/ doc / quickstart.rst
quickstart.rst
  1  Quickstart
  2  ==========
  3  
  4  Super Fast Quickstart
  5  ---------------------
  6  
  7  Building images with live-wrapper is quite simple. For the impatient:
  8  
  9  .. code-block:: shell
 10  
 11   sudo apt install live-wrapper
 12   sudo lwr
 13  
 14  This will build you a file named ``output.iso`` in the current directory
 15  containing a minimal live-image.
 16  
 17  .. warning::
 18  
 19   Currently live-wrapper will create a lot of files and directories in the
 20   current working directory. There is a TODO item to move these to a temporary
 21   location and clean up afterwards, though this has not yet been fully
 22   implemented. You may want to use an empty directory to run ``lwr`` in.
 23  
 24  Customising the Image
 25  ---------------------
 26  
 27  There are a number of supported command-line arguments that can be passed to
 28  live-wrapper. These change the behaviour to create a customised image.
 29  
 30  Changing the Distribution
 31  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 32  
 33  By default, the ISO image will be built using the ``stretch`` distribution. If
 34  you'd like to build using ``buster`` or ``sid`` you can pass the ``-d``
 35  parameter to live-wrapper like so:
 36  
 37  .. code-block:: shell
 38  
 39   sudo lwr -d buster
 40  
 41  .. note::
 42  
 43   You must use the codename, and not the suite (e.g. stable), when specifying
 44   the distribution.
 45  
 46  Using an Alternative Mirror
 47  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 48  
 49  By default, ``vmdebootstrap`` will use the mirror configured in your
 50  ``/etc/apt/sources.list``. If you have a faster mirror available, you may want
 51  to change the mirror you're using to create the image. You can do this with the
 52  ``-m`` parameter:
 53  
 54  .. code-block:: shell
 55  
 56   sudo lwr -m http://localhost/debian/
 57  
 58  Customising Packages
 59  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 60  
 61  There are two methods of specifying extra packages to be installed into the
 62  live image: the ``-t`` and the ``-e`` paramaters. The difference between these
 63  two parameters is that the list of tasks given to ``-e`` is passed to
 64  ``debootstrap`` for installation as part of the initial root filesystem
 65  creation, whereas the packages passed to ``-t`` are installed as part of the
 66  ``vmdebootstrap`` hook.
 67  
 68  This essentially means that any packages installed using ``-e`` will *not* have
 69  their "Recommends" installed, but will have their "Depends" installed while
 70  packages installed using ``-t`` will have both installed making ``-t`` the
 71  suitable place for the installation of task packages.
 72  
 73  There is no reason you cannot pass your entire package list to ``-t``, these
 74  are seperated mainly to help with the readability of parameters passed to
 75  live-wrapper.
 76  
 77  For example:
 78  
 79  .. code-block:: shell
 80  
 81   sudo lwr -e vim -t science-typesetting
 82  
 83  Testing the Image with QEMU
 84  ---------------------------
 85  
 86  You can easily test your created live images with QEMU.
 87  
 88  .. warning:: You will need to increase the amount of memory available to
 89               QEMU when running the live image. The image will crash if run
 90               with the default memory limit.
 91  
 92  To test the image using BIOS boot:
 93  
 94  .. code-block:: shell
 95  
 96   qemu-system-x86_64 -m 2G -cdrom live.iso
 97  
 98  For EFI boot you will need to install the ``ovmf`` package and then run:
 99  
100  
101  .. code-block:: shell
102  
103   qemu-system-x86_64 -bios /usr/share/ovmf/OVMF.fd -m 2G -cdrom live.iso 
104  
105  To test with an emulated USB device, run:
106  
107  .. code-block:: shell
108  
109   qemu-system-x86_64 -m 2G -usbdevice disk:live.iso
110  
111  To test the speech synthesis installer option, you will need to add the
112  following to the QEMU invocation:
113  
114  .. code-block:: shell
115  
116   -soundhw sb16,es1370,adlib
117  
118  .. note::
119  
120   Using -hda to attach the disk image will prevent the installer from detecting
121   the "CD-ROM" as this is not a removable device, it is an emulated attached hard
122   disk drive.
123  
124  Next Steps
125  ----------
126  
127  To learn more about using live-wrapper, you can read the man page or check out
128  the :doc:`advanced` section of this documentation.