From owner-freebsd-small@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Feb 9 09:25:34 2004 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-small@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id CCCD016A4CE for ; Mon, 9 Feb 2004 09:25:34 -0800 (PST) Received: from cruzio.com (dsl3-63-249-85-132.cruzio.com [63.249.85.132]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 93C0843D1D for ; Mon, 9 Feb 2004 09:25:34 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from brucem@mail.cruzio.com) Received: from mail.cruzio.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by cruzio.com (8.12.10/8.12.10) with ESMTP id i19JO9Z2000245 for ; Mon, 9 Feb 2004 11:24:09 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from brucem@mail.cruzio.com) Received: (from brucem@localhost) by mail.cruzio.com (8.12.10/8.12.10/Submit) id i19JO83L000244 for freebsd-small@freebsd.org; Mon, 9 Feb 2004 11:24:08 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from brucem) Date: Mon, 9 Feb 2004 11:24:08 -0800 (PST) From: "Bruce R. Montague" Message-Id: <200402091924.i19JO83L000244@mail.cruzio.com> To: freebsd-small@freebsd.org Subject: RE: PicoBSD diskless embedded 'where to start' X-BeenThere: freebsd-small@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Dedicated and Embedded Systems List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 09 Feb 2004 17:25:34 -0000 For the archives/record, the following statement in this thread reflects the notion that PicoBSD is a "distribution", in this case the remark indicates that it's thought to be a distribution based on FreeBSD 4.3: "> ... Pico shows ...built on a more modern kernel... > ...the 4.3 for Pico, and m0n0 presently uses the 4.9." No, No, No. PicoBSD is just an alternate means of _building_ any version of FreeBSD. Think of it as a wrapper script around a normal kernel build that also crunches up a bunch of apps into a buffer in a static driver built into the kernel and uses alternative rc scripts that are about the minimal required to run diskless. The biggest drawbacks to PicoBSD are that it does not support loadable modules and requires that your apps can be "crunched" toghether, which due to collision of public symbols may not be the case. PicoBSD is still very nice to have when you want to boot one file and get an entire small FreeBSD system up. It's still easy to make single floppy "rescue" systems. Entire compressed PicoBSD systems, apps and all, are small enough so that they can be mailed as attachments, for instance... As the first sentence in "man picobsd" says: "picobsd is a script which can be used to produce a minimal implementation of FreeBSD (historically called PicoBSD) which typically fits on one floppy disk, or can be downloaded as a single image file ..." - bruce