lee: > Jochen Schulz <m...@well-adjusted.de> writes: > >> Depending on what you want to use the machine for, you may be better >> off using something like Damn Small Linux or even OpenWrt. When using >> Debian, you will have to tweak the system quite a bit to ensure it >> runs as fast as possible. > > Would starting with a minimal installation and adding only the needed > packages later require much tweaking?
I knew someone would ask that question. :) Ok, I'll bite.
I'll try it using qemu. Wait a minute … The system is already swapping
while d-i is running. :) And installation takes ages, even on a Core2Duo
core at 2.4GHz and an Intel SSD. I didn't install any tasks, not even
the "Standard system utilities".
Result: installation size of 384MB and only 8MB of RAM in use! That's a
lot less than I expected.
Nevertheless, one should probably at least disable the installation of
Recommends and you have to be very picky about packages to install. I
wouldn't even run Apache on such a machine. Total RAM usage after Apache
installation: 13MB. Lighttpd uses 2MB less, dhttpd uses only one
additional MB. Running aptitude in TUI mode (without any webserver
running) makes the system use 23MB. Vim-tiny uses 1MB. Heck, even top
needs about 1MB!
I still think it may be worthwhile to check out alternatives to Debian
that use slimmer libraries and less dependencies. My access point
(OpenWrt) runs from 8MB flash and offers an httpd, dropbear (an SSH
server), pppoe and dnsmasq with only 14 processes running.
J.
--
There is no justice in road accidents.
[Agree] [Disagree]
<http://www.slowlydownward.com/NODATA/data_enter2.html>
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