Chisel¶
Chisel is a tool for carving and cutting Ubuntu packages.
It is built on the idea of package slices - minimal, complimentary, and loosely coupled sets of files, based on the package’s metadata and content. Slices are basically logical subsets of the Ubuntu packages, with their own content and set of dependencies to other internal and external slices.
Chisel is able to extract a highly customised and specialised Slice of the Ubuntu distribution, which one could see as a block of stone from which we can carve and extract the small and relevant parts we need to run our applications.
It operates similar to a package manager, but for package slices, thus being particularly useful for supporting developers in the creation of smaller but equally functional container images.
In this documentation¶
Get started - become familiar with Chisel by slicing Ubuntu packages to create a minimal root file system.
Step-by-step guides - learn key operations and common tasks.
Technical information - understand the CLI commands, slice definitions files and Chisel manifests.
Discussion and clarification - explore Chisel’s mode of operation and learn about fundamental topics such as package slices.
Project and community¶
Chisel is free software and released under AGPL-3.0.
The Chisel project is sponsored by Canonical Ltd.