I've been building a lot of QEMU appliances lately, and I'm planning on making a few available for download. Here's what I've been working:
- 512MB debian install - this is about the smallest usable debian install I've worked with. It is possible to go smaller but not really worth it. With a 24MB swap, 84MB boot partition, and the rest for root. I've been able to install ejabberd in it, and that alone makes it a very useful appliance.
- 1GB debian install - this is about as small as you can go with a debian gui. I've installed fluxbox on it and its working great!