[leaf-devel] Bering compiled with uClibc

[Luis.F.Correia <Lui...@se...>]

Ok guys, here's a crazy thought:

For a while it puzzled me why didn't LEAF evolve to a more recent and stable
libc.

Then I looked a bit into it and realised the obvious, to better support
virtually everything, libc has bloated. Its fat, huge and ugly. 

So some time in the past two weeks, I started to envision a new evolution:
recompiling every binary that Bering v1.0-rc3 uses against a new libc.
For starters, I choose uClibc. Some friends had already mentioned this
small footprint library.

Here's the resumed report of my work so far:

Using RedHat 7.3 running under VMWare on Windows 2000.

I downloaded the following sources from their home locations.
(later I will produce a full report containing the sites)

ash-0.3.5 with additional patches
	(ash_0.3.5-11.diff.gz)
	(ash-hetios-0.5.1.diff.gz)

busybox-0.60.3.tar.gz 
	(I used Jacques Bering_1.0-rc3-bb-0.60.3-Config.h but removed NFS)

sed-3.02 (from gnu.org)

uClibc-0.9.15 (added shadow support and removed NFS)

So far these packages are to be used in initrd.lrp

I extracted all these packages and compiled first uClibc to create the
libs and the crosscompiler stubs. Then I compiled ash, busybox and sed.

After unpacking initrd.lrp, I mounted it as loop and added the new libs
retaining the old glibc2.0. I changed the stripped binaries and dismounted.
I then gzipped initrd and copied it to the floppy.

It booted OK (after a few tries...)

So, now I had a working Bering using mixed libraries!

The next step was to compile other binaries, I downloaded:

sysvinit-2.84
hwclock-2.17

After compiling, I extracted root.lrp and swapped the binaries. 
Again it booted OK.

Now I am compiling new binaries as I send this email :)

If you want to try the already built floppy, her's the link:
http://leaf.sf.net/devel/lfcorreia/Bering-uClibc-0.2.ima

Changes to the stock Bering v1.0-rc3:
	Portuguese keymap is loaded
	IP is set to 192.168.69.1
	firewall name is porteiro

Let me know of serious bugs! Remember this is only a binary change,
so expect no new features! Please test it for non-working features.

rants:

why are we using ash? is none of the busybox shells useable?
why GNU sed? 

Cheers!

Luis Correia
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