Notices

Hi, this is my first post.

I ordererd a n810 and I'll get my hands on it this week.
I currently own a Zaurus C3200 with Debian EABI running natively.
I did my setup using debootstrap and I find this tool amazing. I even used it to setup Debian root fs on other embedded devices (ie a Dreambox 7025 linux based PVR with a MIPSEL cpu). I see on other threads that there is much work going both on porting KDE on OS2008 and on booting native Debian on ITs. I think that a debootstrap+chroot approach would be interesting.
I'm thinking about these steps:

1) clone the OS on an external SD in order to get more space, but we can even mount a loop fs or a partition on the SD without cloning the whole FS.
2) install debootstrap from debian repositories: http://http.us.debian.org/debian/poo..._1.0.8_all.deb
3) compile pkgdetails.c from debootstrap sources and put it in /usr/lib/debootstrap (for ease of use I attach a pkgdetails binary I compiled on my Zaurus, I think it should work)
4) run debootstrap in order to get you rootfs, ie: debootstrap --verbose --arch armel sid <path to your debian root directory> http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian and go for a cup of coffee

At this poin we have a basic debian ARM EABI root fs ready for chroot.
We can mount with the bind option useful directories on the rootfs and then chroot, ie:
mount -o bind /dev <path to your debian root directory>/dev
mount -o bind /proc <path to your debian root directory>/proc
mount -o bind /home <path to your debian root directory>/home
mount -o bind /root <path to your debian root directory>/root
mount -o bind <path to FAT SD partition> <path to your debian root directory>/<whatever>
chroot <path to your debian root directory>

Now we should have a debian shell ready to apt-get install and run zillions of official debian packages. I think that, with this approach, we should be able to run X programs inside maemo native X server and window manager. I think that we even should be able to install wathever desktop enviroment we like (KDE, XFCE, etc) and run it with a script that does something like this:
1) exit from the maemo desktop enviroment
2) fire the command that launches the desktop enviroment in the chrooted debian, ie: chroot <path to your debian root directory> startkde
3) launch again maemo desktop enviroment after completion of the previous command (ie kde log out)
We should package such a script and put it on the maemo menu with a debian icon

I think that this approach could bring to an usable debian enviroment, without the hassle of a native setup (It's an hell to make it work all hardware), nicely integrated with the native SO and with all the advantages of a full debian distro (ie: full working desktop enviroments like KDE and applications like Abiword, GIMP and wathever, without compilig them in the OS2008 enviroment; apt-get update, apt-get upgrade and we have all the packages updated)

Any thoughts?

Good to see more Debian fans here. I've always found it to be easiest to just debootstrap the first part from another Debian machine. So on my desktop I run:
then I pop the SD card out and put it in the Nokia and run this on the tablet:
Saves time and work.

Here link to johnxs Debian:
http://www.internettablettalk.com/fo...d=1#post132980
http://www.internettablettalk.com/wi...p?title=Debian

I planned to do that over a NFS mount but it seems impossible , I dont understand why , or how can it be workarounded ...

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http://rzr.online.fr/q/chroot