How to create a readonly root linux: Can be mounted as writeable for persistent changes?

Posted by Mr Anderson on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by Mr Anderson
Published on 2013-11-08T12:57:35Z Indexed on 2013/11/08 15:59 UTC
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linux

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read-only

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embedded-linux

I'd like a read only file system that runs almost entirely in RAM but the compact flash or hardrive can be mounted and made writeable to make persistent changes.

How do I do this on Linux? I've looked at several tutorials but none really explain how to create such a system with the option of being able to mount the storage device and make persistent changes.

I looked at this so far: http://chschneider.eu/linux/thin_client/ I also looked on the old gentoo wiki but the article was very specific to Gentoo. I'll be using a debian based Linux but it would be nice I've someone could explain to me how to do this in pretty generic instructions ,that would work on any Linux distro.

Thanks.

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