For Fedora 38

This is how to do a minimal installation of Fedora.

1. Grab the Netboot ISO from https://fedoraproject.org/server/download/
2. Boot the CD, choose “Install Fedora 38”
3. Choose your language, click continue
4. Choose “Installation Destination”, choose “Storage Configuration” → “Custom”, click “Done”
5. Create partitions as you wish, click “Done”
6. Back in the Installation summary choose “Software selection”
7. choose “Fedora Custom Operating System” (Note: this is even smaller than the “Minimal Installation” option)
8. Create a User account by clicking at “User Creation”
9. Click “Done”, then “Begin Installation”
10. When finished click “Reboot System”

After installation login and become root and execute the following commands

systemctl disable systemd-userdbd
systemctl disable systemd-oomd
systemctl disable systemd-resolved
rm -f /etc/resolv.conf
 
# a privacy respecting nameserver from https://dnsforge.de/
echo "nameserver 176.9.93.198" >/etc/resolv.conf
dnf update
# replace dnf with dnf5, a more lightweight and faster implementation of dnf
dnf install dnf5
ln -sf /usr/bin/dnf5 /usr/bin/dnf
dnf upgrade
 
# remove unnecessary packages
dnf remove firewalld
dnf remove sssd-*
dnf remove audit
dnf remove NetworkManager
 
# Install DHCP client daemon
dnf install dhcpcd
systemctl enable dhcpcd@eth0 # replace eth0 with your network interface

Then reboot. Congratulation, you have now the smallest Fedora system possible.

Memory consumption (htop): 125 MB

In this example we use herbstluftwm. Execute the following commands as user

sudo dnf install herbstluftwm xterm xorg-x11-server-Xorg xorg-x11-xinit xorg-x11-drv-* mesa-dri-drivers
echo "exec herbstluftwm" >~/.xinitrc
startx

Once X and herbstluftwm has launched press Alt + Return to launch xterm

Memory consumption (X+herbstluftwm+xterm+htop): 168 MB

In this example we use river, a simple tiling Wayland compositor

Execute the following commands as user

sudo dnf install river foot
mkdir -p ~/.config/river
cp /usr/share/river/init.example  ~/.config/river/init
river

Hit Super+Shift+Return for launching foot terminal

Memory consumption (river+foot+htop): 159 MB