Forwarding my response to Ubuntu devel list as I see my response going as blank on the list.
---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Bhavani Shankar R <bhavi@ubuntu.com>
Date: Fri, Feb 24, 2023, 08:32
Subject: Re: Possibility of accepting a network-based installer of Ubuntu as an official flavor?
To: Aaron Rainbolt <arraybolt3@ubuntu.com>
From: Bhavani Shankar R <bhavi@ubuntu.com>
Date: Fri, Feb 24, 2023, 08:32
Subject: Re: Possibility of accepting a network-based installer of Ubuntu as an official flavor?
To: Aaron Rainbolt <arraybolt3@ubuntu.com>
On Fri, Feb 24, 2023, 08:19 Bhavani Shankar R <bhavi@ubuntu.com> wrote:
On Fri, Feb 24, 2023, 04:54 Aaron Rainbolt <arraybolt3@ubuntu.com> wrote:Note, I'm asking this *very* early. I don't have the project I have in
mind even started yet. I'm not even sure what I want to name this
project. This is more of a "testing the waters" to see if this kind of
thing is even a possibility before getting started.
I've seen more than one person annoyed by the fact that the mini.iso
netinstaller is no more. It was never officially supported anyway, but
apparently people got use out of it, so it seems like something that
would be handy if it still existed. I'm sure we're not going to start
producing it again, so I got the idea of making something that could act
somewhat similar to it. I asked people about this idea on Mastodon and
the response seemed fairly positive.
My idea is to either write my own installer or use a customized version
of the existing Debian installer, and package it into a "flavor" of its
own, which would be capable of installing any supported version of any
official flavor of Ubuntu. The "flavor" would be able to be held in a
very small ISO file (preferably CD sized), and it would download and
install all of the packages that make up the Ubuntu system at runtime.
This would allow a user to install Ubuntu or any desired flavor thereof
using a single installation medium, rather than having to flash an ISO
every time they want to make a drive install a different flavor. The new
installation would be entirely up-to-date from the get-go, and it would
enable the use of existing small storage media for those users who don't
have sufficiently sized optical discs or flash drives.
I would eventually aim to make this into an official flavor of Ubuntu,
however it would differ from all existing flavors in several significant
ways:
* It would be the first flavor that could not be installed onto a target
system by itself.
* It would be the first flavor that could install other flavors onto a
target system by design.
* It would be the first flavor that could install versions of Ubuntu
other than the one it is based on.
* It would have a different installer than any existing flavor of Ubuntu
most likely, and would not be able to make use of existing official
installers in any meaningful way without large changes to one of them.
Because of these differences, I'm not sure if such a project could ever
become an official flavor, and I may end up simply maintaining it as an
unofficial installer by myself should I end up doing it.
Is this kind of project a possible candidate for becoming an official
Ubuntu Flavor, or is this enough info to declare it as not a possible
candidate?
Somehow my reply went blank last time..
So it's like ubuntu-minimal package isn't it?
Right now it's available for cloud but debian already has one
So, if this is for flavours with only the bare essential main repo pulled in with optional network support.. it's a +1 from a Lubuntu user here! As it helps in reviving old systems and reach out to people with low bandwidth..
Just my 2 cents here.
Regards
Bhavi
