Native Harddisk Install 1.6

From Alpine Linux
This material is retained only for historical reasons ...

This document covers the ancient 1.6 release. For the ancient 1.9.x series, see Native Harddisk Install 1.9; for more recent instructions see installation.
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Alpine HD install

NOTE: This document covers 1.6 release. From version 1.7.3 there is an albootstrap script that will install the basic packages (except grub) into a subdir. The script is available here: http://dev.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v1.7/albootstrap

Alpine is more geared toward live-cd or usb-key usage, but it is possible to install it to a harddisk.

This is how it is done. The Alpine version is 1.6.1

Installation

Create partitions with fdisk.

fdisk /dev/hda

You should have 2 partitions: /dev/hda1 as "Linux" (type 83) and /dev/hda2 as "linux swap" (type 82).

Install needed programs for the setup

apk_add e2fsprogs rsync grub

Create filesystem and swap

mkfs.ext3 /dev/hda1
mkswap /dev/hda2

Turn on swap already now

swapon /dev/hda2

Mount file-system

mount -t ext3 /dev/hda1 /mnt

Install base packages on harddisk

ROOT=/mnt apk_add uclibc busybox apk-tools alpine-baselayout alpine-conf grub

If you want pcmcia support, then also add the pcmciautils package

ROOT=/mnt apk_add pcmciautils

Install busybox links

mkdir /mnt/proc
mount --bind /proc /mnt/proc
chroot /mnt /bin/busybox --install -s
umount /mnt/proc

For convenience, copy the apk repository.

rsync -ruav /media/cdrom/apks /mnt

Create the apk.conf:

mkdir /mnt/etc/apk
echo "APK_PATH=file://apks" > /mnt/etc/apk/apk.conf

Copy the hd/ext3 initramfs image, kernel and kernel modules.

rsync -ruav /media/cdrom/kernel/generic/hd-ext3.gz /media/cdrom/kernel/generic/bzImage /mnt
rsync -ruav /lib/modules/* /mnt/lib/modules/

Configure grub

grub-install --root-directory=/mnt /dev/hda1
vi /mnt/boot/grub/menu.lst

It should contain something like:

default 0
timeout 0
title Alpine Linux
root (hd0,0)
kernel /bzImage root_dev=hda1:ext3 alpine_dev=../:ext3
initrd /hd-ext3.gz

Install grub on MBR:

grub
root (hd0,0)
setup (hd0)
quit

Append the swap to fstab:

echo -e "/dev/hda2 none swap sw 0 0" >> /mnt/etc/fstab

Unmount, remove cdrom and reboot. (If you can't eject, just remove it manually as the machine reboots)

umount /mnt
eject 
reboot

After reboot, log in as "root" and run:

setup-alpine