From Fedora Project Wiki
< SIGs | Minimal Core
This is a draft proposal.
What is the purpose of the @core group in Fedora?
Fedora is not an ultra-minimalist "tiny linux distribution". However, we need a reasonably small base for the rest of Fedora to build upon.
The basic principles for packages in the core group are:
- The basic target is a running command-line only system with an ssh server and a network-capable package installer. Some use cases (like running in a chroot) need even less than this, and while we want to address that as well, that's a subset of the core package set.
- As small as possible, but no smaller The packages in core aren't a separate mini-distribution but instead are the base of Fedora as a whole. Everything that we do include should be basically functional as-is. For example, we don't need every single man page split into a different sub-package, and since we do install man pages, a man page reader should be installed.
- Avoid dependency creep as a default If you maintain a package in @core, please avoid introducing additional dependencies whenever possible. If an updated package does bring additional packages, please bring this up on the Fedora Development list.
- Features and First are still important. We value the Fedora foundations of Features and First, and recognize that the introduction of new dependencies is often required to meet those needs.