.

Partimage makes images of individual partitions. Whatever you want to ghost it to must have the same partition setup (number of partitions; not necessarily the same size). Adding partition images to other partitions (as in append, not overwrite) could pose problems. Perhaps dar would serve your purposes better? Dar doesn't care about such things. A full backup (I mean absolutely full, relative to /, minus a few cache files, one /dev file, a couple of /var, and /tmp and /proc records the relative path to files, regardless of partition.
I searched for the last 3 years for a backup app to do what I wanted. I ignored dar untill 2 weeks ago. In desparation, I tried it. It took a couple of days to get things configured the way I wanted (a shell script to call dar solved my probs).

Now, all I can say is WOW!.

TaR backups have the limitation that if one file is corrupt, the entire backup is corrupt. Apio and Cpio are not much better. Dar allows you to set limits on file size to compress; file extensions to prevent compression (as in, already compressed); which directories to backup; which to not backup; the list goes on and on.
It took me a couple of days to get it configured and write a shell script for full backup. But, I'm no guru, so I tend to be a bit slow at these things at times. Once I got it going, WOW!
I successfuly make a *completely* full backup (7.7G reduced to 4.0 when compressed). I tested, listed, and restored successfully.

PS: you can write a dar backup to floppy, zip, cd, dvd if that trips you trigger. It handles media size quite well, though it may take a bit of tweaking to get the size just right. My best luck was in using the -m option set at 1024 (that's 1024 bytes per KB). When I got that right, it all fell into place.
Once again: dar: WOW!
I've seen (after doing some 'net research) claims that a dar full backup can be restored to an empty partition and booted. I can't verify that, 'cause I haven't tried it. But everything else works as claimed.

There is another way that I use fairly frequently to clone systems and that is rsync. If you want to transfer a system, partition the drive then mount it and use rsync to transfer the system to the new disk. Take the disk out and put it in its new home. This will not restrict you in terms of having the same size partition etc that happens with using imaging.

i guess im not asking my question right.

under windows i can 'ghost' a system to a server and then bring that image down to any computer i want. now barring major change in hardware it will look exactly like the last computer. with limited change in hardware the OS just needs to adjust to the differnt hardware after the first boot and your set. hopefully.

i can do that either to a phsyical server, or i can move it out to bootable CDs/DVDs and instlal directly from either source.

i like the concept of IPCop were you just put the CD in, answere a few questions and reboot the box after taking the CD out and vioa you have a brand new box up and running with zero problems...

how hard is something like that to creat in linux? i have a few friends that are wanting a setup much like i have. if i could make a Cd or set of CDs that they boot from, that would save much time in the long run i think.

I understand what you are tyring to do. PartImage has limitations as mentioned by bigrigdriver in that it gives an exact copy of the partition and will create a partition exactly the same size on the recipient drive. This can be a very limiting factor. That is a decision for you. I have not come across dar but it is probably worth investigating as well. rsync can be used across a network as well. Obviously the recipient machine must be able to connect via the network. I backup my Internet server on to my box via rsync across a network.

ok, thanks all.