Also the goal was to run LATEST kernel with no changes - just config. With other compression algorithms it was impossible to fit everything into a floppy. And I really wanted to have nano and some space to save few files. Without this it would be totally not usable OS.

also I got 486 DX2/66 as my first PC so I set that as a goal. Then checked how lower can I go. Also I only have 486 DX4 now to test on real hardware.

I would love to have a modern recreation of it.

Nice to read all of those comments. The project goal is more to learn how to make your own Linux distribution than to fit as much as possible on a floppy. It is fun to have a fully working OS at the end of this learning experience. Floppies are easy to use and just cool :)

There are a lot of better suited distributions for size and memory usage. What makes FLOPPINUX stand out is the complete tutorial to follow and then make your own changes on top of it. Learn and have fun!

https://krzysztofjankowski.com/floppinux/

It boots latest Linux, spawns console and have Vi for editing persisted files on that boot floppy. Runs on 486 CPU.

Official homepage is here: https://smol.p1x.in/os/

Another new and exciting thing for me is the Gemini protocol. The simple, low-tech internet. I started porting all my texts/websites to my own capsule at gemini://floppy.p1x.in (server from real 3.5" floppy!)

- lychee - pohotos

- nginx-proxy-manager - proxy/letsencrypt

- jellyfin - movies

- audiobookshelf - audiobooks

- nextcloud - news/talk

- ghost - few blogs

- httpd - many private and commercial web pages

- domistyle/tor-browser - easy access to TOR

- exatorrent - downloading linuxes ;)

- m4yur/mindmaps - mindmap

- portainer - administrating all those dockers

I got into the 512kb club at orange group (<250kb) https://512kb.club/#250 :)

With sample application and KIOSK mode.

- you compiled some parts in 64 bits and try to run the QEMU 32 bit system. Try qemu-system-x86_64

- you do not enabled starting #! scripts in the kernel

I ended up building the whole system on a 32bit old laptop and just don't care about the problems with installing missing 32bit libs on my 64bit system.

For me it's the best way to learn Linux.

But I don't think it is what you want. For sane set of tools it was a little bit over 1MB. Mine is bigger as I still need more tools for fixing/experimenting on live system (I'm using shell scripts for my application). In the end I will be removing more and more tools.

I updated the post with that info.

Thanks!