Fedora IoT Bootc Images

Getting Familiar with Bootc

As part of Fedora’s initiative towards bootable containers, you can now create Fedora IoT bootc images. These images use standard OCI/Docker containers as transport but contain all components needed to boot a Fedora IoT system. This allows you to ship updates to your Fedora IoT system using container images.

Essentially, Fedora IoT bootc images retain all the functionality you’re used to in Fedora IoT, while leveraging the flexibility and ease of maintenance provided by bootc.

For more information, please check out the official bootc documentation, as well as the Fedora Bootc Base Images Git repository.

Fedora IoT Bootc Image Example

This example walks through building and booting a Fedora IoT bootc image in a Podman machine.

To start, create a clone of the Fedora Bootc Base Images Git repository. This includes the Fedora IoT package manifest we will use to create out Fedora IoT bootc image.

Within this clone, create a Containerfile.custom with the following contents:

FROM localhost/fedora-bootc as builder
RUN /usr/libexec/bootc-base-imagectl build-rootfs --manifest=fedora-iot /target-rootfs

FROM scratch
COPY --from=builder /target-rootfs/ /
LABEL containers.bootc 1
ENV container=oci
STOPSIGNAL SIGRTMIN+3
CMD ["/sbin/init"]

Initialize your Podman machine using the following command. You may skip this step if you already have a podman machine.

podman machine init

Grant your Podman machine the permissions necessary to run your Fedora IoT bootc image using:

podman machine set --rootful

Start your Podman machine using

podman machine start

Next, create a localhost/fedora-bootc image using the command below. This is required for building your Fedora IoT bootc image, as the containerfile you created uses localhost/fedora-bootc as builder:

podman -c podman-machine-default-root build --cap-add=all --security-opt=label=disable \
--device /dev/fuse -t localhost/fedora-bootc .

You’ve now created a localhost/fedora-bootc image and have all the tools to build your fedora-iot image. Use the following command to do so:

podman -c podman-machine-default-root build --cap-add=all --security-opt=label=disable \
--device /dev/fuse -t localhost/fedora-iot -f Containerfile.custom

After building the localhost/fedora-iot image, you should be able to see it in your Podman machine’s list of images. Use the following command to check:

podman -c podman-machine-default-root images

You’re now ready to boot a virtual machine using your new Fedora IoT bootc image. The command below will boot a VM in your current terminal window, allowing you to test everything that Fedora IoT bootc images have to offer:

podman-bootc run --filesystem=xfs localhost/fedora-iot

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