I've got some embedded systems which I'd like to deploy a debootstrap-prepared Ubuntu rootfs to. But I need some kind of a stub which I can use to boot these systems, either via USB or PXE. Basic requirements:
- Recent-ish kernel (>3.8)
- Starts SSH server on startup with a default user/password (or something it receives from the DHCP server somehow).
- Entirely in initramfs, total size < 50MB.
- Contains filesystem utilities like parted.
- Bonus points for Python 2.7 (for example, to use Ansible)
- Bonus points for an iso which can boot both i386 and amd64.
- Bonus points for announcing itself on the network and/or providing some kind of status information using Avahi.
I could just build this up myself, but it seems like it should be a problem which must have been solved before. Is there something preexisting which I can just deploy?
Most recovery-oriented distros like GRML seem to assume that you a) want a desktop and b) don't want an SSH server. I don't want a desktop, I just want the bare minimum that will be necessary to get a system rolling so that I can push the "real" rootfs to it over the network, chroot to it, and install the bootloader.
Thoughts?
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