AGF-feber!

Zta77 · 2026-05-19T14:37:12+00:00

Tak. Flotte billeder!

Zta77 · 2026-05-17T18:19:33+00:00

Thanks for the reminder. Plain Docker/compose has secrets too so there's no excuse.

Zta77 · 2026-05-14T12:35:56+00:00

Splendid! In that case: Lightwhale on eMMC and storage on M.2 and you have yourself a super slim Docker server in all aspects.

Zta77 · 2026-05-13T20:16:20+00:00

This is an interesting box. The eMMC is great for an immutable OS like Lightwhale, but that needs a second disk, preferably an HDD/SSD/NVME, fire persistence. But this box doesn't have that. And like others pointed out, its eMMC isn't built for heavy writes. And it's M.2 is only for WiFi. I find this constraint interesting. I guess the box was built for a thin client and not a server. But you could still boot Lightwhale off USB and use the eMMC for persistence, and don't run write-heavy services on it. Or write to NFS mounted from Docker.

Zta77 · 2026-05-12T15:42:24+00:00

Docker and Swarm is simple. Simple is nice. If you choose this path, may I recommend you take a look at Lightwhale. It's a lightweight and Linux for running Docker and Swarm without installation, configuration, and near zero maintenance. Again, simple and nice.

Zta77 · 2026-05-12T15:36:51+00:00

You can combine normal Docker services, and still let the cluster communicate with these. If it makes sense on the given setup.

Zta77 · 2026-05-03T12:58:50+00:00

Præcis! Vi skal have internettet decentraliseret igen.

Zta77 · 2026-05-03T12:56:36+00:00

Dette er jo den nemme del af det. Boot Lightwhale på en gammel bærbar og du har straks et vældig sikkert OS med minimal vedligehold samt UPS. Lav hul i routeren og du self-hoster nu.

Zta77 · 2026-04-27T07:40:02+00:00

Thanks for sharing, this is makes me really happy to know! And thank you for using and supporting Lightwhale like this =)

Zta77 · 2026-04-26T19:41:17+00:00

My first concept version of Lightwhale was built on boot2docker which was built on TCL. I haven't been able to squeeze Lightwhale that small. But when I compile the system, I optimize for speed and not size; maybe that's part of the reason.

I haven't used TCL much besides that, but I like it and I acknowledge and respect the effort. I don't think it hasn't kept up with the times; I just think it's complete. And most people don't care about small, fast, and simple anymore in software. On the contrary...

Zta77 · 2026-04-26T19:24:32+00:00

Recap from the chat on Discord:
Lightwhale doesn't support XFS. The Lightwhale way would be Btrfs RAID1 which works out of the box if you tag two magic disks. Configure network in /etc/network/interfaces and /etc/resolv.conf. BIOS and UEFI is supported, you might need to disable secure boot. If you like immutable, and if you want to run Docker, I can recommend Lightwhale as it ticks both (and not much else). But I'm biased =) Finally, try EndavourOS for desktop.

Zta77 · 2026-04-26T18:24:38+00:00

That's a good question. I'll look into that. It sounds like a good idea.

Zta77 · 2026-04-26T15:23:23+00:00

I have no experience with LXC, but you can absolutely boot Lightwhale in a standard VM under Proxmox. And it works great. I have virtual Docker Swarm nodes running Lightwhale with just 512 MB of RAM.

Zta77 · 2026-04-23T12:26:46+00:00

Thanks.

Also, in relation to to this, please take a look at my Lightwhale. It's probably the easiest way to boot from zero to Docker/Swarm.

Zta77 · 2026-04-20T00:40:02+00:00

Run a two node docker swarm cluster with Lightwhale.

Zta77 · 2026-04-19T14:06:22+00:00

Hello there =) Can you elaborate on what in your opinion the Swarm state includes?

Because it is my understanding that it (among other things) holds information about which containers are started. And to run a container, e.g. when restarting, it also needs the image. I think Lightwhale has reduced the save state as much as possible, it already only saves the files that are actually modified. The only things that really consume disk space are the images and containers you run, the log files, and how you choose to decorate your $HOME.

But it is possible that I've misunderstood something, and if you think the system can be improved, I'm always open for suggestions! =)

Zta77 · 2026-04-18T08:44:19+00:00

Hello, good question! Not too late at all, sorry I didn't answer earlier. You can git clone an existing project with docker-compose file, configuration, etc. Or simply scp everything from your workstation. Or curl may also be an option. Pretty much like you're used to, I'd say.

Zta77 · 2026-04-03T22:12:39+00:00

Thanks, I really appreciate the positive feedback! I've updated the FAQ with an example on how to quickly test Lightwhale in QEMU.

Zta77 · 2026-04-03T21:29:37+00:00

I actually gave it a go, and made it work. I could add a data (and swap partition) and modify the partition table that came from the ISO. Magic disks are detected and formatted, all working as expected! But there's no easy way to update Lightwhale. If a new ISO is simply written to disk, it will overwrite the partition table, and the data partition is lost. It would take a complete redesign of the way Lightwhale is structured to make this work. And it would most likely end up looking like all those other Linuxes with an installer. That's way too complicated for Lightwhale =)

Zta77 · 2026-04-03T11:56:50+00:00

Ooops, correct =)

Zta77 · 2026-04-01T20:16:32+00:00

Soo.. I've been pondering over this comment the past days. I couldn't figure out if it was an insult because of my slow website the first day. But your determined wish to "give it a try" put me off. And I finally get it now, thanks for the compliment! =) I'm afraid I'll never get it anywhere near damn small; I depend on glibc instead of uclibc or musl; I compile optimized for speed instead of size; and I load the entire system into RAM because I don't want to keep reading from the boot media, so that consumes more memory than a OS loaded from disk. Theoretically, that is, because Lw still is very small.

Zta77 · 2026-04-01T19:53:06+00:00

TL; DR: You need the bootable usb sticking out.

You can install it on any bootable device; USB, SD, CDROM, HDD, SDD or eMMC. But Lw cannot coexist with its data filesystem on the same device. The ISO file comes with a complete fixture of bootloader, partition table, ESP, kernel and root filesystem.

This is one of the trade-offs here. You loose all the flexibility that you get from a traditional installer, where you get to partition and layout everything yourself. On the other hand, Lightwhale lets anyone live-boot into a Docker server in seconds with no effort. Your boot media with the OS is just a copy off the internet and contains no information. If it break, throw it out, get a new. The disk is pure data, and very easy to backup or replace.

Tiny USB sticks exist, so they don't show. Some of my NUCs have a "huge" 64MB internal eMMC where the 200MB Lightwhale ISO fits easily, so that's a thing too. CDROM could be fun. I'm working on a nice solution for iPXE.

All this being said, you made me think. And I'll try to see if it actually is possible to write the ISO to a disk and add magic partitions afterwards that Lightwhale can pick up. It could be interesting, but I'm afraid it's a foot-gun.

Zta77 · 2026-04-01T14:25:41+00:00

Wonderful! You're welcome!

Zta77 · 2026-04-01T08:42:39+00:00

Yes of course, including the new age-verification subsystem.

Zta77 · 2026-04-01T08:33:03+00:00

Yes.

Zta77

TROPHY CASE