Hi there,
Maybe a stupid question, but if I use the snapshot tool to create a custom iso, will this be a proper remaster that runs on all hardware just like the default Antix and can also be installed normally? Or will it be specific to my hardware? Does it have any limitations?

In other words: What is the exact difference to a standard remaster (I recall there is another remastering tool in Antix)?

my answer assumes antiX-13.

a snapshot iso should boot on another computer. I often build custom antiX installs from core in virtual box and then use the snapshot tool to make a bootable iso. The snapshot isos install with the cli-installer instead of the regular gui installer.

there is one little bug on install of a snapshot iso in that you may have to remove entries in / etc/rc.local to remove some scripts that are called in the live session. sometimes they still show up in my custom installs. Its a quick edit.

remaster is for liveUSB (or frugal install) media, to take changes in the filesystem and roll them back up into the linuxfs squash file system that the live media uses.

snapshot makes an iso from an installed system.

Thanks for the answer but I think I still don't get it entirely.

So none of them will allow me to boot a live cd, change stuff and install programs in the live session and then create a new iso from this which is a full live/install iso just like antix itself?

I understood that this is how remastering in Puppy Linux works.

fladd wrote:Thanks for the answer but I think I still don't get it entirely.

So none of them will allow me to boot a live cd, change stuff and install programs in the live session and then create a new iso from this which is a full live/install iso just like antix itself?

I understood that this is how remastering in Puppy Linux works.

I can't tell you how puppy works because I don't know.

the snapshot version in antiX-13 will not make an iso from a liveCD session, only from an installed system. that may come down the road (I think the version in the MX edition can do that).

if you install apps to in a liveCD session, then the installer will install those apps if you run the install from the same session. (home folder changes will be lost unless you copy them over youself).

if you use a liveUSB w/ persistence then changes made to the liveUSB will be carried over to future installs, and the remaster utitility will roll changes from the persistence file back into the main file system file. and the regular gui installer works just fine that way. This is normally how I do what you are talking about. On the one PC I have that can't boot from USB, I use a plop bootloader floppy (a cd will work too) to boot the usb.

I see. Interesting. I should look into remastering then I guess. Thanks!

fladd wrote:So none of them will allow me to boot a live cd, change stuff and install programs in the live session and then create a new iso from this which is a full live/install iso just like antix itself?

In the future the antiX snapshot program will allow you to do this. The MX snapshot program (in MX-14.4) lets you do it now.

With antiX, if you have an existing partition that has a few gig free then you can select"frugal" from the"F5 Persist" boot menu and do a fast and quick frugal install from the CD. Think of this as a to-disk equivalent of to-ram. You will also get a chance to enable root and home persistence. This will allow you to have both persistence and remastering available when booting from a LiveCD (you must keep selecting"F5 Persist" --> frugal on each for this to work even though the install happens only the first time).

Unfortunately, as Dolphin_Oracle already said, the snapshot program in antiX doesn't work on live sessions. In the meantime the isomaster program (available via Synaptic or apt-get) can be used to create an iso file from a remastered LiveUSB (or frugal install).

To come back to this topic:

So in Antix15 I can run the snapshot programme from the live cd?

And is there any (technical?) reason, whe an ISO created by a snapshot does not include the GUI installer? This somehow gives me the impression that snapshot ISOs are not supposed to be given to other people, or supposed to be used to create public re-spins of Antix. Is this correct? It would be great to be able to create re-spins quickly, which then are also"normally" installable.

Bear in mind that with each new antix release, the documentation might not have caught up with features which have been recently tweaked/added.

the snapshot program in antiX doesn't work on live sessions.

I'm stunned at reading this. I didn't realize this... and find it hard to believe this is/was correct.
In any event, included in the soon-to-be-released antiX 15 is a new"iso-snapshot" tool. It certainly runs (I tested) from live session.

Use of the earlier antix-snapshot tool, followed by the"antix2usb" tool, I expect that would do exactly what it sounds like you wish to accomplish.
IIRC, the newer"iso-snapshot" tool should fit the bill. In fact, I just rechecked its description, which states"Create a live CD snapshot of your system"

Across distros, the term"remaster" is used a bit too generically, too liberally.
The way I see it, the output of Remaster... is intended to be shared with other people (acquaintences or strangers)
and remastering tools are designed to scrub all"personal" data (including hardware-specific configs/settings).

In contrast, snapshot tools are expected to output"a faithful copy" of your currently configured system.
Some scrubbing is still necessary and/or desirable, and the workflow of a snapshotting tool should
both explain this and encourage you to pick/choose what NOT to carryover into the snapshot output.
For instance, I surely don't want to copy the content of my browser cache directory... but someone paying for internet access per-Gb might want that to be copied.

If you just"dive in, and do it" (snapshot), I think you'll be pleased with the result.
In the meantime,"reading about it, talking about it, wondering about it" will likely increase your confusion.
(Not your fault. From a distance it's a confusingly abstract subject.)

The snapshot programs are designed to create"respins" as you say but we have decided to call them"snapshots" to distinguish them from distro respins. antiX is a respin of Mepis. Eino has created a music/musician oriented respin of antiX. The difference I think is that a snapshot is a one-off while a respin implies ongoing support.

I don't know if the new iso-snapshot program includes the GUI installer or not. I know it is much improved over the previous version. It is actually a fork of the mx-snapshot tool created by Adrian for the MX distro (which is a major respin of antiX).

The snapshot tools create iso files. They were originally meant as backups but we have been modifying the tools so people can use them to make snapshots for general distribution. Adrian uses his mx-snapshot tool to make
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with the latest upgrades/updates.

If you start off with a live system then add and remove packages and then make a general-purpose snapshot, the iso file you create should be fine to distribute to others. But there may still be a few (perhaps minor) imperfections. It is quite good now but we are trying to make a few improvements. For example, I think the current antiX iso-snapshot program will work on a Live system but it will store large intermediate files in RAM so if you don't have a lot of RAM then it may not work.

The live-remaster program is similar but it is slightly different. It can only be run from a LiveUSB or a frugal install, not a LiveCD. It is more for updating your existing LiveUSB system. Normally on the Live system all file system changes are stored in RAM. If you make a lot of changes then you should run live-remaster which will make a compressed version of your current file system, basically converting all of those changes in RAM into a new linuxfs file that lives on the LiveUSB. The next time you boot the new linuxfs file will be used automatically. So you don't get a new iso file from a remaster, you just get an updated LiveUSB.

We don't yet have a program that makes an iso file directly from an existing LiveUSB (although this is own my todo list). The iso-snapshot program can do this but it is time consuming because it has to re-compress the entire file system.

I agree with skidoo:

If you just"dive in, and do it" (snapshot), I think you'll be pleased with the result.

Edit: fixed link to Adrian's monthly snapshots.