Re: Help, tailored Linux desired

From: Robert Heller (heller_at_deepsoft.com)
Date: 09/17/04 

Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 00:08:35 +0200

  sanramnam@yahoo.com (Ramnam),
  In a message on 16 Sep 2004 08:59:36 -0700, wrote :

R> sanramnam@yahoo.com (Ramnam) wrote in message news:<c27ccfaf.0409150853.27927ed2@posting.google.com>...
R> > I have always wanted an extremely "clean" version of linux which
R> > allows me to surf using opera/firefox and do emails. I would not need
R> > any other software in it. (Not even editors like Pico. Just internet
R> > and email.)I have a Pentium 4, 1.7G, Celeron, 80G Hdd and modem. Can
R> > you please suggest me how to come up with such a "clean" version of
R> > linux myself? If there are any prepackaged version of linux like
R> > described above, could you please let me know? I would really really
R> > be grateful to you. Thanks.
R>
R>
R> Thank you beautiful people who replied to my post; Michael, John and
R> Mr. nobody. It seems like I could not make myself clear
R>
R> enough. Let me put it this way. Using Windows instead.
R>
R> When I buy Win XP, the system comes bundled with:
R> 1. drivers that I never possibly ever use (printer, graphics, modem
R> etc.) except the One that I plug in.
R> 2. An internet explorer
R> 3. Media Player
R> 4. Outlook express
R> 5. Some simple games etc.
R> 6. and a lot of other stuff that I rarely use.
R>
R> I as a user want to use Opera for internet and email. And I don't want
R> any of the stuff as described through points one to
R>
R> four. So if it was possible, I would remove all those stuff thus
R> making my install smaller, cleaner (because the needless
R>
R> bloat is removed) and less prone to crashes and frequent reinstalls.
R> Also, I believe the system on which this sort of
R>
R> configuration is installed should be a lot faster. The point here is,
R> I don't want anything, any software, however small or
R>
R> nifty in my distribution that I am not going to use. Since I cannot
R> have this in windows, I want to have a Linux system that
R>
R> can.
R>
R>
R> The reason I have been dreaming of this system is that I find that
R> over ninety percent of the time, I use my machine for
R>
R> internet and email. (I use XP most of the time for this purpose and RH
R> 8 for the fun of linux.) And now I have two installs
R>
R> of XP. One consists of all my the programs that I use like Office,
R> Photoshop, Encyclopedia etc. The other install of XP only
R>
R> has opera and nothing else. I use the latter for internet only and
R> whenever I need to work with docs, I switch over to the
R>
R> "clutterd" version from my "pure" version. My wish is to have the
R> "pure" version of Linux instead of XP. But since I know
R>
R> Linux is configurable, I overwhelmingly would like to remove all those
R> things that donot directly depend upon my running
R>
R> opera over linux. Everything else is to be removed. For example, no
R> source codes, no drivers of graphics card except the
R>
R> intel one that my system uses, one matching driver for sound card and
R> modem, no programming languages, no compilers (if they
R>
R> are not dependent) no printer drivers, no drivers for LAN card, no
R> extra fonts, no multiple browsers (konqurer, etc), no
R>
R> music playing software or word processing or spreadsheets or jpeg
R> viewers or bmp viewers. Just the absolutely necessary files
R>
R> to run Opera over Linux. Now, advise me how I should proceed.

Generally, you can install any reasonable Linux distribution. *Most*
allow you to customize the install.

In the case of things like 'drivers', these exist at a couple of levels.
Most of the modern Linux distributions include only the 'necessary'
drivers compiled into the kernel (such as the IDE driver and the floppy
driver and some other stuff, like console and tty I/O modules) and many
other drivers as 'modules'. Since custom compiling a kernel (and
modules) is a not trivial sort of thing (many users like you would find
re-building the kernel a somewhat daunting task), the distribution
supplied binary kernel package, includes a whole pile of drivers. The
only way to get rid of them is to re-build the kernel (changing lots of
'm's to 'n's (or 'y's in some cases). In order to do this you need to
install the kernel *sources* AND stuff like the C compiler and binutils
-- lots of additional sruff you don't want. Also, if you make a mistake
with your kernel build, such as fail to include some random driver, you system
won't work with the new kernel. Also if/when you decide to add some
random goodie (some as seeming trivial like a new USB digital camera,
you might find you need a driver you eleminated ('bloat'). Now you have
to re-install the kernel sources, C compiler, binutils, etc. and
re-build the kernel *again*. It is *simpiler* (esp. for someone like
you -- a non-hacker), to just install the kernel binary with all of
these 'extra' drivers. Unless you have a seriously small hard drive,
this should not be an issue. Note that the unused modules are NOT
loaded into memory unless needed. The /lib/modules directory for a
2.4.20 kernel (a stock RedHat 7.3 built kernel) is only 30Meg and the
stock kernel (that lives in /boot) is only 1meg.

As for things like drivers for video cards, you are in a somewhat
similar situation, only custom re-compiling X11 can be even more of a
hassle than re-building the kernel (you will need a pile of *-devel
packages installed, maybe even the C++ compiler for some of it). OTOH,
the XFree86 4.3.x driver directory is only 3.4Meg.

I don't really understand about the need for an 'uncluttered' (your
word) install of Linux, if you also have a fully featured install on
the same machine with the same disk(s). To me, this only makes sense
if you have two machines: one with a big disk and one with a little
disk (I have a desktop machine with two 18gig disks, which has all
sorts of stuff, including three different RH installs (RH 5.2, 6.2, and
7.3), a laptop with a 6gig drive (with only RH 6.2 and a base set of
stuff (includes C and C++ compiler, Tcl/Tk/Tix (two versions each),
LaTeX, and some other stuff) and a print server with a 4gig drive (RH
6.1, just enough utilities to handle printing) -- each machine as a
different set of packages installed, tailored to the machine's use and
resources). It makes sense to minimuize what is installed on the
little disk. Unlike MS-Windows, when you install software under Linux,
you don't clutter the *run time* environment (eg global registry and
randomly dumping junk on your desktop, etc.) if you don't in fact use
the installed software. Yes, there is stuff on the disk, but generally
only in 'system' areas, which generally don't affect 'user' space --
most of the time, you have to pro-actively create menu items, tray
icons, and desktop icons, they don't (generally) get installed
automagically for you. Yes, various distros will create 'default'
desktop setups with lots of random junk. If you don't want these
default extra icons or startup menu junk, the solution there is easy:
create a second user account and 'ruthlessly' trim stuff off the menus
and trash all of the extrainius icons and other desktop stuff. You can
also create an 'empty' default desktop (with virtual NO default icons
or startup menu junk, just minimal things, like the base control panel
config tools, from which you can add just the minimal things you want.

R>
R>
R> Thanks in advance, once more.
R>
R> :)
R>
R> ramnam
R>

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