If you already have a ZFS pool, I'd probably personally just throw on zfsbootmenu and a ZFS-root Alpine install. But, this is cooler and does have advantages:)

TIL about ZFSBootMenu! Still, the whole frood system is significantly less complex than ZFSBootMenu alone.

ZFSBootMenu and Alpine are a beautiful match.

> root/etc/ssh/ssh_host_ed25519_key and root/etc/ssh/ssh_host_ed25519_key.pub and root/root/.ssh/authorized_keys for obvious reasons.

What are the _obvious_ reasons for the NAS root to have an SSH key?

To log in and administer it? There's even an example; search for "extlinux --once". (There are other options, like a web UI or non-root SSH, but that's the obvious thing. Also if you want to advocate non-root I'm going to want to hear a threat model.)

You don't need a private key on the host for that, only your public key in authorized_keys.

Edit: Oh boy I should have paid more attention. Those are the host keys. :facepalm:

Previously -> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42428722

Thanks, macroexpanded!

Frood, an Alpine Initramfs NAS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42428722 - Dec 2024 (13 comments)

Reminds me of https://github.com/poettering/diskomator

I'd like the see the author achieve the same setup but with Nix

Unlikely to happen (with the author anyway). From TFA:

> Importantly to me, it’s not defined in some complex DSL

I'd like to see some other author achieve the same setup with Nix.

.. and/or Guix.

This looks interesting. I just set up an Alpine Diskless system that boots from a USB stick.

I originally tried to set up a NixOS diskless system with persistence for the same reason as the author but the LLM jerked me around and I had little understanding of the implications of the commands I was using. So I thought it best to pull the plug on that and stick with something more familiar.

You can do the same from an USI made from mkosi (mainstream distros support) with kernel boot parameter systemd.volatile=overlay. https://github.com/rhee876527/UKIfy-Xubuntu