Customizing SCLive using Linux command lines

The SystemC liveCD is based on the Linux operating system. As a result the provided ISO file can easily customized with just a few command lines. This how-to will detail the steps required to mount the SCLive ISO file, modify it to fit your own requirements and eventually, recreate a new ISO file containing your alterations.

• The first step is to mount the original SCLive-x.x.iso file this can be achieved with the command:

sudo mount -o loop -t iso9660 SCLive-1.0.iso /mnt/loop

• The next step will be to create a temporary directory and copy the content of /mnt/loop inside it:

mkdir ~/mySCLive

• We can now move to the temporary directory and copy the content of the ISO in there:

cd ~/mySCLive

sudo mkdir /mnt/loop

sudo cp -r /mnt/loop .

• We now need to change the permissions to ‘write’:

sudo chmod -R +w *

• You can now add or remove modules form the temporary directory. Typically you will navigate to the modules directory and add or remove .mo files from here.

cd ~/mySCLive/loop/modules

sudo rm Geany_0_7_1.mo

sudo cp ~/SciTE_1_66.mo .

• In this example we are replacing the geany IDE with SciTE. These modules can be found at http://www.slax.org/modules.php
• Once your alterations are done we will need to recreate the ISO file with the following commands:

cd ~/mySCLive/loop
sudo cp -f boot/isolinux.bi_ boot/isolinux.bin

sudo mkisofs -o mySCLive.iso -v -J -R -D -A "mySCLive" -V "mySCLive" \
-no-emul-boot -boot-info-table -boot-load-size 4 \
-b boot/isolinux.bin -c boot/isolinux.boot .

Et Voila. You should now be able the burn the newly created ISO file with your favorite CD burning software or by following one the the how-tos on burning ISO files.

Just a last recommendation, use a CD-RW or even better a virtual environment (See the Virtual Machines how-to) when creating your own ISO image since it usually takes a few iterations before you get it just right.

David Cabanis