Has anyone here tried to make their own Distro from scratch ? How long does this process normally take to get the complete distro ? Any other related info. welcome.

I have some basic experience with Windows and Linux install/Use. I thinking of learning and slowly working on a Linux from scratch project. This is like a grand Jigsaw puzzle but with a lot more meaning to me.

Thank You.

Vijay

It's hard to say how long it take. But if you look at their web site at LFS Book , You'll find, that they have own measurement unit which depends on compiling one package. After do that, you will know approximately the time you need.

Compiling packages is not the same as making a distro. Depending on what you mean, it could take months or years. What do you want it for? Who else is going to use it? Merely compiling a useful desktop system in your spare time can take weeks. There's a lot to be learned in developing a distro and once you've done it, you need to maintain it. It's a long term commitment - one year minimum I'd say.

Of course, it's easier to just put together a simple system for yourself and your friends. That's been discussed before in this group. Could be done in couple of months, or even a few days if your very focused/limited about what you want and have decent hardware. It all depends on what you want.

Good luck.

Mike

I am not IT Literate. Meaning which I am not a programmer. Hence, doing something for such a long term as a year is not really for me unless ofcourse I do it really slowly.

On the other hand, I once installed GreyCat Linux. It comes in several floppies and gets compiled on your PC. It took a real long time and I didn't enjoy the process at all. Some of the error messages even scared me. It worked but not to my satisfaction.

I am just reading the LFS manual. To me the entire LFS seems to be like compiling/installing a Linux system without the Graphics/Windows option. Once this is done BLFS is almost a must.

What seems to be good for me is to learn BLFS manual also a little. Then take a distro, remove what I don't want and add what I want.

All this will teach me a lot more than the average Linux user and help me solve any problems that develop efficiently.

Vijay

Vijay,

Core Linux might be what you are looking for?

It is basically the guts of Linux and not much else.

EDIT: It is similar to a LFS system waiting for the BLFS treatment. It was how I learned Linux properly. The only problem is that it is on the old side gcc-3.1 and glibc-2.3 IIRC i.e. prebuilt GTK2 versions of Firefox and Thunderbird will not work on it. However, if you want a learning tool it fit's nicely between a mainstream distro and LFS. Follow Tony Whitmore's guides the first time you install it.

Sorry to scare you off like that You could get something pretty decent in a couple of months, but if you're scared of error messages then BLFS might not be for you. It's still worth the read though. You might want to consider something like Slackware or Gentoo. I've not tried them but I think they're pretty easy to customize.

Mike

You didn't scare me away. Error Messages are OK in the right instances.

As the BLFS manual says, even the average user can learn something from this manual and is hence worth a read. It is not just for those who wish to build an LFS.

I already use Vector Linux a derivative of slackware and am hence quite content with it. Gentoo needs long connections to the net. That is not for me either. What is good for me perhaps for fun/for learning is to take a small distro like Damn Small Linux and add/remove programs to it as a learning experience. This is for the long term

One of the main reasons I came here is that my CDWRITER when installed inititially worked very well. However, later on it couldn't read data files and now it is not writing properly it appears. Wonder if I can remove my entire cdwriter/cdrom files alone and replace them.
With time perhaps I will lern this.

Vijay



Vijay