bug#40514: closed (Should we shrink the installer by a gig or so?)

[GNU bug Tracking System]

Your message dated Fri, 10 Apr 2020 02:02:27 +0200
with message-id <87369c8ayg.fsf@nckx>
and subject line Re: [bug#40514] [PATCH] vm: Transparently compress iso9660 
images.
has caused the debbugs.gnu.org bug report #40514,
regarding Should we shrink the installer by a gig or so?
to be marked as done.

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40514: http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=40514
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--- Begin Message --- Subject: Should we shrink the installer by a gig or so? Date: Wed, 08 Apr 2020 22:56:27 +0200

Guix,

I've met at least someone who was worried that Guix wouldn't support their System ‘because the installer fell back to text mode’. They didn't mean nomodeset: obviously a 1.5-GiB ISO must be hiding a full desktop somewhere, not just the interface of a text-mode netinstaller image about 2.5% its total size:

 $ du -h Downloads/trisquel-netinst_8.0_amd64.iso
 37M    …

 $ du -h /gnu/store/l005v0ssz34gz5mrg3vpr51sq8sry8wp-image.iso
 1.5G   …

Now I'm not suggesting we add Gnome (yet), but how about reducing the size by 60% for 1.1.0?

 du -h /gnu/store/jcpg5wsflpymiq3vx929wq2cr0qbw44f-image.iso
 561M   …

Our CD image finally fits on a CD!  Remember those?  I try not to.

It also fits onto the ~100 1-‘GB’ USB drives I have in a box and can now finally give away as Guix installers.

Zisofs is a somewhat obscure, Linux-specific extension to Rock Ridge that transparently (de)compresses file data using zlib. Our linux-libre already supports it. As far as the system is concerned it's just a regular iso9660 file system.

Unlike squashfs (with which I'm currently playing) it requires zero further changes to the creation or boot process that could introduce new bugs. Hence I'm hopeful that this can be tested and merged in time for the next release.

Kind regards,

T G-R

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--- Begin Message --- Subject: Re: [bug#40514] [PATCH] vm: Transparently compress iso9660 images. Date: Fri, 10 Apr 2020 02:02:27 +0200

Danny,

Danny Milosavljevic 写道：

Tested it and it works

Thanks!  Pushed as 26c1bd9dfafb5a954d2174b7a000304cd7ae6345.

and I see no downside either.

We can now fit a Gnome 3 desktop on an image the size of the previous installer. I'm sure someone considers that a downside.

Kind regards,

T G-R

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