[Server-devel] Best XSCE strategy for us in Pacific with XO-1.5 2GB Testing XSCE 3 on XO 1.5 2GB os855

[George Hunt]

This is probably a question for James C. I'm concerned that I may have
invalidated the verification, or at least created misleading information.

My confession: I couldn't pass up the chance to evolve our
"prep-storage.sh" script that is part of XSCE before I lost the exfat
formatting. So I tweaked on our script until it recognized and dealt
correctly with exfat format.  So when I did the "fs-update <os.zd>", the
64GB SD card was already formatted ext4.

Do you think that a separate formatting step is necessary, or irrelevant,
to the success of fs-update?

George


On Tue, Jun 18, 2013 at 12:27 PM, George Hunt <georgejhunt at gmail.com> wrote:

> I followed the suggestions at
> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Release_notes/10.1.0#External_SD --
> substituting 31035o1.zd for the earlier OS64.
>
> devalias fsdisk /sd/disk at 1:0
> fs-update u:\os64.zd
>
> after the reboot, the "df" command indicated rootfs had a size of 60GB. I
> was able to write and read from the command line as olpc and as root. So I
> believe that indicates that 64GB drives do work on the XO-1.5.
>
> George
>
>
> On Mon, Jun 17, 2013 at 10:55 PM, James Cameron <quozl at laptop.org> wrote:
>
>> On Mon, Jun 17, 2013 at 09:20:20PM -0400, George Hunt wrote:
>> > I ordered a 64GB SD, and have it in hand. It is formatted with exfat
>> > disk format, apparently a Microsoft proprietary standard.  There is
>> > a driver for exfat, but it is not shipped with the XO, so there was
>> > some truth to the hearsay that 64GB SD cards do not work on the
>> > XO. BUT . . .
>> >
>> > I was able to read exfat formatted "out of the box" transcend 64GB
>> > drive on a XO1.5, with a downloaded driver, so I expect that
>> > electrical compatibility is already established.
>>
>> It is the protocol compatibility that causes us problems.  There's
>> this tiny computer inside the card which has to interoperate with our
>> computer.  And from what you describe above, you haven't yet tested
>> the protocol compatibility with Open Firmware.  You have to boot from
>> it to test that.
>>
>> > I think you will want it to be formatted with ext4, because the OS
>> > doesn't run on a FAT formated drive. I should caution that I have
>> > read that SD cards have an erase block size that makes it important
>> > to preserve the partition location and sizing, as the disk format is
>> > being erased and reformatted.
>>
>> If you use the drive for the operating system, there's no need to
>> partition or format, because the fs-update of 13.1.0 .zd file will
>> create all that is required.  Just make sure you use the devalias
>> fsdisk ext:0 trick to persuade fs-update to use the external slot.
>>
>> During boot, the operating system may expand the filesystem to cover
>> the rest of the device.
>>
>> > I do not expect that the "prep-storage.sh" script which is part of
>> > XSCE-0.3, will correctly format a 64GB SD card. I do not know
>> > whether the XSCE install process will properly function when it is
>> > loaded into a 64GB SD. (I expect probably so, since I don't think
>> > the OS would know whether it was running on the mother board or on
>> > an external SD card).
>>
>> It must know, and does know.
>>
>> > I'll experiment with my new SD card, and try to document the results
>> > with a script that you can use to format big SD cards.
>>
>> I suggest gparted for partitioning and formatting.
>>
>> --
>> James Cameron
>> http://quozl.linux.org.au/
>>
>
>
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