# Minimal Linux Script
One script which generates fully functional live Linux ISO image with minimal effort. This is based on the first published version of [Minimal Linux Live](http://github.com/ivandavidov/minimal). All comments and empty lines have been removed and the original script code has been modified to reduce the overall script length.

The script below uses **Linux kernel 4.6.2** and **BusyBox 1.24.2**. The source bundles are downloaded and compiled automatically. If you are using [Ubuntu](http://ubuntu.com) or [Linux Mint](http://linuxmint.com), you should be able to resolve all build dependencies by executing the following command:

    sudo apt-get install wget bc build-essential gawk syslinux genisoimage

After that simply run the below script. It doesn't require root privileges. In the end you should have a bootable ISO image named `minimal_linux_live.iso` in the same directory where you executed the script.

    wget http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v4.x/linux-4.6.2.tar.xz
    tar -xvf linux-4.6.2.tar.xz
    cd linux-4.6.2
    make clean defconfig vmlinux
    cd ..
    wget http://busybox.net/downloads/busybox-1.24.2.tar.bz2
    tar -xvf busybox-1.24.2.tar.bz2
    cd busybox-1.24.2
    make clean defconfig
    sed -i "s/.*CONFIG_STATIC.*/CONFIG_STATIC=y/" .config
    make busybox install
    cd _install
    rm -f linuxrc
    mkdir dev proc sys
    echo '#!/bin/sh' > init
    echo 'dmesg -n 1' >> init
    echo 'mount -t devtmpfs none /dev' >> init
    echo 'mount -t proc none /proc' >> init
    echo 'mount -t sysfs none /sys' >> init
    echo 'setsid cttyhack /bin/sh' >> init
    chmod +x init
    find . | cpio -H newc -o | gzip > ../../rootfs.cpio.gz
    cd ../../linux-4.6.2
    make isoimage FDINITRD=../rootfs.cpio.gz
    cp arch/x86/boot/image.iso ../minimal_linux_live.iso
    cd ..

Note that this produces very small live Linux OS with working shell only. The network support has been implemented properly in the [Minimal Linux Live](http://github.com/ivandavidov/minimal) project which is extensively documented and more feature rich, yet still produces very small live Linux ISO image.