Floe Linux

Lightweight Distribution

View on GitHub

Floe is a lightweight Linux distribution made specifically to run Linux containers.

It uses Tiny Core Linux, runs completely from RAM and is a ~25 MB download*.

Added Features

  • Linux kernel configured with container support, like cgroupfs and overlayfs
  • GNU C Library (glibc) made container friendly, to support old kernel versions
  • Go language compiler package
  • Container runtime packages

Penguin on Ice Floe

Designed by brgfx / Freepik

Supported Architectures

amd64 (x86_64)

Also known as “CorePure64”

Core64 had a 64-bit kernel with 32-bit applications, CorePure64 has 64-bit apps

cdrom CorePure64.iso

The default ISO bootloader is isolinux, and it is tuned for generic CPU (VM).

arm64 (aarch64)

Also known as “piCore64”

piCore is the Raspberry Pi port of Tiny Core Linux, piCore64 has 64-bit support

cdrom piCore64.img

This uses the SD card bootloader, and it is tuned for cortex-a53 CPU (RPi3).

Supported Runtimes

Docker

Version 20.10 and later. See boot2docker for 19.03

$ tce-load -wi docker

Packages: runc.tcz, containerd.tcz, docker.tcz

Podman

Version 2.1.0 and later. See boot2podman for 1.9.3

$ tce-load -wi podman

Packages: crun.tcz, conmon.tcz, podman.tcz

Installation

There is currently no public release avaiable.

Ice Machine

Virtual machines with Floe can be created using Ice, like so: ice-machine create.

Note: ice-machine is based on the previous docker-machine and podman-machine.

Raspberry Pi

The image download can be flashed directly, using Balena Etcher or similar SD tool.

Packages

  • compiletc.tcz
  • go.tcz*
  • git.tcz
  • openssh.tcz
  • docker.tcz*
  • podman.tcz*

Repository, see: https://cloudsmith.io/~floelinux/repos/

Package repository hosting is graciously provided by Cloudsmith.

Version History

TCL Kernel Glibc Year Status
9.x 4.14 2.26 2018 Obsolete
10.x 4.19 2.28 2019 Previous
11.x 5.4 2.30 2020 Previous
12.x 5.10 2.32 2021 Previous
13.x 5.15 2.34 2022 Previous
14.x 6.1 2.36 2023 Current

Based on the original CorePure64 ISO and tatsushid/tinycore:10.0-x86_64.

See https://github.com/tatsushid/docker-tinycore for the original Dockerfile source

kvm -cdrom CorePure64-10.0.iso

Screenshot of QEMU Core

docker images tatsushid/tinycore

REPOSITORY          TAG          IMAGE ID      CREATED        SIZE
tatsushid/tinycore  10.0-x86_64  939e756a8d71  23 months ago  8.65MB

$ docker run -it docker.io/tatsushid/tinycore:10.0-x86_64
/ $

* for the boot image, excluding packages

15M CorePure64-10.0.iso
16M CorePure64-11.0.iso
17M CorePure64-12.0.iso
18M CorePure64-13.0.iso
19M CorePure64-14.0.iso

piCore 11.x only supported arm32 (32-bit).

24M piCore64-12.0.zip
25M piCore64-13.0.zip
26M piCore64-14.0.zip