Re: [Rule-list] Modifying the current anaconda--progress update

[Chuck Moss]

On Fri, Feb 08, 2002 at 11:15:37AM +0100, Marco Fioretti wrote:
[snip]
> 
> Back to the issue now: I think the default base install is interesting
> to check also because we might need to redefine/take out something even
> from that. For example, does it still include all the shells ever 
> invented since Charles Babbage, or library support for some unlikely
> (for old PCs, that is) hardware, or server use?

The "base" install is the bare minimum of packages that is installed with
redhat when NOTHING is selected.  It is a group of about 130 rpms that get
installed no matter what else you select.  I don't think it includes any
networking rpms.  


In my view we should take this as a starting point.  From a message on the
enigma thread(from Erik Troan): 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Don't blame python of the installers size. It doesn't help, but it's really a
pretty small % of the overhead. Talking about the text install, the big
overheads items are:

        1) The package list (we ship a *ton* of packages). This has to be
           held in RAM as we haven't repartitioned the disk yet.

        2) The RPM transaction

        3) The GUI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

So if we can skip the logic that loads the package list into memory and
just load precanned configs that are a good starting point we may be able
to squeeze the install into much less memory.

I think the thing that could prevent this approach is if the installer
relies on too many things from the CD/network to do the install.  I am
hoping we can patch the anaconda portion that is  ON THE FLOPPY to bypass
some of the logic and just provide a list of packages that have been
pre-checked for dependencies.

Is anyone on the list familiar enough with anaconda and the boot process to 
say whether this approach will work?

As Wade mentioned in a later message the install does use some files
provided from the CD or network.
On the CD in RedHat/base are the following files:

comps - 20k list of packages in groups

hdlist - 1.7 MB compressed ~7 MB in ram,  RPM descriptions, some file 
information, and such

hdlist2 - 13 MB  compressed? ? MB in ram, 

hdstg1.img - 6.7 MB stage 1 of installer for install from CD

netstg1.img - 6.9 MB stage 1 of installer for install from network

stage2.img - 49 MB common stage 2 of install


If the portions of anaconda we need to patch are on the CD then the
approach I have suggested won't work and a solution involving the stock CDs
would be a much bigger project. :(

I have appended a list of the RPMS that are in the base install.
I think we would need to add networking and ssh for the machine to be at
all useful.  A non-graphic minimal desktop would be somewhat boring without
the networking capability.

Chuck
List of base packages:


  MAKEDEV                 grub                    passwd
  SysVinit                gzip                    pciutils
  anacron                 hdparm                  pcre
  apmd                    hotplug                 popt
  ash                     lilo                    procmail
  at                      indexhtml               procps
  authconfig              info                    psmisc
  basesystem              initscripts             pwdb
  bash                    ipchains                quota
  bdflush                 iproute                 raidtools
  bzip2                   iputils                 readline
  bzip2-libs              iptables                redhat-logos
  chkconfig               console-tools           redhat-release
  cpio                    kbdconfig               reiserfs-utils
  cracklib                kernel                  rootfiles
  cracklib-dicts          ksymoops                rpm
  crontabs                krb5-libs               specspo
  cyrus-sasl              kudzu                   sed
  cyrus-sasl-md5          less                    sendmail
  cyrus-sasl-plain        libstdc++               setserial
  cyrus-sasl-md5          libtermcap              setup
  db1                     logrotate               setuptool
  db2                     lokkit                  sh-utils
  db3                     losetup                 shadow-utils
  dev                     mailcap                 slang
  dhcpcd                  mailx                   slocate
  diffutils               man                     syslinux
  dosfstools              mingetty                sysklogd
  e2fsprogs               mkbootdisk              tar
  ed                      mkinitrd                tcsh
  eject                   mktemp                  termcap
  file                    modutils                textutils
  filesystem              mount                   time
  fileutils               mouseconfig             timeconfig
  findutils               ncurses                 tmpwatch
  gawk                    netconfig               utempter
  gdbm                    net-tools               util-linux
  glib                    newt                    vim-common
  glibc                   ntsysv                  vim-minimal
  glibc-common            openldap                vixie-cron
  gpm                     openssl                 which
  grep                    pam                     words
  groff                   parted                  zlib