[ale] Xen / Virtualization and minimal Linux guest installations

[Brian Pitts]

On 12/04/2009 01:00 PM, Ty Connell wrote:
> Greetings,
> 
> I'm wading into the Xen waters, and I'm interested in testing
> lightweight / small footprint Linux guest distros.  Kind of what I'm
> looking for is:
> 
> 1.  A distro that supports a gui or menu driven installation to the
> guest "space" (forgive my terminology).
> 2.  Installs only what's necessary for booting and networking, and
> 3.  Supports some kind of package manager installation.
> 
> I don't really want to get into the loop of download source, compile,
> and configure.  Something that works is OK.  For example, I'd like to
> setup a guest OS that has nothing but linux, and the stuff to run
> postfix.  Another guest would run nothing but DNS.  Similarly for Apache.
> 
> Test box is older hardware thus limiting what I can do with it. 
> 
> I know there are a number of small footprint projects out there -
> looking for some advice on culling that herd.

If you liked Read Hat or Fedora, check out Thincrust. One part of that
project is an "Appliance Operating System"; basically a minimal Fedora.
Thincrust is one of the many virtualization-focused projects that are a
part of Red Hat's Emerging Technology project.

http://www.thincrust.net/
http://et.redhat.com/page/Main_Page

-- 
All the best,
Brian Pitts