Greetings:

Please excuse what may be an already discussed thread
and feel free to direct me to a more appropriate forum.

I haven't seen an obvious method for upgrading the binaries,
kernel and configuration files on a Nokia 770 via the usb connection
to a Linux machine.

I am not averse to compiling the code on a Linux server and flashing
the object and I do recognize the limitation imposed by the absence
of a hard drive. If this is the only method, is there an open source
flasher and are there any ramifications as to what may be flashed
and where?

Thanks!

There is no open source flasher, but there is a freely available one. Tools also exist to create a new initfs and rootfs.

There is no obvious method. The entire process is rather difficult, and in general I'd say to do it in userspace.

Replacing binaries is relatively trivial after gaining root, and gaining root is a very well documented process.

Check up on maemo.org --- both wiki and official documents.