[Debian] Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

So, I'm thinking to start making a way to install Deblet properly on the 770, but I need to know if people are interested, if I make the restrictions:

* You'll have to download a initial debootstrap tar.gz (70mb) (installer might wget it), or make the first-stage debootstrap yourself

* It won't be a shiny installer and the "installer" won't be doing partitioning or mkfs etc for you, and will be run in a SSH or x-terminal

* It will require a swap partition on the RS-MMC most likely - and the "installer" may simply mkfs and sfdisk it to the right shape, requiring a 2gb card. It won't work with cloned OS2006/HE etc.

So, what I've picked up with the one person (zanshin) who made Deblet work decently on 770 is the following steps, also from the Debian sid 770 thread here.:

(Desktop# is at your desktop machine, 770# is in root on 770). I would like someone to try these steps out again and tell me what doesn't work - so we can get things rolling. You will probably have to pop your battery once or twice or more.

Desktop# debootstrap --foreign --arch armel lenny /root/debian_lenny_base http://ftp.dk.debian.org/debian
Desktop# tar -zcf debian_lenny_base.tar.gz debian_lenny_base

On the 770, partition your MMC into a big ext3 partition, and a 128-256mb swap partition, and mkswap the swap partition and mke2fs -J the partition. Mount the ext3 partition in /mnt/deblet (mkdir it). Then copy debian_lenny_base.tar.gz to /mnt/deblet and tar -zxf it there.
770# export LC_ALL="C"
770# chroot /mnt/deblet mount /proc /proc -t proc
770# chroot /mnt/deblet mount -t devpts none /dev/pts
770# chroot /mnt/deblet mount -t sysfs sysfs /sys
770# cp /etc/hostname /mnt/deblet/etc/hostname
770# chroot /mnt/deblet /debootstrap/debootstrap --second-stage
(this will take a while)
770# mount --bind /tmp /mnt/deblet/tmp
770# mkdir -p /mnt/deblet/mnt/rootfs
770# mount --bind / /mnt/deblet/mnt/rootfs
770# chroot /mnt/deblet
(now in chroot, ch# from now on)
ch# apt-get install python2.5
ch# wget http://trac.tspre.org/svn/deblet/dep...stallerdeb.deb
ch# dpkg -x installerdeb.deb /
(verify /usr/libexec/deblet is there.)
ch# wget http://trac.tspre.org/snapshots/nit-...ackages.tar.gz
ch# tar -zxf nit-base-packages.tar.gz
ch# cd /usr/libexec/deblet
ch# debconf-set-selections debconf.preseed
ch# export NIT_ROOTFS=/mnt/rootfs/
ch# python

(py# now is input to the python interpreter.)

py# import deblet_installer, config, sys
py# config.PRESET = {}
py# config.NIT_ENVIRONMENT = "nit-env-basic"
py# config.NIT_REPO_PACKAGES = deblet_installer.from_file("/nit-base-packages/packages.conf")
py# config.NIT_FILL_IN_PACKAGES = deblet_installer.from_file("/nit-base-packages/fillin.conf")
py# deblet_installer.fake_start_stop_daemon_add("/")
py# deblet_installer.build_apt_repos_install("/")
py# deblet_installer.install_environ("/")
py# deblet_installer.fake_start_stop_daemon_delete("/")
py# sys.exit(0)

ch# passwd
(enter password for root)
ch# umount /proc
ch# umount /sys
ch# umount /tmp
ch# umount /mnt/rootfs
ch# umount /dev/pts
ch# exit

N770# reboot

(and in your boot menu (fanoush's), select the partition on the RS-MMC). And see how far you get. This will end up in a console login prompt ideally, but these instructions may fail before. So if you fail to do these, report what OS2006/2007HE/2008HE you have, your tablet configuration regarding MMC etc, and what errors you got during the process.

My intention is to support 770 as well as is possible with Deblet, so - any input is welcome - and thanks for your effort if you help me out - I hope I'll be able to help you out too with an updated platform for the 770. :)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

I don't currently have a 770 (I've only had the 810 for about 10 days now), but given the low cost of used ones I might pick one up shortly if it seems enough others are interested in a deblet port. For daily use I'd definitely stick to the n810 (mainly because of the keyboard, but gps is quite handy as well), but functional debian on a 'cheap' 770 would be great for many tasks.

Some quick brainstorming:
1. Portable snort node
2. portable kismet node
3. remote for home automation (x10, etc)
4. handy x display for headless workstations/servers
5. travel router (does the wifi chipset support 'master' mode?)

Given that these are such small devices and linux capable, you could use them for just about anything. The 770 has the advantage that you can buy used ones for ~$60-$100 means that they're close to the price of a linksys wrt54gl or netgear wgr614l, and much smaller/more capable (plus you can view the battery as a builtin UPS). I'd consider using a ~$75 770 in a lot of applications that wouldn't be options for a ~$350 n810.

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

With much help from stskeeps (although I got udev working on my own) we have deblet booting on the 770!
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3085/...b266cf.jpg?v=0

EDIT: Video of it booting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGZupqelDVY

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Woot!
Damn you guys, now I have to start lurking on ebay again ... ;)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Count me in - I'll give it a try.

My 770 is still sitting on the desk - after my os2008 experiments..

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Well then. We seem to have X11 working now!
Here's a picture:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3238/...bb0098.jpg?v=0
and a video of it shutting down, the booting. With a framebuffer splashscreen. :-)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRRF-fBrGEM

Many thanks to stskeeps again for getting this working!

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Excuse my dumbness :-) What advantage/s for the 770 and is it practical given memory constraints?

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Well actually it did run quite stable and nicely even without swap - remember that X was made to run on slower machines even back then :) The advantage for the 770 is that we can put a modern system on it and the tablet isn't left behind in terms of software updates (such as that OS2008HE doesn't have Diablo things for instance - and it's slow).

The goal is to provide a decent alternative that is power saving and responsive.

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

In 2 attempts I'm 0 for 2.

with a 770 with 2008he - I got as far as running the deblet installer - which then put me in a reboot loop.

reflashed to a fresh os2006 - and have too many package dependency problems (need wget, bootmenu, python2.5, binutils, libslang2, effsprogs,libreadline5,ncurses-base,zenity,cfdisk, roxterm...)

resolved wget pretty easily - what repos for the others? or how about retry with 2007he? What was the baseline where others had done a load from?

Suggestions please...

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

This is a great idea, and it is much appreciated! I would love to try this baby out asap, please continue with this :D

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Ah, your mistake is using the deblet installer :) We haven't made an actual installer just yet for it - it will be simple however, and we're using OS2006 as baseline for now. I hope to have an installer going sooner or later for this - for now it's just tech showoff as things actually work, and simpler than we thought :)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

When this gets up and running, I would be interested in trying it out.

Frank

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

wow! nice to see such kind of topic!
my 770 is sleeping in my drawer for a long time. he is hunger for alternative OS!
keep moving, i don't mind to be a beta tester when there is a better installation guide come up.

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Hi,

Thanks for your efforts.

Two problems on my 770, running 2007he:

/dev/pts did not exist, so I had to create it as well as /dev/pts/0.

I am stuck at the installation of python2.5. There is no repository defined indeed, and apt-get fails, saying that it could not find this package.

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Thank you so much for getting this going Stskeeps!

I want to test this with my 770. Are there any known improvements on the originally-posted instructions? (anyone feel free to chime in with what worked)

It would be great if the Deblet Trac was opened up to public registration so we could all help to document this. Stskeeps, check out AccountManager plugin to simplify trac auth and allow public registration.

I can't wait to try this out!

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Yeah, I'll get to that - right now I'm aiming for releasing the 2.4 of the installer with the new packages structure and such, which is a prerequisite for 770 support, and I'll then edit the wiki and probably add AccountManager plugin. And document the 770 steps.

Everyone is welcome to get edit rights though, it's just a matter of priv'ing me really..

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Okay, so I gave in and documented what me and aladds had done so far:

It is described at http://trac.tspre.org/projects/deblet/wiki/770Port - Feel free to try it out and comment in this thread how far you get. Warning: Wifi does not work yet, the guinea 770 managed to burn out before we got to try it well :)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Burn out? That sounds scary. Think it was deblet-related, cosmic rays, or too much rough loving by its human symbiant?

Anyways I'll try it out shortly, for the good of all dork-kind

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

The latter, i think - custom usb power supply :)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

I'm debootstrapping now. Assuming all goes well, how can I help with testing wireless?

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

mkdir -p /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware and copy the files in there on initfs to the deblet partition. Reboot.

edit /etc/network/interfaces, and ifup wlan0 and see how it works..

You -must- use a insecure router for now for testing. Use MAC address filtering or something. WPA support will come later.

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

I had corruption issues debootstrapping on the tablet, so I did it with my Ubuntu Laptop. Nice shortcut if it works out, took just a few minutes.

Does it matter what initfs is flashed? I just reflashed with os2008_HE (chinook) since I lost ability to boot somehow (likely unrelated).

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

I get a segmentation fault whenever I try to run
or
(based on wiki instructions)

Any ideas?

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

We tried on OS2006 originally, and is swap enabled still? (swapon). The whole HE thing may mess up things :)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Also, did you make sure to use --foreign and stuff for the debootstrap? and debootstrap --second-stage on the chroot?

What kind of corruption did you experience?

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

it seems that my debootstrap wasn't complete (apt-get wasn't there), guessing that's why mount chokes. Will keep trying. Corrupt ext3 fs happened the first time,

2008 is way too unstable for this. I'm using mistral (2006) now. I've had every kind of corruption :)

I'm still making progress, will post an improved version of your forum post instructions on the wiki as an alt method (works much better for me)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

I have a bad mmc mobile card. going to have to wait for a new one to ship. will be back in a week or so :)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

I'll have to buy a 2 gb card and try this out. Just to make sure, can I still use os2006 in 770, so debian is on mmc and double booting still exists?

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Yes, it's dual booting through bootmenu.

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

If I try Deblet on a new MMC can I still boot to my HE2007, in my present mmc (change cards of course), using the same boot menu, or do I have to flash 770 again? E.g MMPC does not work on OS2006, so I still neeed HE2007. 770 is my only IT, so I have to keep it functional untill the next (hopefully 3G) version launch

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Yes, but you may need to set up a boot menu item for it (it's easy, look in the alpha/beta testing thread). What boot menu do you use? fanoush's or the clone-to-SD deb?

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

I use Fanoush boot menu

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

this is not found:

http://trac.tspre.org/svn/deblet/tru.../deblet/md5sum


is this right address:

http://trac.tspre.org/svn/deblet/tru...ibexec/deblet/

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

My apologies, - I've updated the 770Port wiki page now, that's what I get for trying to move things into a nice structured tree ;)

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

maybe you should correct this too:

dpkg -i http://ftp.dk.debian.org/debian/pool...1.0.10_all.deb

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

nit-env-lxde is not installable. debends nit-env-x. that one needs tablet-x and something else and after these nit-env-lxde is still uninstallable. Any ideas?

I flashed the latest os2006, intalled wifi hot fix, xterm and becomeroot and the bootmenu (from installation instructions). I have a 2gb sd card as my mmc

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Tried from scratch, same result, nit-env-lxde needs nit-env-x, "not to be installed". Trying to install that gets you to an endless install sequence.

Anybody else tried with the 770 port instructions with success?

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Same result. The Package is not installable. :confused:

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

Yeah, I'm looking into it - it's a N8x0 dependancy so (hald-addon-bme). in the meantime you can try with apt-get install nit-env-basic, and hold down the home button when you've selected Deblet in boot menu and starting to boot, and select console boot there.

I think it should work, report otherwise.

Re: Deblet on the 770, - Is there any interest?
 

I saw an earlier post on trying wifi. Now, I wonder whether some of the icons- terminal, web browser, shut down- should open something now, or is my installation incomplete?