Post #4367202

I've found a solution to the "init is not PID 1" problem on Alpine Linux. Now I can use a normal Alpine Linux as a bootloader! It turns out that "userspace-only reboot" is also supported by BusyBox init, after all. When you send SIGQUIT to PID 1, BusyBox shuts down all services, and relaunches a new init according to /etc/inittab's ::reboot:/target. So, to chainload your next system from an Alpine Live CD/USB. You just need to do these steps. First, get your networking, VPN (kernel-mode only) and NFS ready. Use IPv6 SLAAC for network, so the network survives in multiple userspaces even without a running DHCP client. /etc/init.d/networking start wg-quick up wg0 mount -t nfs4 -o vers=4.2,sec=sys 10.10.20.1:/client1/debian_root /mnt/ Then, echo "::restart:/sbin/switch_root /mnt /sbin/init" >> /etc/inittab # reload inittab kill -s SIGHUP 1 # disable sanity check # warning: switch_root will delete everything in rootfs touch /init # the king is dead, long live the king kill -s SIGQUIT 1 OpenRC shuts down the Alpine Linux, and BusyBox init replaces itself with systemd, and starts Debian in /mnt via NFS + VPN! The kernels don't match, new Debian kernel modules WILL NOT work, so you need a "double jump" with a kexec step to reload the kernels. This is currently in development, I'll write a blog post soon.