Getting started with LFS
 

Hello, I am interested in moving from a pre-compiled distro to LFS. I just have a few questions about getting LFS up and running.

1) Is it possible to use knoppix or another live-cd distro as a host system to format one's hard-drive and compile packages to create a working LFS system, without LFS having to coexisit with a host installed on disk?

2) Once I create an LFS system, can I upgrade packages not cutting-edge by just installing over them, i.e will ./configure&&make&&make install overwrite the old packages with the new ones, or do I need to remove older versions?

3) Are the patches discussed in the book just necessary to get the system up and running, or do you need them to run the programs after the initial install?

4) Once installed, is it possible to create your own distro by packaging the programs created with LFS and creating a script to install them off a live cd?

5) Is there a free program for linux like Norton Ghost for winblows to capture an image of my hard drive so I can restore my LFS system in an emergency without recompiling every program again?

6) Can I install udev with a 2.6.* kernel instead of the 2.4.26 kernel and static /dev entries?

I really like the concept of having a linux system free of packages and package managers, where everything is compiled yourself, however for me to make the switch I would like to have these questions answered. :)

Well, I'm still working on getting my LFS system set up, but I'll have a go at answering :) As I understand it, the answers are:

1 - yes

2 - yes

3 - no, but unless you know exactly what you're doing, it's a very good idea to do exactly what the book says

4 - You might want to look at the ALFS web pages - automated LFS is, I believe, intended to do just this.

5 - Probably, but it's dead simple to do it manually - see the LFS hint at http://lfs.securewebservices.co.uk/h.../lfsbackup.txt

6 - See 3, and also the hints http://lfs.securewebservices.co.uk/h...s/2.6-udev.txt and http://lfs.securewebservices.co.uk/h...2.6-how-to.txt

Hope that helps, and is accurate :)