Tiny Core Linux

Tiny Core Base => TCB Q&A Forum => Topic started by: FxIII on March 14, 2011, 04:54:37 AM

Title: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: FxIII on March 14, 2011, 04:54:37 AM

I want to boot TC from a xfs partition where lives an ubuntu and let the TC to use a persistent directory on said filesystem. How one can use that persistent storage if is not supported by tc when it starts? I want to underline that the boot loader knows how to read from xfs.
Ty!

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: tinypoodle on March 14, 2011, 05:25:59 AM

Remastering adding xfs support could be an approach.

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: curaga on March 14, 2011, 07:58:44 AM

If your bootloader can load multiple initrd's, you don't even have to remaster the main initrd (see the dynamic remastering wiki page).

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: vinnie on March 14, 2011, 10:18:10 AM

take this opportunity to ask a question
A friend asked me if he can "install" TC on an ntfs partition, I think something similar to that of FxIII with xfs.
I did not understand what the need to do this, but I have not been able to respond.
what do you say?

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: curaga on March 14, 2011, 12:20:06 PM

@NTFS

A limited frugal install (no home= opt= etc, only a tce dir and backup) will work using svolli's remaster (it includes ntfs-3g in the base for ntfs rw, and grub4dos that can boot from ntfs).

A more complete install with persistency would only work with a loop file (similar to Ubuntu wubi) & svolli's remaster. I don't know of anyone who's tried this though, the loop file option is usually used with virtual machines.


In short, no with vanilla TC. XFS is different, since it's a real linux fs supporting permissions.

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: vinnie on March 14, 2011, 04:03:56 PM

Thanks curaga, the situation is better than I thought  :)

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: Rich on March 14, 2011, 04:35:10 PM

Hi vinnie
Since it's so simple to set up an empty partition there's really no good reason to force Linux to run
on an NTFS. Someone just gave me a killer laptop with XP on it and here's what I did. Defragged the
drive a couple of times (Windows needs 2 or 3 tries to get it right). Booted the TC CD. Downloaded
gparted, dosfstools-3, e2fsprogs_apps, and mtools. Used gparted to create and format a new EXT3
partition. Then I went to step 5 of the hard disk installation instructions and proceeded from there.
If he just wants a /tce directory on the drive he could format it FAT if he wants.

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: FxIII on March 25, 2011, 04:05:07 AM

Is the fact that my bootloader has the ability to read a xfs partition be used to do the little bootstrap required to mount the partition at boot time?

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: tinypoodle on March 25, 2011, 04:39:38 AM

The only relevance of a bootloader having the ability to read a particular fs would be related to loading kernel and initrd from such fs.

Out of curiosity, which bootloader is that?

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: FxIII on March 25, 2011, 05:35:24 AM

@tinypoodle
the one in the latest version of ubuntu
i belive is some version of  grub2

Title: Re: how to make available a tce dir stored on a unsupported filesystem
Post by: tinypoodle on March 25, 2011, 05:50:01 AM

Ah, ok. I was just thinking that LiLo would probably simply not care about the filesystem to load the kernel from.