Save space used by an Ubuntu VM by using the live CD, the slightly easier way

Yesterday I worked out how to use the Ubuntu live CD to save space on Ubuntu VMs. It turns out you don't need to change initrd.lz.

Instead, all of the options in casper.conf except root_persistence can be specified on the kernel command line - simply add them (without the quotes) to extlinux.conf.

1. Create a virtual machine with a hard disk of your choosing. Boot the Ubuntu live CD in it.

2. Create a partition on the virtual hard disk for persistence, and make it bootable.

3. Format it, give it a label:

   $ sudo bash
   # mkfs.ext2 /dev/sda1 -L overlay
   

    # mount /dev/sda1 /mnt

    # mkdir /mnt/boot

    # cp -p /cdrom/casper/vmlinuz.efi /mnt/boot

7. We need to edit /etc/casper.conf inside the initrd:

   # cd /tmp
   # mkdir i
   # cd i
   # lzcat /cdrom/casper/initrd.lz | cpio -i
   

   now put in /tmp/i/etc/casper.conf (I found out the variables by looking through /usr/share/initramfs-tools/scripts/casper, which is run by the kernel command line's boot parameter.):

   # This file should go in /etc/casper.conf
   # Supported variables are:
   # USERNAME, USERFULLNAME, HOST, BUILD_SYSTEM, FLAVOUR
   
   export USERNAME="user"
   export USERFULLNAME="Live session user"
   export HOST="vm"
   export BUILD_SYSTEM="Ubuntu"
   
   # USERNAME and HOSTNAME as specified above won't be honoured and will be set to
   # flavour string acquired at boot time, unless you set FLAVOUR to any
   # non-empty string.
   
   export FLAVOUR="Ubuntu"
   
   export PERSISTENT="Yes"
   export root_persistence="overlay"
   

   You can customize your username and host name in this file too. Note root_persistence is the label we specified in step 3. Now compress the initramfs:

   # cd /tmp/i
   # find . | cpio --quiet --dereference -o -H newc | lzma -7 > /mnt/boot/initrd.lz
   

8. Now for a bootloader which uses the above stuff. Install the extlinux package. I grabbed the .deb from the package search.

9. Install extlinux:

   # mkdir /mnt/boot/extlinux
   # extlinux -i /mnt/boot/extlinux
   

   Put this in /mnt/boot/extlinux/extlinux.conf:

   DEFAULT linux
   
   LABEL linux
   KERNEL /boot/vmlinuz.efi
   APPEND boot=casper initrd=/boot/initrd.lz noprompt
   

10. The hard disk is probably missing a master boot record.

    # dd if=/usr/lib/syslinux/mbr.bin of=/dev/sda
    

11. Unmount /mnt and reboot.