PRoot on Replit

This is a PRoot implementation of alpha version for Replit.

This repl is using Alpine Container to demonstrate PRoot on Replit. Just press the start button and look at Console/Shell.

You may install some packages like coreutils, neofetch, and more so like that.

Basics

proot -0 -r rootfsDir -b /dev -b /prop -b /sys -w /root /bin/sh

• -r - option to specify the rootfs where Linux distribution was installed.
• -0 - tells PRoot to simulate a root user which expected to be always available in Linux distributions. This option will allow you to use package manager.
• -b /dev -b /prop -b /sys - options to make file systems at /dev, /proc, /sys appear in the rootfs. These 3 bindings are important and used by variety of utilities.
• /bin/sh - a program that should be executed inside the rootfs. Typically a shell.

Alpine Linux Basics

Installing & Uninstalling packages

Installing packages

apk add [package name]

Uninstalling packages

apk del [package name]

Learn more at: https://wiki.alpinelinux.org

Why using Alpine instead of Ubuntu, Debian, or Fedora?

First, AlpineLinux is known as a lightweight linux distro. Because replit only has a small storage, Those distro is not very perfect for this condition. Mainly because it's package repo/manager like apt.

Their recommended packages that should installed is very alot which will uses a lot of storage. Just imagine, neofetch is originally 400 KB only. But in debian apt, it will uses 50 MB of storage which is big pain. That's why i choose alpine for this proot demonstration.

AlpineLinux rootfs itself is 40% Very small (5 MB) compared to other linux distro rootfs:

• Ubuntu: 42.0 MB
• Debian: 99 MB
• Fedora: 35.3 MB

Sources

• PRoot: https://proot-me.github.io
• Talloc (Proot Dependencies): https://talloc.samba.org
• Alpine Linux: https://alpinelinux.org