Debian Live Build Project

This project contains the configuration for building a custom Debian Live ISO based on Debian Testing with GNOME.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure you have the necessary tools installed on your Debian-based system.

sudo apt install -y live-build debootstrap git qemu-system-x86 qemu-utils genisoimage xorriso squashfs-tools curl wget

Project Setup

If you are setting up this project for the first time or need to re-initialize the configuration:

lb config --distribution testing \
    --archive-areas "main contrib non-free non-free-firmware" \
    --linux-packages "linux-image" \
    --debian-installer-gui true \
    --debian-installer live

Customization

Adding Packages

To add or remove packages, edit the package list file: config/package-lists/desktop.list.chroot

Add the names of the packages you want to install, one per line.

Package Caching

To speed up subsequent builds and avoid re-downloading packages, you can use apt-cacher-ng.

1. Install apt-cacher-ng

sudo apt install apt-cacher-ng
sudo systemctl enable --now apt-cacher-ng

2. Configure Live Build

Configure live-build to use the local proxy:

lb config --apt-http-proxy "http://localhost:3142/"

Building the Image

To build the ISO image, run:

sudo lb build

This process will take some time as it downloads packages and constructs the filesystem. The final ISO will be generated in the current directory (e.g., live-image-amd64.hybrid.iso).

Testing the Image

You can test the generated ISO using QEMU without rebooting your machine.

qemu-system-x86_64 -m 4G -enable-kvm -cdrom live-image-amd64.hybrid.iso

• -m 4G: Allocates 4GB of RAM to the virtual machine.
• -enable-kvm: Uses KVM virtualization for better performance.
• -cdrom: Specifies the ISO file to boot from.

Rebuilding and Updating

If you need to rebuild the image (e.g., to update packages or apply configuration changes), you must clean the workspace first.

Step 1: Clean previous build artifacts

sudo lb clean --all

Step 2: Regenerate configuration This step is crucial after cleaning to restore necessary state files.

lb config

Step 3: Build again

sudo lb build

Note: Since this distribution is based on Debian Testing, rebuilding will automatically fetch the latest versions of all packages from the repositories.

Troubleshooting

"Target is busy" Error during Build

If the build fails with an error like umount: .../chroot/proc: target is busy, it means a process is still holding the filesystem open.

Fix:

1. Force Unmount:

   sudo umount -l chroot/proc
   sudo umount -l chroot/sys

2. Clean and Rebuild:

   sudo lb clean --all
   lb config
   sudo lb build

Resources

• https://live-team.pages.debian.net/live-manual/
• https://debian-install-notes.pages.dev/netinstall/live-build
• https://gitlab.com/bitspur/community/linux-factory
• https://debian-live-config.readthedocs.io/en/latest/custom.html