Building the ISO

Everything that makes up Boykisser Linux is in one repository:

Path	What
`auto/config`	live-build settings (Debian release, bootloaders, boot options)
`config/package-lists/`	Packages in the image
`config/hooks/normal/`	Setup scripts that run inside the image while it’s built
`config/includes.chroot/`	Files copied straight into the image (themes, configs, artwork)
`config/bootloaders/`	Live boot menu theme
`tools/`	The `boykisser-*` scripts and Boykisser Center, packaged into `.deb`s
`web/`	This website
`docker/Dockerfile.builder`	The Debian container the build runs in

Build

You need podman (or docker) and around 30 GB of free space. The build runs in a privileged Debian container, so the host distro doesn’t matter.

./build.sh                 # full ISO
./build.sh --netinstall    # slim ISO, apps download on first boot
./build.sh --lite          # BIOS-only ISO for old hardware
./build.sh --fast          # keep the built system, only regenerate the ISO
./build.sh --clean         # start from scratch, including the package cache

A full build takes 20 to 40 minutes the first time. Downloaded packages are cached in cache/, so rebuilds are quicker. The log goes to build.log and the ISO lands next to build.sh as boykisser-linux-amd64.iso (or -netinstall- / -lite-).

--fast is only for boot menu and ISO-level tweaks. After changing package lists, hooks or tools, run a normal build.

Test in a VM

./test-vm.sh               # boot the ISO (UEFI)
./test-vm.sh --bios        # legacy BIOS
./test-vm.sh --disk        # attach a 40 GB virtual disk to try the installer
./test-vm.sh --installed   # boot what you installed on that disk

It needs QEMU, and OVMF for UEFI. KVM is used when available. If your distro packages QEMU’s GTK window and virtio GPU separately (Arch: qemu-ui-gtk, qemu-hw-display-virtio-vga), the script falls back to plain VGA and a VNC display on 127.0.0.1:5900.

The build needs real root (debootstrap creates device nodes), so with podman run it as root, e.g. sudo ./build.sh or ENGINE="sudo podman" ./build.sh.

Change the tools

Edit scripts in tools/bin/. To try them on a running system without a rebuild:

tools/build-debs.sh && sudo apt install ./tools/dist/*.deb

The next ISO build packages them automatically. To ship them to installed systems, bump tools/VERSION and push a matching tools-vX.Y.Z tag. CI builds the packages and boykisser update picks them up.

Releases

Every Monday CI tags a new vMAJOR.MONTH.YY.N release (for example v2.10.26.4; the major number lives in MAJOR_VERSION) and builds all three ISOs with the current Debian kernel and security updates.
./scripts/bump_version.sh tags a release by hand.
ISOs are published to GitHub Releases (the full one split into parts) and mirrored to the Internet Archive with a torrent.

The website

cd web
npm install
npm run dev      # http://localhost:4321

It’s Astro with Starlight for the docs. Docs pages are Markdown files in web/src/content/docs/docs/. Every page has an Edit page link at the bottom.