Hi,

Im just wondering what do you guys use for a base system to install LFS from, I have a completely blank hard disk and was wondering if it would be possible to do the install from something like Knoppix?

Thanks
Shak

If Knoppix has all the development tools it would be possible.
I would think a light version of Debian or Slack would be a better choice. Just basic plus development packages.
I used Mandrake ages ago when I did the basic LFS build.
If there is some reason you want only LFS on the new disk, perhaps you could install it as a slave to build the system, then back to master before adding the config scripts VIA Knoppix. I don't think any of the programs know what partition they are on during compile. That seems like too much trouble though.
Good Luck.

When I'm testing LFS builds I usually take the latest versions of Redhat, Debian, Slackware and whatever else tickles my fancy that particular week. Of course I use LFS systems too to build from (my main workstation is probably a 50th generation LFS by now but that doesn't really count

Basically recent versions of any distro will do. Knoppix will do just nicely.

Thanks lfslinux and 2damncommon, the fact is that Im simply too lazy to install another distro and then install from that, Knoppix seems too damn slick

Respect Gerard, a damn fine job you're doing there

Thanks

Shak

I'm building my lfs from knoppix, and it going great. I'm in chapter 6.

I usually use Slackware because of how generic it is.

I think this may be a little off topic so, if so, just tell me to go away.

In CORE you get a minimal package of essential tools and utilities and then compile the kernel. I've downloaded an LFS book and read a bit of it and was wondering - is it fair to say CORE and LFS are comparable except that CORE precompiles everything but the kernel and everything you'd add, whereas LFS is completely ciy? Or are there more important differences, aside from the obvious of learning a lot more and having it a lot better tailored in LFS? And, flipside - if it would serve a purpose, would LFS from CORE work? I probably can't do it due to RAM/HD size limitations on my current Linux box but I was thinking of LFS eventually after I finally take a shot at my newest box.

I use Gentoo.

Cheating, I know, but it does have all the low-level basics.

To tell you the truth, a lot of time I use a "feeder" os, and build most of the base system in a chrooted environment. Then you can tarball the result, AND you know that it all at least worked. Also makes it easy to do sausage-factory installs on clusters.

Hope no-one minds here if I ask, does it matter if I cross compile? i.e. compile the system on a PII 400 for an Athlon (I understand this will mean that optomisations are out of the question but this is going to be generic [for distribution])

Thanks

Shak

Actually there is no limitation to cross compiling.

I actually use a trick where I'll build a base system in a directory of an already existing system. When I get to the point it will run on it's own, (with GCC and GlibC installed) I CHROOT into the base system and run the rest of the installation from there.

When it's all done, you can exit and tarball the result. Now this assumes that you are operating under a common architecture (I do most of my work under X86). This also assumes the hardware your are compiling for is as beefy, or more beefy, that the environment you are compiling. A P3 can operate inside of an i586 (or i386) environment. An i386 would have a harder time running the P3's instruction set.

http://hints.linuxfromscratch.org/hi...piling-x86.txt

There are several other hints that you might take a look at further up that link.

Good stuff Gerard!

FYI, I used Slack 8.1 as my host distro...

Cool

Complete LFS 4.1 os on a bootable cd that you can build your system from. It has the LFS book and packages you need to build new system. It even has X installed check it out

http://www.stockwith.co.uk/iso/

If you need a bit of help getting started (in other words, not truly building completely from scratch, just growing your own system from scratch), I don't think it makes a great deal of difference where you start. It makes a lot more difference which pieces you decide to change and tailor to suit your needs.

Gentoo Linux is a highly optimized, leading edge distribution that's very close to starting from scratch, since everything gets compiled and is optimized for the platform you're using. It may be a bit too leading edge for some people, particularly if you want a stable server system, but it runs real fast, and it's not necessarily unstable, you just have to be careful which pieces you use and which pieces you change to ensure stability.

Slackware almost always makes a good, stable starting point. I'd argue that Debian stable also makes a great starting point, and it's optimized well enough that you may even consider using it as the core of your system. You can get either binary packages or source packages with Debian, so you can optimize it quite a bit yourself. For me, that's optimal enough, and it's a lot quicker (for me, at least) to get a final working system, so that's usually what I end up doing.

Depending how much work you want to do upgrading host tools (such as gawk, sed, bash, autoconf/make, flex, bison, m4, make THEN gcc + binutils) you can pretty much build on anything...

Personally have just finished updating a RH6.1 system to kernel 2.5.68/glibc cvs (w NPTL ) w gcc 3.3 CVS