NAME¶

febootstrap-minimize - Minimize an febootstrap image

SYNOPSIS¶

 febootstrap-minimize [--options] DIR

DESCRIPTION¶

febootstrap-minimize minimizes an febootstrap(8)-created filesystem. This means that unneeded files and cruft are removed from the image.

If no options are given, the default is to minimize the image as much as possible. This means, for example, that locales are removed so the image will only be usable in US-English, there will be no documentation or manual pages, and the image will only work in a UTC timezone.

Note that image minimization involves deleting files that have been installed by RPM. Thus after minimization, it is no longer guaranteed that RPM will function correctly on the image. You should only do this as a final step for "throwaway" appliances that do not need to be modified or upgraded in future.

OPTIONS¶

--all

Perform all minimization operations, to produce the smallest possible image. Note in particular that locales are discarded.

You can perform all minimization operations except X, Y and Z by doing:

 febootstrap-minimize --all --keep-X --keep-Y --keep-Z ...
    

("--all" can be omitted since it is the default).

--none

Start with no minimization operations. You can specify only minimization operations X, Y and Z like this:

 febootstrap-minimize --none --drop-X --drop-Y --drop-Z ...
    

--keep-locales

--drop-locales

Keep or drop locale support.

--keep-docs

--drop-docs

Keep or drop documentation, man pages and info files.

--keep-cracklib

--drop-cracklib

Keep or drop cracklib libraries.

--keep-i18n

--drop-i18n

Keep or drop "/usr/share/i18n".

--keep-zoneinfo

--drop-zoneinfo

Keep or drop all timezones (except UTC which is never deleted).

--keep-rpmdb

--drop-rpmdb

Keep or drop the RPM and YUM package databases. Obviously RPM and YUM will be completely non-functional if you drop these.

--keep-yum-cache

--drop-yum-cache

Keep or drop the yum cache. Note that febootstrap(8) has already deleted this directory unless you ran it with the "--no-clean" option.

--keep-services

--drop-services

Keep or drop the "/etc/services" file. If dropped, this file is replaced with a very minimal one which just lists the most common services. For less common services you will have to refer to them by port number instead of name.

--keep-sln

--drop-sln

Keep or drop "/sbin/sln" (statically linked "ln"). This is not really required in minimal appliances.

--keep-ldconfig

--drop-ldconfig

Keep or drop "/sbin/ldconfig", "/etc/ld.so.cache" and "/var/cache/ldconfig" (the dynamic linking cache). This is not needed. Dynamic linking during program execution will be marginally slower.

--pack-executables

This option has been removed in febootstrap 2.5. In previous versions it was used to pack executables using the external "upx" program. However it was not enabled by default and never worked very effectively.

TODO¶

• Deduplicate files with the same content (by hardlinking them). See the program hardlink(1).
• Remove unused binaries.
• Remove unused libraries.

SEE ALSO¶

febootstrap(8).

AUTHORS¶

Richard W.M. Jones <rjones @ redhat . com>

COPYRIGHT¶

(C) Copyright 2009 Red Hat Inc., <http://people.redhat.com/~rjones/febootstrap>.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.