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.

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.

With much help from stskeeps (although I got udev working on my own) we have deblet booting on the 770!


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

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

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

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

Well then. We seem to have X11 working now!
Here's a picture:

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!

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

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.

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...

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