Bootstrapping Alpine Linux

VPS

This section is to provide a means to bootstrap Alpine Linux on any VPS.

Process

Prepare

1. Download apk-tools-static for your architecture.

wget https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/api/v4/projects/5/packages/generic/v2.14.0/x86_64/apk.static

2. Unpack .apk

tar zxf apk-tools-static-*.apk

Install

Assuming your alpine rootfs is mounted in /tmp/target

sudo ./sbin/apk.static --arch $(arch) -X http://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/main/ -U --allow-untrusted --root /tmp/target --initdb add alpine-base

• edit /tmp/target/etc/fstab
• edit /tmp/target/etc/inittab
• edit /tmp/target/etc/resolv.conf
• mount proc/sys/dev

for a in proc sys dev; do mount -o bind /$a /tmp/target/$a; done

• chroot into your new installation

chroot /tmp/target /bin/sh

• setup repos (setup-apkrepos -f)
• add a few base packages (apk update && apk add linux-lts linux-firmware-none acpi mkinitfs)
• setup hostname (setup-hostname)
• setup network (setup-interfaces)
• add services

rc-update add acpid default
rc-update add bootmisc boot
rc-update add crond default
rc-update add devfs sysinit
rc-update add dmesg sysinit
rc-update add hostname boot
rc-update add hwclock boot
rc-update add hwdrivers sysinit
rc-update add killprocs shutdown
rc-update add mdev sysinit
rc-update add modules boot
rc-update add mount-ro shutdown
rc-update add networking boot
rc-update add savecache shutdown
rc-update add seedrng boot
rc-update add swap boot

References

• Running a Custom Linux Distribution on a Linode
• Run a Custom Compiled Kernel with PV-GRUB
• Replacing non-Alpine Linux with Alpine remotely
• Install Alpine on Amazon EC2
• Install Alpine on coLinux
• Install Alpine on Rackspace
• Alpine setup scripts
• How do I chain boot from grub to syslinux?
• Alpine Linux on Linode
• Installing Alpine Linux in a chroot