Disk layout :: Thumbelina :: Desktop Tooling Docs

All layouts use GPT.

Mode	Partitions	Windows-visible
Live ISOs	ESP FAT32 + exFAT (remainder)	Branded exFAT (ISOs + service kit)
Installed	ESP FAT32 + service exFAT (~256 MiB) + Btrfs (remainder)	Service exFAT only
Both	ESP FAT32 + exFAT (sized) + Btrfs (remainder)	exFAT (ISOs + service kit)

Mode

Partitions

Windows-visible

Live ISOs

ESP FAT32 + exFAT (remainder)

Branded exFAT (ISOs + service kit)

Installed

ESP FAT32 + service exFAT (~256 MiB) + Btrfs (remainder)

Service exFAT only

Both

ESP FAT32 + exFAT (sized) + Btrfs (remainder)

exFAT (ISOs + service kit)

Service kit

Written to the Windows-visible exFAT on every mode:

README.txt, VERSION.txt, links.txt, instance.json
docs/ how-tos
tools/ host binaries (native per OS/arch; optional polyglot experiment)
isos/ folder (primary on Live/Both)

Volume label defaults to Thumbelina.

Boot

GRUB EFI on the ESP. Live ISOs via GRUB loopback (no Ventoy runtime hook). Installed systems via rootflags=subvol=… into Btrfs subvolumes, with optional compress=zstd.