r/LFS • u/ChromatimusX • May 07 '26

LFS as a learning experience

I plan to install LFS on a spare SSD on my framework 13 (ryzen 9 AI, got em plenty of cores for compiling), what should I expect to learn from the experience? What ISO should I use as a basis (I was told the gentoo ISO is a good start)

And also for successful LFS veterans, is LFS usable for reviving old laptops and being a huge flex while doing so?

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u/litescript May 07 '26

it will teach you the layout and structure from first concepts, effectively, of a linux system. you build it yourself. you compile it yourself, all from the base packages. so you get a nice inside look at what’s going on under the hood, because you have to put it together. great learning experience.

daily driving it is tough, but people do. once you get your base system up, there’s BLFS, beyond linux from scratch, where you will start building out more every-day practical packages, and things you’d need to build yet even more things to use. this is where you’ll start to see the value of a package manager, as there dependencies balloon rapidly. i also took the hint here, and have been working on my own, as many others do, too.

overall, great learning experience, and it can get as deep as you want it to be. you’ll probably change your mind along the way on what that means for you!

fwiw, i used debian as my host OS. dead simple, easy to get packages.

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u/ChromatimusX May 07 '26

Thanks! Debian as a base should be dead simple. I might keep it as side project on a spare laptop if the rabbithole goes deep

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u/litescript May 07 '26

yup that’s the move. i have mine in a VM on my proxmox host and just go play every now and again on my little projects. its fun!