Questions for peaslaker and other Goflex net owners

[jayjay]

Hi all,

Firstly, big thanks to Peter and Jeff and all contributing forum members for the great work in making debian running on Goflex Net. It is an amazing work.

I am a complete newbie in this. I have read all the threads about Goflex Net at least twice in this forum and Jeff's forum. My new Goflex Net has just arrived. I am excited in running debian with the following services - Samba, minidlna and asterisk 1.8 on the device.

To help me understand more, I'd like to ask a few questions.
(1) What is a primary difference between Peter's method and Jeff's method ?
(2) There are two ways to install debian,
a) On NAND. This is my preferred method. I'd like to install debian and the above services on NAND. How do I do it ? Is there enough storage ?
b) On external storage device. This is my second choice. I'd like to install debian and the services on a SATA drive (I don't have an eSATA drive). When I follow Peter's method as documented here, how do I plug in a SATA drive without damaging it ?
c) From Peter's document, there is no need for a swap partition. Do I get it right ?
(3) With some reasonable effort, can I cross compile asterisk 1.8 on Ubuntu Lucid x86 machine ? How ?

Thank you.

--jj

[pepedog]

What's wrong with Arch Linux ARM?
Asterisk 1.8 is already built here.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jayjay', '(')1) What is a primary difference between Peter's method and Jeff's method ?

Very kind of you to answer my questions clearly. Thank you.
At first, I was thinking of installing OpenWRT on it since it's light. Then, I found Jeff's forum and then this forum.
Now, I just have to find time to start working on it. Will report back. Thanks Peter once again.

--jj

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('peaslaker', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jayjay', '(')1) What is a primary difference between Peter's method and Jeff's method ?

[jayjay]

I started working on it last night. The uboot part was no problems. However, I was stuck here (cannot download the file).$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', 'on /dev/sda1 wget http://plugboxlinux.org/os/2011.02/PlugApps-Linux-2011.02-rootfs.tar.gz -O rootfs.tar.gz
') I managed to work around it and completed the installation successfully. It is now running Arch Linux ARM install linux There is one small issue. That is, the MAC address of the device was not updated correctly. I did enter the device MAC using$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', 'ethaddr uu:vv:xx:yy:zz') but I got a completely different MAC after it booted up. Can I rerun the ubit_start in Arch Linux ARM install linux and then try the ethaddr command again?

Thanks

--jj

[peaslaker]

To run ubit_start from Arch Linux ARM install you need to install the 'cpio' package
$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', 'pacman -Sy cpio')

You should then be able to set the ethernet address... but you may find it resets itself on reboot. To avoid this copy a fresh version of the ubit ramdisk to the boot directory.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', '
rm /boot/uInitrd
wget http://jeff.doozan.com/debian/goflex/v0.6/uInitrd -O /boot/uInitrd')

[jayjay]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('peaslaker', 'T')o run ubit_start from Arch Linux ARM install you need to install the 'cpio' package
$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', 'pacman -Sy cpio')

You should then be able to set the ethernet address... but you may find it resets itself on reboot. To avoid this copy a fresh version of the ubit ramdisk to the boot directory.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', '
rm /boot/uInitrd
wget http://jeff.doozan.com/debian/goflex/v0.6/uInitrd -O /boot/uInitrd')

[peaslaker]

U-Boot can't use anything clever like UUIDs or labels. The UBIT U-boot has a very comprehensive set of search paths for a bootable system:

http://Arch Linux ARM.com/index.php5/UBIT_boot_sequence

The UBIT ramdisk doesn't use UUID. It uses labels. Use tune2fs to mark your rootfs drive:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', 'tune2fs -L "rootfs" /dev/sda1')

What this means is that as long as UBIT can find the kernel and ramdisk, the ramdisk can guarantee the rootfs is mounted. It is a pretty good system at the moment and should have good reliability for booting.

[maihoaomv]

peaslaker
I have a question for you. I converted my Goflex Home from Seagate default (yuk) to Arch Linux ARM. It worked well at first until I tried to upgrade software. That's when I started having problems. I couldn't boot from the SATA drive (/dev/sda1) any more. After reloading/upgrading software to latest it would work perfectly for a while then it won't boot from the SATA.

I don't as a general rule leave it running 24/7 but boot it, use it, then shut it down when I'm done. It may boot once or twice before failing or it may boot many times and work perfectly for a month or more before failing. The USB rescue boots fine so it's most likely not the base unit. I have reloaded software probably 20 times or more but it continues to fail (seemly at random). I generally allow enough time for disk spin down prior to removing power.

I finally got netconsole to work. The best I can tell it boots the kernel (from the SATA) and the kernel is working (plug in usb and it outputs to the kernel netconsole). But it doesn't seem to be getting an IP address from the LAN router. Thus I can't ssh, ping or do anything. So I don't know if it's hung up or working but just not talking to the LAN. I made backups while it was working with both tar and dd. But when I put the backup back on sda1 sometimes it'll fix the problem and sometimes it won't (I think I'm setting it up correctly). It's runs nicely until it crashes but it's very frustrating having to go thought the entire setup, install software, have it working for a while then crashing.

I'm not the only one who is having this problem. I made a post on the Arch Linux forum (viewtopic.php?t=3190). I didn't get any useful feedback but I did get a reply that someone else was having the same problem. So I don't think it's just me with a one-of-a-kind problem. I'm stuck trying to find a solution to this problem.

The SATA (1 TB) is partitioned as follows:
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 487 3911796 83 Linux ### 4 GB, ext3, “rootfs”
/dev/sda2 488 549 498015 82 Linux swap ### 500MB
/dev/sda3 550 121601 972350190 83 Linux ### remainder of disk, ext3

The GFH only has 128MB of ram. Is 500MB swap enough?

I'm not exactly a Linux newbie but I'm not an expert either. Do you have any ideas? suggestions? thoughts? about why I'm having this problem? I would like to get it to work reliably. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks
maihoaomv

[moonman]

Check your sata hdd smart status. Maybe it's failing. Download Hiren's Boot Disk, boot off of it and run dos programs -> hdd utilities --> vivard. This will check/remap bad blocks on the hdd (temporary fix, but if it finds something than it's a sign that hdd is failing) Mine was the same way until I replaced the hdd.