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Documentation › Developing Aurora

Building Aurora

Requirements, make targets, build stages and developing the desktop without an ISO

Requirements

A Linux computer with Docker (or Podman), about 25 GB of free disk space and a network connection. Building takes 20–60 minutes the first time.

Build

git clone https://github.com/padovanl/auroraOS
cd auroraOS
make iso          # out/aurora-os-VERSION-amd64.iso and its .sha256

Make targets

Target	What it does
`make iso`	Builds the ISO in a container, stage by stage.
`make run`, `make run-uefi`	Boots the ISO in QEMU (BIOS or UEFI).
`make debs`, `make repo`	Builds Aurora's packages and the signed apt repository.
`make site`	Rebuilds the website from the README and docs/_src.
`make manual`	Rebuilds this documentation from docs/_manual.
`make -C desktop pot`	Regenerates the translation template.
`make test` and friends	See Testing.

Stages

Stage	What it does
`10-bootstrap`	debootstrap creates a minimal Debian trixie.
`20-packages`	Installs the package lists in config/packages/, translations and locales.
`25-extras`	Third-party packages verified by checksum.
`30-system`	Copies overlay/, writes Aurora's identity.
`35-defaults`	Firewall, automatic updates, Flathub, Docker, shell setup.
`40-desktop`	Builds and installs `aurora-desktop` and `aurora-artwork`.
`50-branding`	Boot splash, GRUB theme, installer branding.
`70-pool`	Offline packages for the installer.
`80-finalize`	initramfs, cleanup.
`90-iso`	SquashFS, the GRUB menu, a hybrid BIOS+UEFI ISO.

Changing the desktop without rebuilding

The desktop is Python: run it from a checkout with AURORA_LIBDIR=$PWD/desktop desktop/bin/aurora-files, or start a headless development session with the tools in desktop/dev/. In a running VM, tests/interact/serve.py and do.py push the checkout's code and drive the desktop.