Direct Disk Installation: Creating a Linux Distro That Installs via curl > /dev/sda
By
astralbijection
A baker's-dozen of insight crammed into one ring.
Summary
The article describes a technical experiment where the author created a Linux distribution that can be installed by directly piping a disk image to a storage device using commands like 'curl > /dev/sda' or 'wget | dd'. This unconventional installation method bypasses traditional installation processes by writing the OS image directly to disk, which works even on EFI machines. The article is part of a series about exploring unusual approaches to early Linux boot processes.
Key quotes
· 3 pulledTo replace your Linux installation with a new OS, you can download a pre-prepared disk image directly to your disk by running a command like this: curl https://something.example/foo.img > /dev/sda
No need to save it anywhere first, just pipe it directly to the disk. Then you can reboot into that OS, and congratulations, you've installed a new OS.
This works even for most EFI machines without any further configuration.
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