Compiling kernel and modules on TC

[kerpob]

Well on my 4th attempt I have succeeded! I am posting this from tcl 2.6.28.6 on the eee. Only the wireless is called wlan0 instead of ath0 now for some reason.

My first 3 attempts got as far as a frozen jwm, although I could drop to cli and connect to the internet there. Only succeeded when I just copied the existing tcl .config file and then got rid of non eee stuff and enabled the atheros wireless driver.
 
EDIT: Still need the wireless tools tce to get wireless up.

[kerpob]

Couple of problems I'm having. Hope someone can help.

1. I have modified bootlocal.sh with 3 lines to get the wireless working (ifconfig wlan0 up then iwconfig wlan0 essid any then udhcpc -i wlan0). Doesn't seem to work at boot, but does if I run it after boot (by simply clicking on it in Rox file manager.

2. No sound. Have installed oss and also tried alsa, but soundon and alsaconf commands aren't recognised. Now my new kernel doesn't allow modules - does that matter or is it something else?

Actually - while typing this I've realised that I ran the boot command home=sda2 but forgot to add it permanently in grub, so local copies going missing may solve either or both of the above. Will edit this with a, possibly, shamefaced update in a few moments...

[curaga]

1. It probably needs to wait some secs to allow the wireless to initialize. For example "sleep 5" right before the ifconfig

2. Both the OSS and ALSA extensions have the support in modules; if your kernel doesn't support modules, the relevant driver can't be loaded.
To get over this you'd need to compile the relevant module into the kernel, which is only currently possible for ALSA.

[kerpob]

1. It probably needs to wait some secs to allow the wireless to initialize. For example "sleep 5" right before the ifconfig

2. Both the OSS and ALSA extensions have the support in modules; if your kernel doesn't support modules, the relevant driver can't be loaded.
To get over this you'd need to compile the relevant module into the kernel, which is only currently possible for ALSA.

1. No joy - put sleep before and after. Must be something else. Is there a way to run the commands after jwm is active?

2. Thanks - I can't remember if I had the drivers compiled into the kernel or not. Just have to wade through menuconfig to find out

[Juanito]

2. Thanks - I can't remember if I had the drivers compiled into the kernel or not. Just have to wade through menuconfig to find out

If I remember correctly, the "soundcore" module is not enabled in the default tc config - this is required for alsa to work.

[roberts]

Wireless commands need full path when run from /opt/bootlocal.sh
Add the path for your iwconfig and you should be fine.

[kerpob]

@Juanito - Yes, I've looked at my kernel .config and I didn't do sound, but unfortunately for me I can't rebuild the kernel yet as I made a fresh install of tcl and then  installed the compiletc having forgotten to add home=sda2 to grub boot, so it is not installed properly & won't recognise "make".

This is actually a bit of a fundamental problem with home=sda2 option. Closing down always prompts for backup, and if you do this once then you are stuck with a slowed down boot as there is an attempted restore each boot. It also means that changes to other directories (e.g. opt for background images and the bootlocal script) are not saved if you don't do the backup. Is there a way around this - e.g. cor home=sda2 to also include opt?

@roberts - thanks! Will give it a try, but as opt is not saved at exit might be a bit pointless.

[kerpob]

recompiled the kernel with both alsa and oss, but still no sound.

soundon has the  messages:

warning cannot locate the linux kernel development package for linux kernel version 2.6.28.6-tinycore
...
error: kernel directory lib/modules/2.6.28.6-tinycore does not exist

alsaconf when I type it, says:

unable to execute /usr/local/sbin/alsaconf no such file or directory

Help appreciated!

[Juanito]

alsaconf is in the alsa.tcel (most likely) or alsa_modules.tcem (possibly) extension

[kerpob]

alsaconf is in the alsa.tcel (most likely) or alsa_modules.tcem (possibly) extension

Yes - the former installs the latter as a dependency. But didn't work for me.

[Juanito]

If you try the two or three commands listed in alsa.tcel.info, do you get any error messages?

[kerpob]

If you try the two or three commands listed in alsa.tcel.info, do you get any error messages?

sudo alsaconf gives:
unable to execute /usr/local/sbin/alsaconf no such file or directory
but alsaconf is in that directory, as is alsactl. Same result even if I run same command from /usr/local/sbin/

sudo udevtrigger --subsystem-match=sound
no response, but no error message either. just straight to next command.

speaker-test seems to be working... apart from no sound!

[Juanito]

sudo alsaconf gives:
unable to execute /usr/local/sbin/alsaconf no such file or directory

This sounds like you need the bash extension loaded - if you look at alsaconf with a text editor, does the first line contain "bash"?

[kerpob]

sudo alsaconf gives:
unable to execute /usr/local/sbin/alsaconf no such file or directory

This sounds like you need the bash extension loaded - if you look at alsaconf with a text editor, does the first line contain "bash"?

Bash loads as a dependancy... It also doesn't work on the normal tinycore kernel, with the same error message, which suggests to me that either alsa tce isn't working or my eee doesn't accept alsa.

[Jason W]

Regarding bash:
It sounds like bash did not create the /bin/bash symlink.  I have had that happen for reasons I didn't investigate as it normally works fine.  Try recreating /bin/bash:

ln -s /usr/local/bin/bash /bin/bash

and see if that helps.