Linux on Universal (Update #4)

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wendenerp

Member
May 2, 2008
39
7
Lahr
Place the downloaded qtopia file system to an ext2 partition and boot with haret, or if it's the second primary partition it could boot with the exe files from opie or gpe.
Or do some reading in previous post i remember an explanationthere.
 

kitor

Senior Member
Apr 11, 2007
170
30
kitor.pl
Ok, ok, I'll look for other storage card for it.

I want to change DPI to 72.
I changed in /etc/X11/Xdefaults value Xft.dpi to 72 and in /etc/X11/Xinit.d/50setdpi all values to 72. Change is visible on GPE login screen, but after login (on GPE and XFCE) I get (i hope) 120DPI, as is set in not-modified OS. Where I can change it? Some dialog boxes from XFCE are too big to use it with that DPI.

Other thing - If I launch XFCE in standard X11 settings (480x640@270deg.), it works OK, but detects screen as portrait, not landscape; effect of it is that some things are under visible screen area (workspace), and everything ends at X=480, not 640. If I run X11 at 180deg rotation, launch matchbox-panel and rotate screen using it, XFCE works OK (correct detect screen as landscape, everything is visible). Where's the problem?
 

wendenerp

Member
May 2, 2008
39
7
Lahr
Where I can change it? Some dialog boxes from XFCE are too big to use it with that DPI.

You think you change dpi (dots per inch) and dialog boxes become smaller?
That's difficult to imagine for me, did this work on your desktop box?
Can't you adjust the size manually, is there no possibilty to configure it?
I for myself usually changed the resolution, but since it works witch 480 x 640 instead of Qvga i'm already very impressed by the device (iphone has half the resolution).

Other thing - If I launch XFCE in standard X11 settings (480x640@270deg.), it works OK, but detects screen as portrait, not landscape; effect of it is that some things are under visible screen area (workspace), and everything ends at X=480, not 640. If I run X11 at 180deg rotation, launch matchbox-panel and rotate screen using it, XFCE works OK (correct detect screen as landscape, everything is visible). Where's the problem?

No idea, but if it's configurable you'll probably are able to make it permanent
 

domi007

Senior Member
Feb 21, 2008
265
43
Budapest
Debian img file?

Hi everybody!
I did last night an IMG file from the debian rootfs.tar.bz2 (the version from shiroikuma).
I've extracted it into a normal folder in Linux, and then I did an img from this folder.
Now, I've got the next problem: howto boot this with haret?
I copied my img on my SD card, and hit the Openmoko-Linux.exe ('cause, openmoko boots also from an image file, and I hoped, that it will work with my image too-i renamed my image also to openmoko.linux.img), but it doesn't work:
Linux starts to boot, but then:
Code:
Mounting SD card
Mounting root fs via loopback
FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL
Unable to mount ext2 filesystem...

And then I'm in BusyBox...

So, it seems, that it tries to boot from the SD card, and not from the img file.

How can I change this?

BTW: I need to use an img file, because my SD card is very bad, and I couldn't do 2 partitions on it (YES, it is possible to have such **** things :D), so there is only one solution with the image file.

I looked in also the Openmoko-Linux.exe with a notepad, and I've found the integrated startup.txt in it. Then I downloaded a haret.exe, a zImage and a startup.txt, changed the startup.txt as I saw in openmoko-linux.exe, but it didn't help: haret freezees in the beginning of the boot process (Jump to kernel... and nothing happens)

DOMy
 

wendenerp

Member
May 2, 2008
39
7
Lahr
I would try to replace the kernel modules from debian archive with modules from qtopia archive and then place the debian archive and qtopia exe to dosfs and hit the exe file.
 

domi007

Senior Member
Feb 21, 2008
265
43
Budapest
I would try to replace the kernel modules from debian archive with modules from qtopia archive and then place the debian archive and qtopia exe to dosfs and hit the exe file.

Thanks for your answer, I will try it, but first I've a question:
kernel modules-where can I find them?
Qtopia archive and exe-where can I find them?

DOMy
 

domi007

Senior Member
Feb 21, 2008
265
43
Budapest
Of course, only now has to be linuxtogo.org down.
I can ping the server, but that's all..****.

Do you know any mirror, which I can use, instead of linuxtogo.org?

DOMy
 

domi007

Senior Member
Feb 21, 2008
265
43
Budapest
Can you use RAMDISK.cab to boot ur Uni in Linux environment and use fdisk command to create 2 partitions manually?

No, my card is very low qulity, I think, it could only operate with one FAT partition...so nothing helps, i need to use an img as with openmoko.

Now linuxtogo.org is available, so i will try the trick from IIZIIm.

Thanks!
DOMy
 
Last edited:

domi007

Senior Member
Feb 21, 2008
265
43
Budapest
IMG size problems

Hi!
First of all IIZIIm: Thank you very much, your solution works very good, but
the qtopia installer makes a 100 MB big image file, and my debian image has an untarred size of 600MB. So, the installer fails (not enough space on the destination disk). How can I change the size of the image? Do I have to edit the installer Qtopia-linux.exe, that it schould create a bigger image? Or can I only increase the size of this half-ready image? If so, how?

Thank You for your help, I know, that I'm very near now.

DOMy
 

domi007

Senior Member
Feb 21, 2008
265
43
Budapest
News

Hi,
I have some news:
First, I tried to resize the img file-with success, but then the installer doesn't work anymore: it tries to boot from the empty 700MB big img file, and doesn't finish the unpack process.
Second, I've tried my img file, that I did from the tar.bz2, but it is also an unsuccess...
So, there must be something between the image, which i did, and the image, which has been done by the installer.

I have to edit the installer, so it should make a bigger partition, OR I have to make a good image (perhaps, I can follow the method of the installer on my desktop PC).

DOMy
 

domi007

Senior Member
Feb 21, 2008
265
43
Budapest
GOT IT!

Hi everybody,
Finally, I did it: the TitchyMobile (full-arm debian for HTCUniversal) runs now from an image file.
Here is the tutorial how I did it:
TUTORIAL: HOWTO Run A Linux From Image File, Which Requires A Partition with Ext2 FileSystem, Without Make Two Partitions On Your SD Card-Using Only The Native FAT32 System:
1. Download the rootfs archive from the distro, that you need (this is the file, that should be untarred on the ext2 partition of your SD card)

2. Boot up a Linux on your PC: You can either use a Virtual Machine/Native Installation, BUT we need hard disk space: the rootfs.tar.bz2 size+untarred size+the ready-to-boot image size-it should be so big as the untarred size, but if you want to install many programs, download files, etc. in Linux on your Uni, you can choose a bigger size

!ATTENTION!
If you want to use TitchyMobile, don't forget that there are some rootfs files (for example the shikomura-file), which requires an ext2 file system, because of special file permissions. If you have such an archive, please don't try to extract it to a FAT partition, because you will get errors. So, in that case you have to use an ext2 partition for everything you do.

3. log in as root in linux, and untar the archive to a folder, for example:
Code:
mkdir /root/rootfs
cd /root/rootfs
tar -xjf <your-rootfs.tar.bz2>

If you have your rootfs on an USB stick, don't forget to mount it

Code:
mkdir /mnt/usb
mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/usb  ->/dev/sdb1 is not always your USB, check it before you mount!

4. Now, you need and image file, do so:
Code:
dd if=/dev/zero of=rootfs.img bs=1k count=800000 (that command makes an img, with the size 800 MiB)

5. Make a file system on your image (i prefer ext2, but you can choose ext3 also):
Code:
mkfs.ext2 -c rootfs.img
y

6. Now, it's time to mount our image:
Code:
mkdir /mnt/image
mount -o loop rootfs.img /mnt/image

7. Copy all the files onto the image:
Code:
cp -av /root/rootfs/* /mnt/image/

You can have a break, (have a kitkat ;), and wait: it takes a little bit time.

8. Unmount your image
Code:
umount /mnt/image
9. And copy it to your SD card (or whatever you like):
Code:
mkdir /media/sd_card
mount /dev/sdc1 /media/sd_card ->/dev/sdc1: it is not always your sd card, check it before mounting!
cp /root/rootfs.img /media/sd_card
10. Now, if you want to boot it on your universal, you need a boot loader. You can get the Qtopia bootloader from here!.

11. Now copy the exe and the img file in the root of your SD card.

12. You must rename your image file, otherwise the bootloader cannot find it, so for qtopia bootloader, your image file should called qtopia.linux.img

13. You are now finished: hit the Qtopia-htcuniversal.exe, and enjoy your linux!

If you get some errors, ask for the solution here.

I know already 1 error message:
The installer says, that the filesystem should be checked, because it is very old (especially 4095 days old). After that check linux is unable to boot and restarts himself automatically.
Solution: hit the exe again, and it won't check the file system anymore, but it boots normally.

Thank you for your ideas, and for Google!

DOMy
 

goxboxlive

Senior Member
Oct 24, 2005
446
15
Oslo
Hi everybody,
Finally, I did it: the TitchyMobile (full-arm debian for HTCUniversal) runs now from an image file.
Here is the tutorial how I did it:
TUTORIAL: HOWTO Run A Linux From Image File, Which Requires A Partition with Ext2 FileSystem, Without Make Two Partitions On Your SD Card-Using Only The Native FAT32 System:
1. Download the rootfs archive from the distro, that you need (this is the file, that should be untarred on the ext2 partition of your SD card)

2. Boot up a Linux on your PC: You can either use a Virtual Machine/Native Installation, BUT we need hard disk space: the rootfs.tar.bz2 size+untarred size+the ready-to-boot image size-it should be so big as the untarred size, but if you want to install many programs, download files, etc. in Linux on your Uni, you can choose a bigger size

!ATTENTION!
If you want to use TitchyMobile, don't forget that there are some rootfs files (for example the shikomura-file), which requires an ext2 file system, because of special file permissions. If you have such an archive, please don't try to extract it to a FAT partition, because you will get errors. So, in that case you have to use an ext2 partition for everything you do.

3. log in as root in linux, and untar the archive to a folder, for example:
Code:
mkdir /root/rootfs
cd /root/rootfs
tar -xjf <your-rootfs.tar.bz2>

If you have your rootfs on an USB stick, don't forget to mount it

Code:
mkdir /mnt/usb
mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/usb  ->/dev/sdb1 is not always your USB, check it before you mount!

4. Now, you need and image file, do so:
Code:
dd if=/dev/zero of=rootfs.img bs=1k count=800000 (that command makes an img, with the size 800 MiB)

5. Make a file system on your image (i prefer ext2, but you can choose ext3 also):
Code:
mkfs.ext2 -c rootfs.img
y

6. Now, it's time to mount our image:
Code:
mkdir /mnt/image
mount -o loop rootfs.img /mnt/image

7. Copy all the files onto the image:
Code:
cp -av /root/rootfs/* /mnt/image/

You can have a break, (have a kitkat ;), and wait: it takes a little bit time.

8. Unmount your image
Code:
umount /mnt/image
9. And copy it to your SD card (or whatever you like):
Code:
mkdir /media/sd_card
mount /dev/sdc1 /media/sd_card ->/dev/sdc1: it is not always your sd card, check it before mounting!
cp /root/rootfs.img /media/sd_card
10. Now, if you want to boot it on your universal, you need a boot loader. You can get the Qtopia bootloader from here!.

11. Now copy the exe and the img file in the root of your SD card.

12. You must rename your image file, otherwise the bootloader cannot find it, so for qtopia bootloader, your image file should called qtopia.linux.img

13. You are now finished: hit the Qtopia-htcuniversal.exe, and enjoy your linux!

If you get some errors, ask for the solution here.

I know already 1 error message:
The installer says, that the filesystem should be checked, because it is very old (especially 4095 days old). After that check linux is unable to boot and restarts himself automatically.
Solution: hit the exe again, and it won't check the file system anymore, but it boots normally.

Thank you for your ideas, and for Google!

DOMy


Great work.
 

kitor

Senior Member
Apr 11, 2007
170
30
kitor.pl
Ok, last question won't exist. Now question about angstrorm x11/gpe rootfs:
what do i need to install to get wlan and audio working? I know that WiFi driver is unstable (tested it on titchy) but what's with audio?
 

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    die-hard said:
    goxboxlive said:
    die-hard said:
    hi all i try to install linux on my sd (A-Data 4Gb)
    i make 3 partitions
    1. vfat (in that partition i make linux folder and 2577 folder) 30M
    2. ext3 (in that partition i put kernel, startup, initrd etc) 1000M
    3. fat32 make with fdisk.

    when i start linux kernel don't work

    1. In the vfat partition you place the files: haret.exe, default.txt (startup.txt ) and the zi ( the linux boot kernel ).
    2. In the ext3 partition you have to extract the opie-image to the root of the partition.
    3. i dont know, just forget about it for now.
    i use 3 partition for windows application and file

    Yes i understand that, but does it work now? Can you boot Linux on your Universal?
    Beware og that you need to have the kernel, startup and haret on the fat partition and not at the ext3 partition. And try to make the ext3 partition smaller than 1GB.
    I am using all this on a 128MB sd card. 30 MB for fat, and the rest for ext3.
    2
    ftp.xda-developers.com/Uploads/Universal/Universal LINUX Dev

    Has anyone looked into the following folder:
    ftp.xda-developers.com/Uploads/Universal/Universal LINUX Development

    I tested the rar password and it's ok.
    rar pwd:
    PU10 Intel PXA270 QTEK 9000
    1
    Where can i download the latest files for trying to boot linux and testing gpe and opie?
    CR2 or Milanvot can one of you upload the requierd files so i can test it?
    1
    vve said:
    madkat said:
    Can the root user be renamed...
    I think this is a funniest post in this forum :). Nobody in my life have ever asked me for this.
    Now, here's a new market - below are things we could make money from:
    1. Change superuser's name from "root" to "Administrator" - $20.
    2. Change superuser's name from "root" to anything you like - $50.

    WTF? I wasn't asking someone else to do it for me.
    I was asking because I don't know much about Linux - but I have renamed the Administrator account in my WinXP Pro to something else to make the machine more secure. I don't think I've seen a Linux or Unix box with a superuser with a name other than "root" - so I decided to ask, rather than making any assumption that making the change would be impossible. Obviously if this Linux were sent out in an easy-to-install form, questions to the end user would be very brief and most would opt to enter no root password at all. That leaves you with machines all over the place with a superuser called "root" and either no password or a very simple password like "123" or "password". I don't know about you, but that strikes me as a very bad idea. Setting a default password is out of the question, and having a "strong password check" will only serve to frustrate people.
    1
    madkat said:
    I have Haret, zi061203, default.txt
    I don't know how to configure default.txt to boot the kernel without mounting a root. It seems to automatically look for /dev/mmc/blk0/something and then complains if there is no "root="
    Milanvot's zi060312 kernel doesn't work without root partition on SD.
    Try to use cr2's zi kernel instead.