Towards Core (microcore) on Raspberry Pi

[roberts]

Now posted first cut of rpiCore.

http://distro.ibiblio.org/tinycorelinux/4.x/arm/armv6/
 
This is pre-alpha. There are no extensions,
Edit cmdline.txt for testing boot parameters. Use a powered hub to use a usb pendrive for backup/restore or persistent home testing.
Expect bugs. Use Raspbian for compiling then move and test on rpiCore.

Install to sdcard via the usual, example using sdd change to your specifics,
gunzip < rpiCore-20120904.img.gz | dd of=/dev/sdd

Proceed with caution. Test carefully.

[netnomad]

hi roberts,

i tested your rpiCore-20120904.img and it boots flawless to the prompt.
the rootfs and /etc look pretty good :-)

what are the limits of this first stage?
can i start using my fluxbox-environment with almost all tcz-packages of the repository
or do we need certain arm-specific packages?

thank you for these first efforts for the rpi and i'm looking forward for the next stages.

[netnomad]

hi roberts,

woooh.... with sudo udhcpc i got a working internet connection.
also tce-ab started promising... but after downloading and installing the midnight commander,
i got the error message that it is not possible to install or to mount the package on the loop device.

would you give me some hints what limits are now or what we have to consider for the next steps?

thank you for every help and hint.

[Rich]

Hi netnomad
Any extensions you want to run need to be compiled for ARM. You can not run X86 programs.

[netnomad]

hi rich,

thank you for your reply.

some further informations:

there are loop devices under /dev:
/dev/loop0 to loop7   =      8 loop-devices
and an empty dir was created under /tmp/tcloop for the first package that was attempted to be installed:
/tmp/tcloop/libiconv

error message:
mount: mounting /dev/loop0 on /tmp/tcloop/libiconv failed: no such device
although there is a /dev/loop0-device.

[roberts]

As I stated in the first announcement post there are no extensions; yet!
You can test very basic stuff, for example:

Connect a usb pendrive via a powered hub.
create some test files in home.
try to backup to pendrive.
try to restore from pendrive.
edit cmdline.txt on sdcard to specify restore=sda1
test persistent home on pendrive, and opt

try using deb to tcz utility on some command line  raspbian deb packages and see if they will work.
try compling some command line utilty rapsbian and see if that will work.

I am working on setting up a procedure to keep raspbaerry pi and allwinner arm ports in sync with x86 core.
Once I get there I will then try to make a few simple extensions.

This is only the beginning!

Too much to do.

Any help is appreciated.

[bmarkus]

Tried to run rpiCore-20120904.img in QEMU but no success. If someone have done it already, please share howto.

[roberts]

Posted an update rpiCore-20120906.img.gz in http://distro.ibiblio.org/tinycorelinux/4.x/arm/armv6/
This syncs with x86 Core's base v4.6.1 and I updated the modules. Currently it contains way more modules than needed for base. But I left them in for now to hopefully help testing.

[netnomad]

hi roberts,

would you mind to add the arm-version of mc.tcz with it's dependencies?
... so the testing and exploring of your arm-stages would be much more convenient, easier and faster.
and the learnig curve would be much higher :-)

thank you for your efforts.

[vinnie]

Tried to run rpiCore-20120904.img in QEMU but no success. If someone have done it already, please share howto.

+1

[roberts]

Version of qemu not stated.
As I stated in another thread I have seen Raspbian running on qemu-1.1.1.1.

[roberts]

hi roberts,

would you mind to add the arm-version of mc.tcz with it's dependencies?
... so the testing and exploring of your arm-stages would be much more convenient, easier and faster.
and the learnig curve would be much higher :-)

thank you for your efforts.

I am the only one working on this and as only one I will not be able to build all the extensions.
My focus, as with x86 Core, has been the base system. There is still much to do there.

I am relying on the slogan, "If you build it they will come." I must rely on a community to contribute as they have overwhelmingly done with the x86 platform.

As much as x86 Core is mature and stable, both arm ports are hatchlings just begining to walk; not able to fully run just yet.

I have had an open strategy to kickstart these arm ports. Each milestone has been posted and shared with the community.

I am currently looking into enhancing an existing tool to further demonstrate both arm systems.

[zerophnx]

I can't wait to try this, though I won't have the SD card for another week or so. In the meantime I'll try compiling a few extensions with the Raspbian card.

Thank you for your continued work on Core, both with the x86 and ARM.

[roberts]

Posted an update rpiCore-20120907.img.gz in http://distro.ibiblio.org/tinycorelinux/4.x/arm/armv6/
Fixed incorrectly configured squashfs module.
tce-load -i  is now working!

Still contains way more modules than needed for base. But I left them in for now to hopefully help testing.

[Rich]

This may or may not be of interest::
http://landley.net/aboriginal/downloads/binaries/extras/
It contains some ARM binaries. The parent directory contains some cross compilers and the readme file
states that image files are bootable under qemu.