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That's exactly what I did, installed Slackware from diskettes in an old notebook with 16MB memory and 1.3GB HD. Runs Abiword and Gnumeric fine, what you need for the majority of office work. It originally had windows 95, but do you know what is the newest version of a Microsoft OS that will install in a machine with 16MB RAM? And how would you fit a Microsoft OS plus Microsoft Office in a 1.3GB disk with space left for user applications, unless it was w95?

The advantage Linux has is that you don't need a 1995 version of Linux to run in a 1995 machine. There are distributions made specifically for small machines

The only thing that keeps Linux from being widely used in the poorest countries is the same factor that keeps it from being more widely used in the USA: ignorance. The tragedy of it is that the poorer a country is, the most it would gain from switching to Linux.

Yes, partnering with Redhat to make a distro is going to make things difficult. But if you give it a brief amount of love, it can easily work. Until two years ago, I ran Debian on a machine with very similar specs, although it did have more disk space. The base install of Debian takes up over 500 megabytes. Localization for a langauge other than english may require up to another 200. The "desktop task" on Debian takes up almost 2 gigs. Although this installs both KDE and GNOME, clearly this system isn't designed for a 100 dollar laptop market that doesn't exist. If rather than install you cook up a single image for all these devices, then KDE+GNOME is down to 1.3 Gigabytes. This is still too damn big. I don't know offhand what eats up a lot of debian's base, but its clear the big guys aren't after this non-existant market at the moment.

However, its not impossible, moreover, its been done before. Fuck, theres even a HOWTO on the subject. There's also several distros and projects on the subject, but many of them have died out as the need for them has waned. In short, you cant just put fedora core on your 512M CF card, and if you expected this, you're much further from done than you think.

The possibilities would be nearly limitless

I'm sorry, but this IS a joke. From what I've read, the NDS has only 4 MB RAM and that's a pretty much hard limit.
Well, there are Linux distros like SmallLinux http://www.superant.com/smalllinux/ that somehow work with such an amount of RAM, but it's shell only and stuff. That's far from "limitless". IIRC Qtopia requires at least 16MB RAM.

Why do so many /.ers whant Linux everywhere?
For tasks like this, you need a highly specialized software, if you want PDA funktionality and that's not Linux.

Maybe it's possible to put extra RAM in a cartridge and uns that as swap, but that won't be cheap.

Small Linux should have everything you need, on two floppies, to mount a USB filesystem. If not, it is simply the matter of compiling a kernel and sticking it on one of the floppies. Good luck with your project!

Better yet, you do a minimum install and I do a minimum install and we compare cos who needs this 1gig shit? I can still do an install in a couple hundred megs easily.

Oh wait, let me use any linux distribution I want. That way I can install smalllinux with smallX (real projects) and run a full OS with a graphical interface similar to windows 98 (of course much more advanced under the hood, reiserfs, preempt kernel etc etc latest tech) on a pentium with 4mb of ram and a 50-100mb hard disk.

Oh no wait we're *not* done. How about I burn a knoppix CD, plug in a small usb key and run without a HD at all?

Oh we're not done yet, how about I take an embeded linux system designed for a mobile phone and put it on a usb key, boot from it and THAT is my OS?
My OS, with full rights granted to me under the GPL on a USB key, yours still the same bloated shit you paid $100 for and have no rights over.
I'll even know what mine is doing on my hardware, imagine that.

Better yet, you do a minimum install and I do a minimum install and we compare cos who needs this 1gig shit? I can still do an install in a couple hundred megs easily.

Oh wait, let me use any linux distribution I want. That way I can install smalllinux with smallX (real projects) and run a full OS with a graphical interface similar to windows 98 (of course much more advanced under the hood, reiserfs, preempt kernel etc etc latest tech) on a pentium with 4mb of ram and a 50-100mb hard disk.

Oh no wait we're *not* done. How about I burn a knoppix CD, plug in a small usb key and run without a HD at all?

Oh we're not done yet, how about I take an embeded linux system designed for a mobile phone and put it on a usb key, boot from it and THAT is my OS?
My OS, with full rights granted to me under the GPL on a USB key, yours still the same bloated shit you paid $100 for and have no rights over.
I'll even know what mine is doing on my hardware, imagine that.

I have a bunch of old laptops so I have had the same problem as you. There is Small Linux but that didn't really suit me at the time. You can forget installing any other Linux distro on anything with less than 4Mb of RAM, although I would say Slackware is the best of the bunch when it comes to hardware requirements.

In the end I opted for Freedos for a 386 with 2Mb that my 5 year old son plays with. It's not UNIX, but it's much more UNIX-like than any other DOS I have used. There are also many educational programs and games that are available for free download.

Hope this helps.

A few megs of HD and 4MB RAM? A 486 is enough to do X, but you'll want to have at least 8 megs of RAM, and you would really benefit from having 16 or even 32 MB. Furthermore, though you may be able to fit an X installation on a HD of just a few megs (see 2diskxwin, Small Linux), I don't think you'll be able to do much of use with it unless you have a hard drive which is at least 30 MB or so.

I personally don't have any experience trying to use X in an installation smaller than 120 MB. If you can get this much, you might try doing what I did: install the latest ZipSlack, then move it to ext2 and add X.

A little googling came across Small Linux. It looks like it includes a few pre-compiled programs and TinyX as well.

Have you ever tried LRP (Linux Router Project)? I suppose no, because you don't get the "NFS mess" you talk about. I've seen it running from floppy disk and compact flash card, and it worked great.

Sure, you don't boot in 3 seconds when you do it from the floppy disk, put the flash card was a better anyway...! and you don't need to flash your BIOS everytime you want to upgrade...

There are a lot more of minimalist Linux distro that don't have this "NFS mess", like tomsrtbt and Small Linux... go to Linux.org to see a huge list of minimalist Linux distro! (of course, you need to select "minimalist" in the category box...)

• http://www.superant.com/smalllinux/
  
• http://ibiblio.org/vectorlinux/
  
• http://www.zelow.no/floppyfw/
  
• http://www.xandros.net/
  
• http://www.gentoo.org/
  
• Smoothwall ...
  
• http://www.ipcop.org/
  
• http://www.mandrakesoft.com/products/snf
  
• http://www.freesco.org/
  
• http://www.coyotelinux.com/
  
• http://leaf.sourceforge.net/
  
• http://www.gnatbox.com/Pages/gblight.html
  (this ones based on BSD IIRC)
  
• http://www.bbiagent.com/
  
• http://www.clarkconnect.org/"
  
• http://www.linux-firewall-tools.com/
  

There are a couple ways to get a modern Linux on your old 386 right now, although getting Red Hat to de-bloat would be very cool. I still use 6.2 on some old laptops because it was a nice, stable release, sorta modern apps, and works fine with 16 megs of RAM. But also look at Vector Linux, which has a 386 & 486 optimized distro with a 2.4 kernel & lots of small recent apps. You can get it on CD too. And also Small Linux, which will run in console mode in as little as 2 megs of RAM, and will do X-Windows with just 4 megs of RAM. The Small Linux kernel is only 2.0, though. But it's very cool to give someone an old 386 laptop with a Web browser, basically restored to some minimal usefulness.

By the way, if you check out Small Linux, you may notice that the home page talks about a .75 release. But you'll find a .81 release available for download. It's definitely improving (my first try with this distro & it just wouldn't even work, but now it actually runs if you're able to follow the instructions carefully).

No, please, not another windowing system. X11 is fine for most purposes and, if you need something is does not provide, write an extension. There are more than enough 'alternatives' that are either designed for niches, have never been finished or will never get a significant marekt share. They don't have any significant advantage, at least as a general window system, and they lack applications. And despite those people who claim that X11 is sooo bloated (usually because they see the memory usage and do not realize that most of the memory is taken by pixmaps that won't take less space in other solutions) there are proofs like TinyX and WeirdX.

We do not support Small Linux

We do not promise that Small Linux does anything

Small Linux may distroy (sic) all your data

Do not be ashamed as an old kernel is quite in style these days. I have been experimenting with some of these older, smaller gems. They were the ones that ran on less hardware and still do it well. Since I have a few 386's, some with 4MB laying around, may I share the following:

Superant - sells cheapo CDs catering to small computers
Xdenu Versions
Linux On A Floppy
Etherboot home page

My favorite:
toms router boot home page