• From: PH
  • Registered: 2011-10-05
  • Posts: 109

Re: Making it more efficient and even lighter

Maybe that's why I didn't have the patience for Arch. lol

How I Became A Linux Lover
  • From: inside Ed
  • Registered: 2011-07-25
  • Posts: 2,803

Re: Making it more efficient and even lighter

Bumblebizzle wrote:

A minimal Debian based Linux system with fully functional bash shell (with GNU coreutils, not BusyBox), TCP/IP networking with DHCP client and APT setup to be able to install any package from the Debian repositories.

The installation media is 68 MB, needs no Internet connection and the installation is really quick. The installed system will use 160 MB disk space. (As a comparison, Debian 6.0 "netinst" media is 191 MB, takes long time to install and will use at least 330 MB disk space after installation.)

Like the Debian business card iso, with all no specified tasks. Plus, the business card iso has a wireless setup portion, that carries on to the install itself. And it's 40 MB, and you don't have to update it, since it pulls in the latest packages, with the choice of Stable, Testing or Unstable in expert mode. I can't figure out what the point of this distro would be really.

LVM | Catalyst | Wireless

128 Reply by Digit

  • Digit
  • #! Die-hard
  • Offline
  • From: the internet
  • Registered: 2009-05-26
  • Posts: 703

Re: Making it more efficient and even lighter

i'll try to repeat as few ideas as possible.  cos loadsa the cool stuff's been said.

1.  remove anti-aliasing.
a massive boost for those with wimpy onboard graphics

2.  if using firefox-based browser, go through the motions for speeding it up, and pinning down it's gurth.   search for "speed up firefox tips" or similar, the biggest single boost will likely be that moz disable pango trick.  for tabaholics, something like bartab is a must (though i dont think works with latest versions), though there are many other alternatives.  also worth serious sconsideration is betterprivacy (or create your own script to find and remove flash cookies), ghostery, adblock, flashblock, requestpolicy, and last but not least, noscript.

3.  use a lighter / smarter browser.   ... i use uzbl...  it's worth a look-in if you're serious about 'nix.    ... a text browser, is more useful than those of us brought up on a strict diet of gui stuff would think.   i'm a big fan of links (/links2/links2 -g/xlinks), though... it's not perfect, so, as ever, shop around.

4.  spend some time checking out the suckless applications, and see where you can swap out a bloater for something crisp and lean.  are you leet enough to ditch your irc client for ii?  think you can survive without terminator, and use st? 

5.  if you're only using one wm and are the only user who uses that os on that box, might as well ditch the login/session manager.

6.  consider not only ditching the login manager, but switching off automatic gui start up all together.  there's surely some times when you dont really need it, and you can get what you need done from command line alone.

7.  nm-applet is a bit of a bloater.   it's hella convenient and effective at what it does, but in some people's situations, it's overkill.

8.  although mentioned a few times already... change wm, likely to a tiling wm.  openbox is really light, but there are lighter, albeit in classic stacking window managers, you usually sacrafice some featureweight for performanceweight.   for example blackbox... it's lighter than openbox, but boy is it sparse and simple.   me, i prefer tiling window managers.. xmonad being my fave, but since it's haskel deps are huge, i go with scrotwm.   dwm'l b lighter yet.   and then there's manual tilers, like musca.  it doesnt have the workflow i like about the dynamic tiling window managers, but boy is it's footprint small.

9.  wanna get extreme?   compile your own kernel.   ... heck compile your own everything, n compile in only what you need.    ... ok, debian's not the most convenient for that (gentoo is), but if you rly want to, u can.

10.   fslint.   or write your own scripts and crons for similar tasks... like maybe emptying the gunk from your browser cache, your logs, and your package manager.   but fslint's a simple, easy and handy piece of kit to ... er... de-lint your system's belly button.   :$

Last edited by Digit (2012-01-19 16:46:58)

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129 Reply by Digit

  • Digit
  • #! Die-hard
  • Offline
  • From: the internet
  • Registered: 2009-05-26
  • Posts: 703

Re: Making it more efficient and even lighter

in addition to #9 in my list there,

real time kernel, anyone?

https://www.google.com/search?q=real+time+kernel+debian


edit
ps,

oh, i forget from reading through... did anyone mention loading to ram?  iirc, it's not much more complicated than adding an option to your grub kernel line. 

you can also just load specific parts like libs, or /usr to ram, this alone would see your applications start immeeeediately, even fat things that otherwise take many seconds.  though i've never done it, didnt have the ram to acomodate the systems i wanted to do it with, and that's the issue with that, n why it's likely not done by default... it takes a few gig on most systems. 

and another "efficiency" tip,

set up keybinds.  either in your window manager, or using something that you can take with you, traversing your different window managers, especially keybinds for opening your configs (esp the one where you set up your keybinds*).  crunchbang was the first to really inspire me to make use of this.  i'd used keybinds before, in xmonad, and in kde, but not to the extent of savvyness that philip brought to us.  think workflow, workflow, workflow.

these two tips together, will take you from 

faffing around grabbing your mouse, finding your cursor, moving the cursor to the menu, clicking, waiting, moving your cursor some more, looking through menus, finding what you want, clicking, waiting, and waiting some more before your app starts

, to, 

pressing two keys, and your app apears on screen.

1337.

BD




* here's what i use to open my openbox config

    <keybind key="C-W-A-o">
      <action name="Execute">
        <startupnotify>
          <enabled>true</enabled>
          <name>Edit rc.xml</name>
        </startupnotify>
        <command>gedit ~/.config/openbox/rc.xml</command>
      </action>
    </keybind>

Last edited by Digit (2012-02-18 11:13:16)

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