i am initiating work on delivering an embedded variant of gnowsys [1] which i intend to complete by december 2016. for the same, i will be re-writing the entire gnowsys stack such that it is geared towards a proper decentralized control model instead of the existing centralized one [2]. the completed project would be targeted to be run on low cost compute systems like the raspberry pi to afford wider adoption by virtue of them being more economically viable than real servers or even desktops. given all of the above, and the fact that i have very little knowledge about hardware level stuff, i request information about; 1. ways in which r-pi based system be wirelessly networked without human intervention, something like creating mesh networks which can auto-discover other nodes using zeroconf. 2. a feasible approach to deploying such nodes in regions with bad electrical and network infrastructure. also, i need a custom designed linux based distribution with the following characteristics; 1. minimal disk footprint (within 8mb), 2. low memory usage (within 4mb), 3. low electrical power consumption, 4. high security (am quite fascinated by the 'olpc' model). this is targeted to be free software, both, as in speech and beer. collaborators interested in working on the above are most welcome to contact me, either on the list or off it. best regards, ~mayuresh 1. http://www.gnu.org/software/gnowsys/ 2. http://www.gnowledge.org/