Pearpc Linux/win64 Boot/install Cd

Hi,

i had a few ideas ago - thinking on the older idea of aquafied XPSP1 installer CD's popping up in the forums a few month ago.

Idea

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Isn't it possible to produce a CD (and distribute it as .iso to the community via net) which should do a few things

1) install a 'low-level' linux (32 or 64) System on an pc

2) checks automatically for all hardware and configures a bootable System

3) starts pear-pc with an auto-config on and for this system

4) and all the user will have to do is - besides telling what HD he wants to have - to insert a OS-X CD and wait for install

5) next time booting (days later ... ) has the opportunity to elect 'osx on linux' in his bootloader (with other options like XP or a 'regular' linux system) and waiting for linux and osx to boot - and then work with all processor power and ressources of his machine *only* on 'OSX' (fullscreen with the latest and best version with all new drivers)

6) Putting a 'PearPC'-Update-Site on the Web - and every time something new on pearPC is done - you click on a button on this site and it automatically updates the underlying linux-system

Probably there can be some flavours of the 'Pear.iso': like AthlonXP, Athlon64, Pentium4 - preconfigured and optimized for the processor (and for graphicscard, soundcard, networking device etc) - alternatively integrate a simple setup routine in this iso (if it cant find the hardware by its own) to select the hardware.

Surely, pearpc has not evolved so far (hardware), but it a few weeks or so (read the wikis)?

some further questions:

a) by the way - win 64 is sort of free actually. Isn't it possible to mod it the same way (by far all resources to pearpc, possibly not/low starting the UI, new OSX-Win64.iso)?

is there a Athlon64 optimized version of pearpc (possibly for win64) yet?

Thanks

#187629

That's a good idea philosopher, let me know when you're done

#187645

Oh come on.

If only one post - but this really a nice one - to a bunch of question is the answer - then i doubt to call this a 'community'.

Maybe someone had already done something bit alike? Or is planning to do so?

I don't think the questions or the ideas are unrealistic - just maybe a bit to early for what could happen if pearpc evolves the way it could.

#188845

We know how to use reshacker, and the l33t of the l33t here are decent at photoshop. I dont think this comunity is up to it

#188894

I like the idea Philosopher

#188899

Originally posted by Philosopher@Jul 12 2004, 07:59 AM

If only one post - but this really a nice one - to a bunch of question is the answer - then i doubt to call this a 'community'.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It's a good idea Philosopher, but something like that would take a very good knowledge of Linux.. I imagine the hardest part would be the auto-detection of everything, automatically setting up your Linux to detect your hardware, automatically setting up PearPC to boot from the CDRom on first boot, then from your hard drive image on every subsequent boot... and if anything went wrong on the install of whatever operating system you plan to throw into PearPC, then you'd be borched and have to re-do the entire thing over again..

No offense to the community as a whole, but a lot of people would have no idea in what's involved to make a CD like that. I, myself, have a general idea of what kind of work it would take, but I am no way up to doing it.

To be honest, I think it would benefit people more to learn how to set up PearPC themselves, and how to tweak the configuration files. It can be sometimes detrimental to have the installer hold your hand through everything, because then if something screws up, you'd be clueless how to fix it.

#188910

I'm not saying that the Idea wouldn't work, but correct me if I'm wrong but... pearpc only runs on 32 bit systems, right? So AMD64 is out of the question (for a while, click here to find out why, very sad). Also another factor is as much as I'd hate to agree with lostspyder, he is right. Although, mabye if we all worked together, it may just work, besides, I want to help pearpc out as much as I can so I guess I could start here. Another thing, would this this low-level linux based version of pearpc use what space on the HDD available as the HDD image? Or is this something you never thought about (not being a jackass or anything, just wondering)?

#190351

I could barely get configure arch linux to make my mouse, internet etc work, and you want an auto script to do it for any type of computer? Plus, its not that hard to get it to work, all it takes is time.

#190405

I guess by "Low level" he means making a Linux distro that is bare bones and only has what is needed to boot into pearPC and when you exit pearPC that shuts down the computer.

Ok so let's say you want to do that. First of all you need to find out what bare minimum software you need (libraries, etc.). I see there is a no GUI mode (rather than using win32 or KDE's) but not sure if that can be run direct from the command line without xfree86?

But... if you have a hard time with just linux in general then this would be even more hard IMO. *edit* Ok assuming PearPC can run straight on the command line and assuming you can get networking working on it and you don't need a GUI to do that it shouldn't be too hard (the last time I tried to configure a command line only linux I had a winmodem so that didn't help). But that discounts things like auto config for any system.

That's just a start, the whole thing seems like a pretty tall order. Not that I'm trying to discourage anyone but it needs some linux programmers\developers to work on it IMO. Why? Because it's not just configuring a linux distro cd for pearPC you have to actually write some new programs for it. Oh yeah I forgot... you also need a person who can write OSX programs to do the stuff that would happen from within that OS like your updater idea.

#190429

Well it probably wouldn't be programmed into OS X, the updater I mean. It would probably be like this: you start with a menu like this once it boots into Linux:

PearPC Options

==========

1. Configure PearPC

2. Update PearPC

3. Start PearPC with ppccfg.example

Your Choice: 2

there is also FreeBSD if the whole Linux thing doesn't work. It requires 4MB of RAM to run, but that would add to the work.

#190626