Like many computer scientists out there, it seems I will be frustrated by computers my entire life. I won't even care to start a rant with these lines. I won't even care to understand once again what went wrong in this upgrade, nor to wait that maybe my problems will be fixed in a future one. (OK. That was a rant.) Instead, I will produce my own Linux distribution. And it shall be called: S.O.S. (Simple Operating System).
My "dream" distribution has the following characteristics:
- There is no upgrade. If it worked then, it'll work now.
- It is therefore hackable, as a consequence of the lack of upgrade. There is nothing that will break your modifications afterwards. Only you, can break your system.
- The actual system is kind of minimal. It contains everything necessary to actually run: network, graphic stack, etc. It does not contain any app, beyond system utilitaries. I'll install those myself, thank you.
- It is fast, because believe it or not: computers are fast. Even my good ol' Sony VAIO I bought in 2011 is fast. Modern distros just don't know it.
As a consequence of these principles, some others may be derived:
- The building blocks I will use must foster stability and reliability, instead of running all the time for new features. Thus, software that didn't change for a long time while still being maintained are good candidates.
- The building blocks I will use must be simple, but not necessarily easy. They should not be composed of many moving parts.
- There will be no package management whatsoever. Instead, I will probably produce a new version of S.O.S. once in a while, with a new kernel, or whatever, and you'll have to install it anew. You will be able to do so without breaking your apps nor your data.
See: I am a man of simple tastes. That shouldn't be too hard to pull of, right? (Lol.)
In the mean time, I want to both freshen and straighten my knowledge of what composes a working Linux system. Therefore I will try to build everything from scratch.
This page will serve as a gross linear account of this journey. Other pages will be linked from there for the detailed operations. Should you follow these steps, you would end up exactly in the same place as I do. Possibly nowhere enviable. You've been warned.
Let's start with a storage volume. It may be a USB key, a hard disk drive or a solid state drive, as long as you know how to select it at boot. I intend to boot on UEFI, cause my computer ain't that old. If yours is older than mine, don't be ashamed, be proud. I'll explain what to change in the partitionning just below.
As I want to boot on UEFI, the storage will be partitionned with GUID Partition Table (no, not that GPT, the other one). We will use gptfdisk to create the partition table. ☞ Let's build this.