[ANNOUNCE] Fatdog-ARM Linux for the XO-4

[James Cameron]

On Sun, Oct 06, 2013 at 09:34:51PM -0700, Yioryos Asprobounitis wrote:
> > 
> 
> > 3.  external media such as SD card and USB drives are not always
> > available, but internal media is always available,
> > 
> >>  That is also why we do not provide zd images that would be easier to
> >>  install.  People that want it in the internal eMMC  should know how
> >>  to do it too ;)
> > 
> > For people who want to try your build, you have made it harder for
> > them, for (in my opinion) no good reason.
> > 
> > You need not use zd images.  A simple Forth script would do fine.
> > 
> > ok d# 4096 fat32-partition int
> > ok copy u:\fd-arm.sfs int:\fd-arm.sfs
> > ok mkdir int:\boot
> > ok copy u:\boot\initrd.4 int:\boot\initrd.4
> > ok copy u:\boot\vmlinuz.4 int:\boot\vmlinuz.4
> > ok copy u:\boot\olpc.fth int:\boot\olpc.fth
> > ok bye
> > 
> 
> Thanks you for the script.
> However this would imply that you already 
> have expanded the tarball in a stick and then you copy over instead of 
> just booting from it. So is hard to see how is any easier for the
> user. 

Yes, because you used a container format with no firmware support.
Why didn't you use .zip?

> > Can also copy out members from within .zip file using Open Firmware.
> > 
> 
> What would be interesting is to download 
> the the zipped file in the internal card and then have 
> forth do the rest. Is it possible to read the file from
> int:\home\olpc\Downloads\file.zip, keep it in RAM, format int and
> write back from RAM?

The versioned filesystem of OLPC OS makes this impractical.

> Though, come to think of it you may not need any of these. Could use alt-boot (assuming is empty) and existing partitions. Fatdog does not really care what else is in the partitions. 
> The challenge in this case is the fatdog-xo olpc.fth to know which device and setting we boot from and act accordingly in all possible scenarios.
> 
> > If you wanted to set up a barrier to booting from internal storage,
> > there are probably more logical methods.
> > 
> 
> Suggestions are welcome as always ;)

Detecting that olpc.fth was loaded from internal storage and then
terminating with a message is probably more appropriate.

-- 
James Cameron
http://quozl.linux.org.au/