Shulou(Shulou.com)06/01 Report--

Editor to share with you what are the five mini Linux distributions that should not be missed. I hope you will get something after reading this article. Let's discuss it together.

Tiny Core

Tiny Core Linux

The Tiny Core Linux is incredibly small: only 11 MB for the terminal version and 16 MB for the graphical interface version. I looked through the old USB flash drive I collected before. the smallest one is 128 MB and is eight times the size of the Tiny Core image file.

Tiny Core includes only the basic operating system by default, and you need to download the applications you need over Ethernet. Due to its extremely compact design, even applications with a full operating system are not included (although they can be downloaded from Tiny Core's software repository if necessary).

I used a 128 MB USB drive to run Tiny Core on a machine with only 512 MB of memory, which was great for an operating system with only 16 MB. It slows down only when using a web browser, but this is mainly because most modern websites are too complex, not Tiny Core problems.

Without a graphical interface, running Tiny Core requires only 64 MB of memory.

Installation

Download Tiny Core and write to a USB disk using dd or Etcher.

You can easily install Tiny Core by clicking on the Apps icon on the launch bar at the bottom of the screen to download the tc-install or tc-install-GUI app.

Tiny Core installer

There are several different ways to install Tiny Core. You can install it on a USB drive formatted as a Linux drive (this requires your computer to support booting using a USB drive. Most modern computers support it, but it is not common on older computers), or installed on a flash drive of Microsoft's FAT file system (which is very useful for most computers that do not support booting from a USB driver), or even in a folder in an existing Linux partition.

The installation process is very fast, and after completion, you can restart the computer and enter the Tiny Core Linux system.

Application program

Since the system has basically only a text editor and a terminal, all you have to do is install some applications. The Apps icon on the bottom launch bar shows all the packages provided by Tiny Core. The Apps software repository also contains some important drivers, which are helpful for using WiFi network cards or printers, etc.

When installing a new application or utility, you can choose to load the package when Tiny Core starts, or when needed. If you choose to load at startup, not only will the software be available immediately, but (unsurprisingly) it will still be available after the next reboot; if you choose to load when needed, it can still be used immediately after the package has been downloaded, but it will not be automatically loaded into memory after reboot. This keeps the boot speed fast and takes up very little memory, but it also means that after each boot, the software package of the application will only be loaded into memory when it is used * * times.

The choice of applications includes both client-side applications such as office and graphics applications, as well as server-side applications such as Samba and web servers.

Of course, as you add more and more apps to Tiny Core, it becomes less "mini". However, on Tiny Core's website, we can see that even the Tiny Core Plus image file that includes all WiFi drivers is only about 100 MB, so "not so tiny" is still likely to be much smaller than 256 MB.

Conclusion

Tiny Core is ideal for underperforming old phones, images used to boot over the network, and anyone who values applications more than operating systems. Tiny Core can be used as a good weekend project: build the operating system step by step from 16 MB until you feel that the operating system is enough to meet your needs.

SliTaz

SliTaz Linux

SliTaz Linux's image file is about 51 MB in size, almost four times the size of Tiny Core, but contains an excellent set of drivers and applications. In fact, if you didn't know it beforehand, you might think it was started with a 1 GB Ubuntu image, because everything you can think of for a basic boot image is here: text editors, web browsers, drawing tools, tabular tools, and so on.

I used a 128 MB USB drive to run SliTaz on a machine with 512 MB memory, and it worked very well. Performance degrades when browsing complex websites, but the system includes a lightweight browser, Midori, that can quickly load most websites.

You can choose to enter SliTaz without a graphical interface at startup, which works well on machines with only 64 MB.

Installation

There are many kinds of SliTaz available for download because its developers and communities offer a large number of versions of the restrictions that may exist. For example, there is a low-memory version that can run on a machine with only 24 MB memory; one version that uses Firefox instead of Midori;, another version that does not contain additional applications, and so on.

If you are blinded and just want to pick a version to try, download the rolling release. This version is about 50 MB in size and is updated every week. If you fall in love with SliTaz and the scrolling release is updated too fast, you can choose a version that better meets your needs.

After downloading the SliTaz image file of your choice, you can write it to a USB disk using dd or Etcher, and then restart it.

Installing SliTaz on a USB disk or hard drive requires the application TazPanel. It will guide you to partition the hard drive as needed, and then install SliTaz in the place of your choice.

SliTaz installer

Application program

The control center of SliTaz is the TazPanel application. If you like OpenSUSE or Mageia (originally known as Mandrake), then TazPanel should be no stranger to you (at least in the core idea): these functions, including system setup, hardware monitoring, user and user group management, system upgrade, and application installation, are all implemented in this application.

The applications provided by SliTaz can meet most of the basic needs, and if you don't care very much about which application you must use to accomplish a task, you should be able to find the application you want in SliTaz's software repository. If you have some special requirements (for example, you want to use GIMP 2.10 instead of GIMP 2.8), then you need to learn how to generate SliTaz packages. The good news is that the tazpkg command supports conversion from several package formats, including:

Debian package (.deb, .udeb)

RPM package (.rpm)

Slackware package (.tgz)

Puppy package (.sfs, .pet)

NuTyX package (.cards.tar.xz)

Arch and Alpine Linux software packages (.apk, .pkg.tar.gz, .pkg.tar.xz)

OpenWrt package (.ipk, .opk)

Paldo package (.tar.bz2)

Void package (.xbps)

Tiny Core package (.tce, .tcel, .tcem, .tcz)

Conclusion

SliTaz is a fast and compact Linux distribution and is very easy to use (because of a centralized control panel). Because its package tools support conversion from Linux packages in other formats to their own format, its applications are theoretically very rich, and you can easily use your favorite tools to build your own work environment. SliTaz is small, but also very lethal, as its spider logo suggests.

Porteus

Porteus Linux

Porteus offers different desktop environments to choose from, with the smallest image around 270 MB and 350 MB. It is one of the mirror files in the mini Linux, but this extra space is used to ensure a very smooth experience in the Linux desktop environment, so that you may forget that you are using a live version. If you install Porteus into SSD or load it into memory at startup, you'll get such a seamless and smooth environment that you won't believe that your operating system takes up less than half the space of CD-ROM.

Porteus's basic image file is relatively small, so it is called "micro", but depending on the version of the desktop environment you choose, Porteus may need as much as 1 GB of memory to run. While other micro-Linux distributions tend to save space and resources by streamlining applications, Porteus wants you to use it like a regular distribution. Forget that you are using a miniature compressed root file system and install all your favorite applications.

Installation

You can download Porteus from the nearest Porteus mirror site and choose your favorite desktop environment from MATE, LXQT, LXDE, OpenBox, XFCE, Cinnamon or KDE. If there is no special preference, the MATE or KDE desktop is a good choice, they can provide a familiar desktop environment experience, and the image file is not too large.

Porteus installer

You can install Porteus to a USB drive or internal hard drive according to the official installation guide. The two approaches are very similar and both use an immutable compressed root file system. This is a stable, restricted file system that will be modified according to your use. Your changes and installed applications will be loaded into memory when you restart, restoring the environment you used before you shut down.

Application program

Applications are called "modules" in Porteus and are provided by the Slackware package Unified Manager (USM). USM's resources cover five different Slackware software repositories, so there are plenty of applications to choose from.

Conclusion

Porteus can provide a complete Linux experience, but uses only a fraction of the space required by a normal Linux. This is an excellent portable Linux distribution with many desktop environments to choose from and many applications.

Bodhi Linux

Bodhi Linux

Bodhi Linux's ISO image, which is 740 MB in size, is not very "micro" at first glance, but once the installation is complete, you will be surprised at how tiny it is. Bodhi also runs smoothly on 512 MB of memory, and its desktop environment looks like it's from the future. Bodhi uses the Enlightenment desktop, a beautifully crafted user interface that is small and powerful.

However, Bodhi does not simply use Enlightenment, but adds a lot of color to it. Bodhi handles the interface on both the configuration application and the system settings panel, avoiding options that Enlightenment sometimes seems too complicated. Bodhi makes some good default choices for you and displays only some of the options. If you are an Enlightenment fanatic, Bodhi may not seem very pure to you, but for most users, Bodhi makes people more focused on the Enlightenment desktop itself.

Installation

Download Bodhi Linux, write to a flash drive via dd or Etcher, and then restart.

The Bodhi installer can be found in the application menu on the settings page. The installer uses Ubiquity, so the whole process is the same as installing Ubuntu. Don't worry if you haven't installed Ubuntu, because this is one of the distributions installed.

Bodhi installer

Application program

Bodhi is based on the long-term maintenance release of Ubuntu, so there are countless applications available. As long as it is available on Ubuntu, it can also be found on Bohdi.

Conclusion

Bodhi Linux is much smaller than a standard Ubuntu, but better than other micro-Ubuntu environments (because of the use of Enlightenment). If you are looking for a Linux distribution that is lighter than most distributions, but do not want to use OverlayFS or application modules, then Bodhi is a good choice.

Puppy Linux

Puppy Linux

There was Puppy Linux long before the birth of Tiny Core, SliTaz, AntiX, or Porteus. As one of the earliest mini-Linux distributions, Puppy has been through the storm for 15 years, and it is always a reliable and bootable operating system for both old and new users.

In order to ensure normal operation, Puppy will guide the user to complete the necessary setup steps after * startup. The whole process involves a lot of windows, but once you're done, you'll know all the features like the back of your hand and then decide if you need to install them.

Puppy is almost 300 MB in size and doesn't work properly on the 1 GB memory machine I tested, so it's not a particularly miniature Linux distribution. Nevertheless, it is still a great operating system under 1 GB, and it is a very friendly one in this kind of system.

Installation

Download Puppy Linux, then write it to USB via dd or Etcher, or burn it to CD or DVD, and then restart.

Puppy installer

Puppy can be installed on a carrier that supports almost any data format. You can find the Puppy Installer installer in the top launch bar, which installs Puppy and Puppy applications.

The Puppy installer will guide you step by step to install the system on any medium you provide. Puppy can be booted from a flash drive, CD, hard drive, or even a SD card. I once ran Puppy successfully on a computer that didn't have a hard drive, failed the CD drive, and couldn't boot from USB. Since Puppy supports writing your configuration options on any carrier, I can even use it on an external device with long-term data storage.

Application program

Puppy installer is also used to install applications on Puppy. Because Puppy is based on Ubuntu, there is almost no shortage of Linux packages in its software repository, and if that happens, you can use Flatpak.

Conclusion

Puppy is the earliest micro-Linux. Although it is no longer the most miniature, it is by far the easiest to use.

Complimentary: Silverblue

SilverBlue, not tiny, but tiny-adjacent

The concept of mini-Linux is constantly changing over time. A long time ago, a mini Linux distribution meant downloading it to CD-R, booting from the CD drive, and then writing changes to external media. Later, you can boot it from a USB drive, and there is room for recording changes. Today's mini-Linux not only supports the above two methods, but can also be installed directly in internal drivers or folders.

No one expected that Linux started the container craze-applications in containers are a stand-alone Linux system running in a paravirtualized environment. Once a niche hobby for people who like to optimize hard disk space or reuse old phones, it quickly became a strong demand for people who wanted to develop containers but didn't want to add too much load to their applications. The hard work on the minimalist and humble Linux distribution paid off overnight in an unexpected way.

Based on the concept of the root file system, the Silverblue experiment initiated by the Fedora project aims to create an immutable operating system. The operating system updates the system and installs applications mainly in the form of containers, and the system itself will never change.

GB's Silverblue is not a mini-Linux distribution, but to some extent it is the product of micro-Linux and container movement.

Installation

Download Silverblue, then write it to USB via dd upload or Etcher, or burn it to CD or DVD, and then restart.

After booting to Silverblue, install it on an internal hard drive using Anaconda (the standard, friendly Fedora installer).

Anaconda installer

Application program

The way Silverblue installs applications is different from the traditional sense: it runs containers on top of the underlying operating system. Specifically, it uses Flatpak to run GUI applications and Toolbox to run commands.

Because Flatpak is not as common as traditional Fedora RPM packages, Silverblue also provides a way to convert Fedora RPM packages into Silverblue form: package layering.

After reading this article, I believe you have a certain understanding of "what are the five mini Linux distributions that should not be missed". If you want to know more about it, you are welcome to follow the industry information channel. Thank you for reading!

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