Howto modify the DSL distro

Forum: Other Help Topics
Topic: Howto modify the DSL distro
started by: Ralle

Posted by Ralle on Feb. 28 2004,11:29

Man i love this distro. I have tried a couple of distros (fairly new at all the penguin stuff), and this has got to be my favourite. Now, even though i love this distro i dont quite agree with some of the apps it has. For example, i could live very well without the toys and games, but i would really like gaim or some other msn communications app. I could go on like that for a long time, wanting some apps instead of others, but since i know this is my personal opinion and that other users would not agree, i wont suggest them as changes. Instead i would like to know if it is possible to change the distro so that i can make my own image with the apps i like. Is this possible and if yes, then how?

Thanks in advance, Ralle (btw. im using dsl right now on some crappy windows box

)

Posted by xeno on Mar. 10 2004,05:24

I would also like to customize DSL with apps I do/don't want yet burn it on a business card CD. Any guide on how to do it?

Posted by PhrozenFear on Mar. 10 2004,08:15

YES !!! There IS a way. Actually, there are a few.

(a) - the HD install.
Install it to the HD and away you go - sudo su and dpkg-restore, then apt-get to your heart's content.

(b) - The customization for your own personal distro.
This one's kinda tricky, but it works like a hot damn. first thing you need is to get a partition you can use that's got upwards of about 200 megs (just to be safe) and also have a decent size of swap (200 megs or so, again just to be safe). I could explain the whole thing here, but I won't steal their glory. Just sudo su, mount the drive (mount /dev/hda3 /mnt/hd (using your own mount point and drive specs), then copy the knoppix folder to the source/KNOPPIX dir (cp -rp /KNOPPIX/* /mnt/hd/source/KNOPPIX). Once that's done, chroot to that dir (chroot /mnt/hd/source/KNOPPIX) and you're on the HD. Then do dpkg-restore to give yourself apt-get, and customize to your heart's content.

The whole tutorial for that is here:
< http://www.knoppix.net/docs/index.php/KnoppisRemasteringHowto >

Read that, and enjoy - it'll tell you how to make your own custom version for a pocketcd or even a larger cd if you don't have any of them.