I have an application running under FreeBSD.  I'd like to reduce the
disk requirements from the current 800MB to under 150MB.  That means
I'd have to strip out X and many other apps.  Is there a way to do
this to my existing system?

Or, if that's not possible, is there a way to build FreeBSD systems
that are smaller in the first place?  (Note I need a system a bit
smaller than the default minimum FreeBSD, which installs at about
250MB.)

I have a general background in operating systems, but I'm a newbie to
FreeBSD, so detailed instructions would be appreciated.  If you
discover other references to building customized small Unix, those
will also be appreciated. Thanks.

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Request for Question Clarification by leapinglizard-ga on 24 Mar 2005 10:51 PST

If you don't need X, then this is not a graphical application,
correct? And do you  need FreeBSD specifically, or can you run it
under any Posix-compatible system? It would help if you gave me an
idea of what compilers, libraries, and other software support you need
to build and run this application.

If you don't need much more than gcc and related compilation tools,
you might be able to do without a system installation altogether.
Instead, it may be feasible to keep only the application on your hard
disk, leaving you to load Linux from a live CD distribution.

leapinglizard

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Clarification of Question by kn98-ga on 24 Mar 2005 15:43 PST

Hi, 

I have two apps, one that's like a router, the other that's a web
server.  In both cases, I need a full operating system, since I'll be
running it on a different computer from its own disk.  So just having
an application doesn't apply.

I won't need any development tools on the resulting machine.  Once
I've compiled the application, I can do away with the development
tools.  That's the idea -- to strip away the parts of the system that
are typically not needed (compilers, gui, man pages, command-line
tools, etc).

As to operating system:  I would like instructions for FreeBSD, but
one of the other BSDs, or even a Linux distro, would also be helpful.

Yeah, I'm with leapinglizard-ga... I'd look at damn small linux
http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/

Or small freebsd ... http://people.freebsd.org/~picobsd/
--
This is a free comment.

Install the minimum build in the first place.  Compile your s/w on
another host with a full version of the same OS; package it and
install on the smaller OS.

If that isn't slim enough keep trimming - remove unwanted stuff.

I got OpenBSD 2.5 under 20Mb but I had to recompile a few things -
e.g. saved about hald the size of the kernel and by having no Kerberos
I didn't need the Kerberos library files.

Your chances of getting really small are better with BSD than with Linux.

If you're only focused on FreeBSD it isnt that terrible. Just make a
list of the packages you need, and run:

pkg_info -r PKGNAME

that will give you a list of all the packages that package depends on.
Simply go through your list and check all the dependancies and try
installing just thoose and see where you get (of course removing
everything else first).

I think if you want hard way you should try this
https://neon1.net/misc/minibsd.html
I've made fully functional OS and it feet on 64MB CF