Making Porteus more Arch Way

[cecetux]

Hello
I've started a project: "Arching" porteus

My goals are:

Port pacman to porteus (done)
Port ABS to porteus (or fork it)
Port all helpers from arch to porteus
Add Arch linux pkgs compatibility in PPM
Write some tools to convert Arch pkgs into modules, installing pkg.tar.gz...etc
Make an unified way of managing pkgs with slackyd and pacman without any conflict (impossible)
Make Porteus more Arch Way!!!

Things I've done so far:

-ported pacman to porteus and built a module

Things I'v planned to do:

Move the true core deps into the core module (porteus booted with only kernel and core modules will be a fully FUNCTIONAL textonly system) and then make an "arch-base" module which will contain all basic Arch stuff (pacman, AUR helpers ... etc).
Booting with kernel+core+arch-base will lead to a minimal FUNCTIONAL textonly slack64-arch64 hybrid sysem.

I insist on on the term FUNCTIONAL cuz when I wented to boot porteus with only kernel+core modules the resulting system was filled with missing core libs (like libxml, libarchive [very important for pacman to run]... etc)

Please help me and mail me at drumboss972@live.fr!!!

By a 14 years ol french linux fan!!!

[crashman]

Hi cecetux

I'm interested in Pacman please upload module.

Cheers

[cecetux]

Ok!!!

click=>http://www.FreeUploadShare.com/DOWNLOAD ... .3.xzm.txt

REMOVE THE TXT EXTENSION FROM THE DOWNLOADED FILE (not the link)!!!

it's just to dupe freeupload

[brokenman]

Welcome to Porteus. There are some useful elements in what you propose!

Write some tools to convert Arch pkgs into modules, installing pkg.tar.gz...etc

If you can give me a working example i can incorporate it into PPM for Porteus v2.0

Make an unified way of managing pkgs with slackyd and pacman without any conflict (impossible)
No, not impossible. I am working on a front end for slackyd ... i havn't looked at pacman database yet but once i understand how it works it would be awesome to include arch packages with dep resolution.

Jud would be proud.

[cecetux]

I'm working at it!!!

The unique things I worry about is rebuilding porteus with the right deps in the right modules to make pacman work without xorg ( Yes!!! Pacman cant run without xorg module cuz xorg module contain libarchive!!! ) I think porteus devs must work at it.

[crashman]

here is link http://forum.porteus.org/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=1014 about pacman and slackware.

[cecetux]

But I think it's a good idea...

In porteus we can install debs and why not pkg.tar.gz???

Better, we can profit of the AUR and all the packages in it!!!

Today I've done an experience...

I grabbed a CTKarch iso ( a live arch based disro ) and converted the gz-squashfs of the root fs to a xz-squashfs and rebooted with only this module loaded....

I pried...

TAH-DAH!!!

It booted very well... smoothly and executed local rc scripts and ...

WOW a Desktop!!!

I can open midori calc and all apps except the terminal and some other apps... ( Oh my God )

I cant reboot or shutdown "the soft way" so I HARDreboot (pleaaase don't shoot me!!! )


But I think what I have to do is roll up a fully new distro that clone all Porteus super features (like modules, change folder, bootparams, ect... )BUT with Pacman as the pkg manager (of course I will try to keep slack pkgs compat cuz of its very minimalist pkgmgr).

I'm dwnlding linux-live scripts..

A lil' bit ambitious I think... But I will work at it... hardly...

[fanthom]

@cecetux

In porteus we can install debs and why not pkg.tar.gz???

Arch provides bleeding edge software while Debian is more conservative (bigger chance that it'll work with slack-13.37).
Debian repo in PPM is just an experiment - it should be ok to pull single CLI apps from it but i would be careful with GUI ones.

But I think what I have to do is roll up a fully new distro that clone all Porteus super features (like modules, change folder, bootparams, ect... )BUT with Pacman as the pkg manager (of course I will try to keep slack pkgs compat cuz of its very minimalist pkgmgr)

i have done that before with PClinuxOS and worked pretty well:
link

anyway - i still think it's a hard task which requires a wide knowledge...
better go with standard Linux Live Scripts from Tomas M which are less optimized but should work for most distros out there.
you could also try Slackware Live scripts which are a modern version of LLS:
link
Porteus derivative of LLS is the best in terms of speed and features (in my not-humble opinion) but will work only with Porteus for various reasons so better avoid them.

good luck!

[cecetux]

All theses scripts depend on some of slack (pkgtools...) and arch has different way of booting (initramfs instead of initrd and a bsd* like startup scripts...).

I'm searching for mkinitrd for Arch... cuz SLL needs mkinitrd on the live system to work...

And I'm searching a way of appending already installed slackware pkgs to pacman's database (and not having to reinstall bash and coreutils and all da basic stuff... just to have compiz...).

Last thing... Fanthom, do you now were I can find a custom LLS that support 3.x kernels? I went to slax forum but I didn't find something that fit my needs (I'v built 3.3.6 kernel with some additional feaures and I want to use it for my project or use the stock porteus kernel.)

(PS: I'm on x86_64)

Still workin'!!!

[fanthom]

please try modified LLS from this thread:
link
(last post from skyhog99)

as mentioned before - i would also give a chance to "Slackware live" project:
link

i have never tried them myself (no need since i have my own derivative) so in case of troubles please ask original devs as they will likely know the answer better than me.