[ELDK] Creating small target rootfs in DENX

[Dave Rensberger]

Hi,

 

I apologize if this already been discussed or documented, but I haven't
been able to find any info on this topic.

 

My question regards how to create the subset of the default root file
system generated by the ELDK "install" script that will be the rootfs
resident on my target.   My question is not about the mechanics of
generating a ramfs/initrd/ext2 image, etc (I consider this relatively
straightforward for anyone who's been worked with embedded Linux at all
before).  The question I have is about the best way to actually
configure the contents of the rootfs itself.  Ideally, I'd like to have
the "install" program continue to generate the big 2GB root filesystem
for NFS mounting purposes, but also simultaneously generate a subset of
that root filesystem for installation on the real target.    I would
have sort of expected that I could just pass additional "*.list" files
into the "install" program and have it generate an alternate filesystem
with only the packages in in that *.list file.  Since this is not the
case, I think I must be thinking about this the wrong way.

 

I can think of a few other ways to accomplish this, but all of them seem
wrong to me for one reason or another:

   - I could just do the full install, and then create a script that
removes all of the RPM packages that I don't want in the target...  I
don't like this, because I'd lose my "full" copy of the rootfs.

   - I could create a separate target in the install package called
"ppc_4xx_mytarget", with it's own "*.list" file.   I don't like this,
because it forces me to have redundant copies of all of the RPMs in my
"ppc_4xx_mytarget" directory.  Also, I tried this, and it's evidently
not that simple... "install" failed when I gave it my new target (which
I kept exactly the same as the generic ppc_4xx target), so there must be
more than just a directory and a *.list file involved.

   - I guess I could do 2 separate invocations of "install", each with a
different *.list file...  That would probably work, but it would use an
enormous amount of disk space, and I'm also lead to believe that this is
the "wrong" way to do it, since "install" doesn't allow me to specify an
alternate *.list file.

 

There must be a fairly straightforward way to manage a full
configuration + subset configuration within the same installation, isn't
there?

 

Thanks,

--Dave