kyak changed the topic of #qi-hardware to: Copyleft hardware - http://qi-hardware.com | hardware hackers join here to discuss Ben NanoNote, atben/atusb 802.15.4 wireless, anelok and other community driven hw projects | public logging at http://en.qi-hardware.com/irclogs and http://irclog.whitequark.org/qi-hardware
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<baaba> Hi, I have a problem, I debootstrapped debian, I can chroot fine to the sd card on my nanonote but if I try to boot pressing M as the wiki says there is a glitchy screen and nothing happens, I have to reset the ben using the button at the bottom
<baaba> do you know what could cause this issue ? By the way this is debian 8
<mth> are you using a kernel from Debian or a NanoNote-specific kernel?
<baaba> i am using the nanonote kernel
<baaba> the only thing I didn't do was installing fakeroot
<mth> did you run the command as real root then?
<baaba> well yes
<baaba> I only have a root user on my nanonote
<mth> some packages refuse to do certain actions as real root, but they'll usually print a warning about that
<baaba> but I can chroot fine to debian
<mth> (to avoid breaking systems where people accidentally run it as root)
<mth> sid is older than Debian 8.0, so maybe some new steps are requried?
<mth> you could try installing sid first and then dist-upgrading to 8.x
<baaba> but sid is just debian unstable
<baaba> it should be even more recent
<mth> ah, it's not a release name?
<baaba> nope
<mth> do you have a serial connection? that would help seeing error messages if the screen isn't working
<baaba> I don't think so
<baaba> well I have an arduino
<baaba> if it can help
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<paul_boddie> baaba: Sounds like a kernel loading issue to me. Which kernel are you using?
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<baaba> It says Linux BenNanoNote 3.3.8 #4 PREEMPT
<baaba> maybe not #4 PREEMPt
<baaba> 3.3.8
<paul_boddie> Have you made it available on the SD card itself in the /boot directory?
<baaba> yes i did
<paul_boddie> One thing you have to be careful about is how init gets called.
<baaba> oh
<paul_boddie> OpenWrt uses a different convention to Debian, at least the version shipped with the Ben.
<baaba> well i ran "ln -s /sbin/init /etc/preinit"
<baaba> in the chroot
<baaba> do you think a more recent kernel would work ?
<paul_boddie> You might experience issues with older kernels. Certainly, recent Debian relies on systemd-related features that the shipped kernel won't have configured.
<paul_boddie> I guess if you've done the second-stage debootstrap in your chroot and have fixed up the preinit thing then that should work.
<paul_boddie> I run User Mode Linux instances for various things, and I had to change the kernel configuration to let Debian Jessie run where Wheezy had been fine before.
<paul_boddie> I guess that if you somehow force the debootstrap to use sysvinit instead, that might save you a kernel recompile.
<baaba> okay thanks, well I will try to boot but I already did all of that and it didn't work, maybe I should try a more recent kernel as you said
<paul_boddie> It's odd that I don't mention this on http://en.qi-hardware.com/wiki/Emdebian however.
<paul_boddie> I did test Jessie on the Ben and it did work. Maybe I should see which kernel I was using.
<baaba> there is a strange thing by the way, when trying to boot on debian the bottom of the screen has some kind of artifacts
<paul_boddie> However, I don't think I got a mainline kernel working until fairly recently, and I was mostly using the OpenWrt one instead, albeit recompiled, but not a much newer version.
<paul_boddie> The boot process involves U-Boot in NAND initialising various things and then trying to execute /boot/uImage, if I remember correctly.
<baaba> what do you think about the small artifacts ?
<baaba> only at the bottom of the screen
<paul_boddie> What happens after that is up to the kernel. When I was getting my own payload instead of Linux running, I saw all sorts of strange screen effects when things went wrong.
<baaba> oh okay
<paul_boddie> OK. So I see that my (slow-booting) Debian is running 4.7.2. That's the mainline kernel with no patches necessary.
<baaba> is it a problem that my sd card is /dev/mmcblk0p1 and not /dev/mmcblk0
<baaba> well no
<baaba> the contrary
<paul_boddie> cat /proc/partition will show you what's going on. The first partition is what will provide the root filesystem.
<paul_boddie> Modifier keys don't seem to work with this kernel. :-/
<baaba> the 4 first lines end with mtdblock[0..3]
<baaba> then comes the mmcblk0
<baaba> should I try to compile linux mainline for the ben nanonote ?
<paul_boddie> I don't think that's a problem.
<paul_boddie> I'll have a look at the other kernel.
<baaba> okay thanks
<paul_boddie> OK, so I'm actually running Debian 7.7 in my rootfs, not Debian 8. This is with kernel 3.3.8 (or 4.7.2 as noted before).
<paul_boddie> I must have another partition somewhere with Debian 8, though.
<baaba> Oh okay :o well it should work then…
<baaba> but it doesn't :(
<baaba> maybe I should copy the kernel again to the sd card
<paul_boddie> As I noted, the systemd stuff might be demanding certain kernel features that you would need to enable. Otherwise the kernel will panic and just hang the Ben.
<baaba> so better try to put a recent kernel you think ?
<paul_boddie> Give 4.7.2 a try or maybe a later kernel. That was the latest one when I looked, I think.
<baaba> okay thanks, but I don't really know how to compile it, I tried getting the toolchain for the ben nanonote but it wouldn't compile, do I need it or only gcc ?
<paul_boddie> I guess you're running Debian on your other computer. If so, there are decent cross-compilers for unstable which I use in a chroot.
<paul_boddie> (I just checked another partition on the Ben and it had Debian 7.3.)
<baaba> oh okay
<paul_boddie> It's been a while since I looked at Linux/Debian on the Ben. Most recently, I was messing around with my own payload being launched from the bootloader instead.
<baaba> oh okay
<baaba> :p
<paul_boddie> I'll check in on this later, but getting a cross-toolchain working is handy, anyway.
<baaba> you must be a pro
<baaba> Well I tried to compile the ben nanonote toolchain but it wouldn't
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<paul_boddie> You want whatever it is that provides mipsel-linux-gnu-gcc.
<paul_boddie> Probably the gcc-mipsel-linux-gnu and binutils-mipsel-linux-gnu packages.
<baaba> I'm running fedora, it has gcc-mips64-linux-gnu
<baaba> I suppose it's not good
<paul_boddie> Keep posting your progress if you like, but I have to do other stuff. ;-)
<baaba> okay :p
<paul_boddie> You want 32-bit MIPS little endian (mipsel).
<paul_boddie> I haven't tried building the OpenWrt toolchain for a while, but it should still build.
<arossdotme> what plastic are laptops (lids) mostly made from?
<arossdotme> abs?
<arossdotme> got these, hoping to laser engrave them http://bayimg.com/album/aAaOPAAAC
<baaba> your site is not working
<baaba> oh now it is
<baaba> paul_boddie, I found that : F1/2/3 will load kernel from sdcard partition 1/2/3
<baaba> F4 will load kernel inside the ubi rootfs of nand.(we need put kernel at /boot/uImage)
<baaba> those kernel command line. boot kernel command can be changed by 'fw_setenv'
<paul_boddie> Yes, there are probably some special keys that can be used.
<paul_boddie> Was just trying to initialise a Jessie rootfs with the 3.3.8 kernel, but it seems to hang after setting up.
<baaba> maybe it doesn't work because of how my sdcard is partitonned
<baaba> oh
<paul_boddie> I may try and boot now and see if I reproduce what you got before.
<baaba> okay :p thanks for helping
<paul_boddie> No problem! Got to keep people using these things. :-)
<baaba> if i copy dumbly my old sdcard contend to my new one but new partition, is it supposed to work ?
<paul_boddie> You can do dd to copy to and from partitions. I don't know whether that answers your question, though.
<paul_boddie> It looks like Debian 8 plus 3.3.8 won't work. I suspect systemd. Will look at doing a rootfs using sysvinit instead.
<baaba> oh okay
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<baaba> you can't boot but you can chroot
<baaba> right ?
<wpwrak> forced upgrades suck :-( ubuntu 16.10 no longer has xchat. and hexchat "it's just exactly like xchat" of course isn't
<paul_boddie> Is hexchat tightly integrated with systemd? ;-)
<baaba> :p
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<baaba> how many partitions do you have on your sdcard for debian 8 + linux 3.3.8 ?
<paul_boddie> 3: 1 for the rootfs, 1 for swap, 1 for backups. But only the first two will be used.
<baaba> oh okay thanks
<baaba> I thought the fact that there is a single partition on my sd card was the problem
<paul_boddie> You only need one partition really.
<paul_boddie> Well, you really need swap if you want Debian. Otherwise stuff like apt won't work.
<baaba> oh okay
<baaba> Is there any other up to date OS for the nanonote ?
<paul_boddie> I don't think so. As for Debian, I'll see if I can't persuade it to switch to sysvinit.
<paul_boddie> Otherwise, a recompiled kernel might be necessary. Or I could try Devuan. :-)
<baaba> Okay :p
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<paul_boddie> Trying again now. Given the poor documentation and multistrap's "silently ignored" features with preseeding, I await failure.
<paul_boddie> But I could also try hacks with preinit before switching to Devuan. ;-)
<baaba> What is the preinit ? :p The wiki says to create a symbolic link of /bin/init to /etc/preinit i believe
<paul_boddie> It seems to be an OpenWrt thing. They configure the kernel to use /etc/preinit as the init program for some reason.
<baaba> oh okay
<baaba> by the way there is no systemd in debian 7 ?
<paul_boddie> That's right: Wheezy uses sysvinit. As I noted, when I set up some User Mode Linux instances for Jessie, I noticed that my kernels didn't boot those instances, whereas they did for Wheezy.
<baaba> oh
<paul_boddie> OK. I obviously didn't read the mind of the developers, and the Ben still doesn't init, so I'll try a preinit hack.
<baaba> how are you planning to do that ?
<paul_boddie> When my preinit file finishes configuring, instead of linking to /sbin/init, I'll invoke some apt magic and hopefully force systemd out.
<paul_boddie> s/instead of/before/
<qi-bot> paul_boddie meant: "When my preinit file finishes configuring, before linking to /sbin/init, I'll invoke some apt magic and hopefully force systemd out."
<baaba> cool bot !
<baaba> ok, i am going to bed ! good luck :p
<paul_boddie> Thanks! You'll read what I find out in the logs.
<baaba> okay thanks :p
<paul_boddie> Well, sysvinit doesn't seem happy with /run/initctl, but it's not over yet.
<paul_boddie> OK, I get a login after "preinit" now.
<paul_boddie> And booting from MMC/microSD works.
<paul_boddie> So, the trick was to put sysvinit-core in the package list for multistrap.
<paul_boddie> Lots of advice about preseed files and excluding systemd may only be relevant for debootstrap, but that may be fixed by now as well.
<paul_boddie> So, 3.3.8 works with Debian 8, but you must use sysvinit-core in the packages list.
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