Meilix

Beautiful Linux Build Distro

• LXQT as the standard Desktop Environment
• based on ubuntu/debian architecture
• Philosophy: light weight, fast, customized
• Reasonable preconfigured settings for the use case
• system lock

Feature

• Meilix uses build.sh to build the Distro.
• build.sh is a shell script which fetch ubuntu sources and customizes it to get the required distro.
• chroot.sh installs the required packages and metapackges.
• debuild.sh is used to rebuild the metapackages in case of a change in the meilix-metapackage.

Starting Development

• Fork the Git repository
• After cloning use build.sh to build an ISO.
• Claim an open issue at https://github.com/fossasia/meilix/issues
• Sent pull requests to the FOSSASIA repository https://github.com/fossasia/meilix/.

Building Locally

• You need to run ./build.sh in your terminal to get an iso locally in your system.

Building on Travis

• After forking the repo make required changes.
• Change the .travis.yml API key by following the article
• Now as soon as you push the required changes in your branch of forked repo, Travis will make a Github Release.
• The build ISO file could be tried out with virtual machines as qemu or virtualbox to test your changes.
• Remember before making a PR, make sure all your changes work, refer to the related issue. The issue should get closed and revert back the Travis API key to that of FOSSASIA since that key will be responsible for building the ISO.
• Squash your commits if there are more than one.

Creating a metapackage

Creating a metapackage is really easy, we will make use of equivs to make our metapackage.

• First, install equivs: sudo apt-get install equivs
• Now run equivs: equivs-control ns-control
• It will create a file called ns-control, open this file with your text editor.
• Modify the file to your needs modifying the needy information.
• Then run: equivs-build ns-control to build your metapackage, thats all simple and easy.
• To add it to meilix follow adding a metapackage to meilix section.

List of basic items included while creating a metapackage

• Changes will be made in the ns-control file which was created earlier.
• Change the name of the ns-control file to control.
• There are several lines of which required one are mention below:
• Source and package is the name of the metapackage that we want to give.
• Depends line consists of the packages that we want the metapackage should consistes of.
• Description line consists a short description of the metapackages.
• There are lots of other line which also matters depending upon the need of the metapackage. Go through here for more info.

Adding a Metapackage to meilix

• Create a metapackage and place it in the root directory of the project
• Add it to the build.sh file like sudo cp -v nameOfYourMeta-package.deb chroot in the 'copy source.list' line and dpkg -i nameOfYourMeta-package.deb lastly apt-get install -f.
• Follow the syntax (writing style) used in the build.sh
• Install reprepro if you don't have it, run: sudo apt-get install reprepro
• Make sure you are on the meilix repository.
• Run the following command for each meta-package you create: reprepro includedeb trusty ./nameOfYourMeta-package.deb

Personalizing it

Updating the OS/metapackage to the latest version

• For this, we need to update sources.list file to the version we desire.

Customize the Browser

• For this, we need to edit chrome.json file found under meilix-default-settings. You can change homepage URL, default search-engine,etc. If you want to change some setting which is selected by default, then remove the comment and change its value from "1" to "0" or from "false" to "true" or vice-versa, depending upon the requirement.

Know your OS

• Metapackage and distro information can be found in dists directory.

Communication

Chat: Gitter Channel | Get an Invite Please join our mailing list to discuss questions regarding the project: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/meilix Scrum report for the repository will be send to the address: [email protected]

Contributions, Bug Reports, Feature Requests

This is an Open Source project and we would be happy to see contributors who report bugs and file feature requests submitting pull requests as well. Please report issues in the GitHub tracker.

Branch Policy

We have the following branches

• master All development goes on in the master branch. If you're making a contribution, you are supposed to make a pull request to master. PRs to the branch must pass a build check and a unit-test check on Travis
• gh-pages This contains the autogenerated code of the master branch that is generated by Travis.
• generator This (obsolete) branch was responsible for having the changes which will be implemented for generating the iso using webapp meilix-generator. It basically fetch the latest release from Github and use mksquashfs tool to extract, made changes and then repack it and mail it. This will take very less time to customize the ISO.

Contributions Best Practices

Commits

• Write clear meaningful git commit messages (Do read http://chris.beams.io/posts/git-commit/)
• Make sure your PR's description contains GitHub's special keyword references that automatically close the related issue when the PR is merged. (More info at https://github.com/blog/1506-closing-issues-via-pull-requests )
• When you make minor changes to a PR of yours (like for example fixing a failing travis build or some small style corrections or minor changes requested by reviewers) make sure you squash your commits afterwards so that you don't have an absurd number of commits for a very small fix. (Learn how to squash at https://davidwalsh.name/squash-commits-git )
• When you're submitting a PR for a UI-related issue, it would be really awesome if you add a screenshot of your change or a link to a deployment where it can be tested out along with your PR. It makes it very easy for the reviewers and you'll also get reviews quicker.

Feature Requests and Bug Reports

• When you file a feature request or when you are submitting a bug report to the issue tracker, make sure you add steps to reproduce it. Especially if that bug is a rare one.

Join the development

• Before you join development, please set up the project on your local machine, run it and go through the application completely. Press on any button you can find and see where it leads to. Explore. (Don't worry ... Nothing will happen to the app or to you due to the exploring 😉 Only thing that will happen is, you'll be more familiar with what is where and might even get some cool ideas on how to improve various aspects of the app.)
• If you would like to work on an issue, drop in a comment at the issue. If it is already assigned to someone, but there is no sign of any work being done, please free to drop in a comment so that the issue can be assigned to you if the previous assignee has dropped it entirely.

Do read the Open Source Developer Guide and Best Practices at FOSSASIA.

Merging Pull Requests

• These MUST apply for your pull request to be merged:
  • you provide a screenshot of the working ISO image
  • the build passes
• Your Pull request can be merged within 24 hours if you get a positive review.
• Your Pull request can be merged after 24 hours of the last commit and last comment if no maintainer responded.

If the pull request creates a problem, the first person to recognize it should revert the pull requets as soon as possible.

License

This project is currently licensed under GNU Lesser General Public License v3.0 (LGPL-3.0). A copy of LICENSE.md should be present along with the source code. To obtain the software under a different license, please contact FOSSASIA.