Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Ok, thanks for checking on the iceweasel bug. Im waiting to install the new tar ball that you compile, the one with icewm. Thanks for all the hard work. Also, Im testing my xp .img file with my psp right now, i will see how it comes out. the img file is about 500mb, i left room in it so i can install halo or something ( hell, i man can dream cant he?)

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Hi, anybody with IceWM experience, where's the menu file for IceWM? I thought it would be in /usr/share/icewm, but that menu file is just a sample, and it bears no resemblance to the menu used in the actual WM. Same goes for the toolbar file. The preferences file, on the other hand, is actually used. There seems to be some system-wide menu thing going on, but I don't know where to look for that... any ideas? People familiar with Debian?

Just a quick screenshot of my IceWM setup for the chroot:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3185/...6398ee1c_o.png

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Looks like your IceWM is coming along well! I *think* a lot of the menus are rooted somewhere - Enlightenment's menu editor (GUI!) has stubs for a few external menus, which I am likewise confused with locating.

Found one really really big win for Enlightenment - it's virtual pager allows pretty easy handling of windows that are too large.

One question - has anyone gotten SDL Audio to work with Debian at all?

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Yes, you have to use the esound option... I got it working with the "abuse" game...

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

As far as I know, configuration files are in the [home]/.icewm directory.
In my rudypuppy linux under .icewm I have these files: menu, preferences, keys, programs, startup (a script), theme, toolbar and winoptions.
I can send you those if needed.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I have tried export SDL_AUDIODRIVER=esd without any luck so far - is there some other setting somewhere I am missing? Depending on the program, some complain about not being able to open /dev/dsp (which indeed doesn't exist).

Update: Not sure what I did - but milkytracker suddenly decided to make noise! :)

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Those are user-specific files that override the system defaults. I figured out where the system defaults are located in Debian IceWM. For future reference:
I'm not yet sure where the active "keys" and "winoptions" are located. These files are in both directories.

I'm really really close to having a new version. I'm just packaging everything up, then testing the package, especially the image downloader script that I modified from penguinbait.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I've done some test installs and uninstalls and re-installs and botched installs, and I'm ready to go live, just need to gather my strength to write up the big post with all the instructions and the FAQ and the notes etc etc etc... This is a huge improvement, the scripts are way better now, the Debian install is not hacked in any way, and the IceWM desktop and automated image installer work well...

The new image is pretty big, unfortunately, it took the installer more than half an hour to download the image and another very long time to unpack the image. But that's not bad if that's the biggest problem.

I think the biggest problem will be the fact that everyone will complain about what dogs these big desktop apps are. They just go so slowly! Especially Firefox.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Yes - I have to admit that I grabbed the App image just to say I did and ran the software, however unfortunately they are, in reality, a bit to heavy for our dear old tablets. While it is definitely cool to see the OpenOffice logo flash up on my n800 (and I got a really good chance to see it), I cannot really see ever using it for anything productive due to the speed.

With that said, I think your efforts still are wonderful, Qole. I have had my n800 in my hands for more straight blocks of time than I have for quite some time, playing with the various options available under Debian. I have found while the modern apps run way too slow, there is has been a serious class re-union to the older apps of yester-years going on, apps that were written for double digit Mhz machines that utterly scream on our Nokia. I think these Gems of old likely will be the real strength of Debian on our Nokias.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Finally, it's done.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Hey Qole - what is your secret to have Xephyr/IceWM having an icon under OS2008 to switch back? I have been manually wmctrl'ing it back up, but a simple "task" to switch back would be hot.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I wrote a tiny Python app that pops open a window in OS2008 called "IceWM", then I used wmctrl to find the window ID, then I open Xephyr inside that window using the -parent parameter.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

As an alternative to OS2008 which is better debian or kde ?

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

That question really doesn't make horribly much sense; I think you misunderstand what's going on here.

KDE runs as a window manager and associated apps on top of OS2008; not an alternative to OS2008, but to Matchbox and some Hildon apps.

Debian is a full free-standing distribution; the topic discussed in this thread, though, is using Debian in a chroot, so you have OS2008 running, providing all system services, and Debian providing applications and their (library) dependencies. You can run Debian as a boot-time alternative, but that's discussed in other threads... It's currently the most viable ITOS replacement, IMO, but Android also works (on N810s, mainly); just not many apps there yet.

HTH

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Thank you Benson. Maybe I didn´t express mylself right , what I mean is it´s better use maemo with kde for productivity apps lilke koffice or use debian in chroot ? But you re right debian is much more intersting , especially if I could use java apps.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

You can use Java apps without (or with) either; Jalimo uses GNU classpath, same as Debian's java implementation, IIUC, just easier with Debian chroot since you don't have to set it up yourself...

Koffice is faster, I think, than OOo, but OOo is more compatible with MSO, and more full-featured in general.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I haven't noticed others posting this question since the release of the easy install..

I am booting from MMC, and have 2.7G left on that partition, plenty I probably won't use. How can I either a) install the image file onto this (ext2) partition or b) install on mmc1 and transfer it over? I presume there's a lot more to the installer than unpacking the bz2 file...

I am downloading the image file to my desktop now, and deleting all my mp3s from mmc1...

Thank you, looking forward to trying this out!

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Ok, still downloading the image, but I have a thought. Is everything else set up after the basic install and before downloading the image?

How about this:

immediately after the existing export= lines in /sbin/debian

and then, in the appropriate spot...

All I would need to do is export the DEBIAN_IMG_ALT= variable setting before running the script. This should keep it easy for basic use and allow advanced users to be more specific.

Any thoughts?

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

BoxofSnoo: That's cool!

I still think the ultimate thing would be to have the debian chroot script search the root fs as well as the mmc cards for image files, as well as unmounted partitions. If it finds multiple image files and/or unmounted partitions, it will ask you which you want to mount. This would let you chroot into other copies of maemo as well as debian, ubuntu, etc. You could have several images on your various cards and choose which one to chroot into...

... This is my plan for the next version of the "Easy Debian" package...

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

That would be awesome! But... probably take too long each launch...

Otherwise you could rescan on demand and use something like this:

The 2> err redirect is purely to prevent seeing the common "too many open files" error. You could use grep or awk to filter just the ones you want, and get them into a list for on-the-fly selection...

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Oh, I didn't mean search the whole file system, it would just look in a couple of places (probably "/" and maybe "/home/user") so that people with big partitions can use them to host their image.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I'd be inclined to have the main scripts read a config file, and have a separate script that can be run on-demand to try generating a config file by looking for debian root filesystems.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

That sounds cool, I look forward to seeing it! I've just learned how to do if-then statements in shell scripts, reading/writing config files is a bit over my head. But if you held my hand...

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Writing's the hard bit, since you have to figure out what to write...

Make your config file look like:
(That is to say, statements interpretable by the shell, leaving settings in shell variables; you can do actual commands and stuff as well as assignments...)
Then, in your shell script, you include the file with . like so:
That causes the shell to jump over to .debchrootrc, continue reading and evaluating lines from it, and when it drops out of .debchrootrc, returns to the including script.

For writing, you wind up with something like:

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Could you please post some of your "gems" in the Debian Apps That Run Well On The Tablet thread?

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I think I will have my chroot script look for the config file, and if it doesn't find one, it will look in a very few specific locations for a specifically named chroot image.

I will then make a new package (called something like advanced-chroot-config) that will use Bundyo's port of Zenity to interact with the user in setting up a variety of options, including using a partition instead of an img file, and then write this to a config file that will then be used by the chroot script. The new package will also include Matan's unmount script for shutting down your chroot so you can switch to a new one, and maybe some other chroot-related utilities if we can think of stuff that would be useful.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Sounds pretty clean from here. Let me know if you run into any trouble with the scripting.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Does This Work On Nokia 770

Re: Resizing the debian.img.ext2 image
 

Hello,

I've been looking for quite a while for an easy way of installing a full linux distro on my n810, and I must say you guys have done an incredible job. The image of qole is working flawlessly. 1000xthanks

I had a question about the partition size. I have a microsd card of 8 GB, most of it I emptied for the debian image of qole. The problem is when I try to install xfce4, I run out of space and it becomes really ugly. So I read this thread (and others) to find a solution and I tried psykosis one but it didn't work. Instead the terminal tells me after this command:

/home/user # resize2fs /media/mmc1/debian.img.ext2 1950M
resize2fs: error while loading shared libraries: libe2p.so.2: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Is this missing library easily installable, is there an other way to resize the image or should I go for a complete personalized chroot install (as it seems you were all doing at the beginning of this thread) ?

note: I have been using linux (debian and ubuntu) for quite a while but am not an experienced user at all. So writing python or C code is not really something I can handle It would be nice if someone would have a not too complicated solutions :).

Again thank for everything.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

UPDATE OF THE PREVIOUS POST:

Finally I found a way around without risking my n810 at all, for anyone interested:

what you need:
- a computer with linux
- resize2fs on it
-> to install it ( normally in root or with sudo):
--> debian and ubuntu: apt-get install <program>
--> gentoo: emerge <program>, I think, it has been a while since I last touched a gentoo box)
- optional: SD card reader + adapter to (micro/mini)sd depend of which of the 3 you use.

steps:
1. Either connect your IT to your pc or get the card out (caution: do not take it out if in use, safest way to make sure: power off your IT) and put it in the card reader.
2. go in the terminal or if in X launch a terminal emulator
3. type cd /<your path to your (micro/mini)sd/
4. e2fsck -f <your debian image file name>
-> it check if everything is allright with the filesystem
5. resize2fs <your debian image file name> 1950M
(As psykosis said you can change the size but if your (micro/mini)sd card is formatted in fat, like mine, the file better not be bigger than 2gb)

And that's it, a loooot more room for installing cool apps :)

thank you very much for the resize2fs trick psykosis I wouldn't have found it myself.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

It's me again,

I've got some other problems, so if you chroot debian pros could help me it would be a very nice. :)

my first problem concerns hal and apt-get. I installed a lot of packages and now each time I use apt-get it is written: (sorry it's in french)

paramétrage de hal (0.5.11-2) ...
dpkg : erreur de traitement de hal (--configure) :
le sous processus post-installation script a retourné une erreur de sortie d'état 1
I think that with all the installs I made some minor manipulation went wrong with hal but I don't know what.

my second problem is about launching properly xfce 4. I can launch xfce from the chroot debian terminal with:
startxfce4
But it isn't fullscreen and it doesn't look like a clean launch at all compared to qole's icewm icon. I looked in the icon of qole and found out that it was this command:
debwm icewm xpice
I tried:
debwm xfce xpice
and
debwm startxfce4 xpice
in an OS2008 terminal but it is not fullscreen and completely buggy (I only see the wallpaper)

But xfce works, when I type startxfce4 in the chroot terminal, the menu, the bar ... they work. So I'm sure there isn't much to do for it to go as flawless as qole's icewm, just that a stupid guy like me don't know what to do to make it work. :)

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

the xpice is a command qole wront on the debian side that statically launches IceWM.. if you want to launch XFCE you need to copy the xpice command in the debian root shell (so launch Debian Chroot):
Then edit the /usr/bin/wmxfce .. there is a line that specifically says icewm-session.. change that to xfce-session (i think - it might be xfce4-session or similar.. type xfce in a debian chroot and hit tab twice).

To something like:
As far as full screen.. read back a page or two - i think there is some python dependencies you need..

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Here's the post from qole regarding the python dependencies... it was in the other thread as well:

Also: I get that hal reconfigure error all the time as well now.. but it doesn't actually hinder the installation of my apps.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I think offensivebias isn't getting fullscreen because he isn't using my Debian script that starts the Xephyr nested X-Server and then sets the display to :1. I think he's actually starting xfce4 directly in OS2008... That produces some seriously weird (but somehow really cool :D ) stuff.

Make sure you use fatalsaint's method for copying and modifying the xpice script.

As for hal, just "apt-get remove hal" ... you don't need it and it won't install right on the tablet. If you can't get it to uninstall, tell me and I'll tell you how to hack dpkg to get it to work. But I hope you can just get it to uninstall. dbus is the other package that doesn't install right.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I was able to uninstall with no problem hal, thanks.

For xfce, qole was right, I was launching "debwm xfce xpice" in an 0S2008 terminal because I thought that the icewm icon qole created was launching from 0S2008. I did what you said about xpice, but how do I launch "debwm xfce wmxfce" on an icon like icewm ? Or if too complicated to explain in which terminal should I launch it ?
(because when I input "debwm xfce wmxfce" in a debian chroot terminal, it tells me command not found and when I launch it from a 0S2008 terminal the host window appears, sadly, debian and xfce do not follow :confused: ).
Maybe I should put something else too in the wmxfce ? I tried to replace "icewm-session" with "xfce-session" and "startxfce4" (the command to start xfce on a normal computer).

thank you all for the very quick reply to my previous post

note: with "startxfce4" in wmxfce, when I launch "debwm xfce wmxfce" in an OS2008 terminal, I get for a brief period a time a minimized black screen with the mouse in x form (like the first moments when x starts, I can move it) and it disapears to leave only the host window, I get the following in the 0S2008 terminal:
oups sorry forgot to paste the output
note: with xfce4-session it gives

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

First, I realized that fatalsaint's instructions need one little bit more to make things work smoothly. Find this line in your Debian script:
This line starts the Xephyr nested X-Server. It looks for a host window titled "icewm" and then uses that window. So if you want to call your host window something else (like xfce4), you have to change the "icewm" in that line to "xfce4". Basically, you change "icewm" to whatever your first parameter of "debwm" is.

Now, the "debwm" command is in OS2008, so you have to run that from an OS2008 terminal, not a Debian chroot terminal. You can troubleshoot your Debian wmxfce script by opening two terminal windows, the standard osso-xterm window and Debian chroot terminal. In the osso-xterm window, enter:
This will open the host window for xfce4.

Now, in the Debian chroot, you run wmxfce (make sure you've made the change above). If it doesn't work, or if it starts up in something other than the xfce4 host window, post the errors, and I'll help out.

When it all works, you can run this from a non-Debian OS2008 terminal or make a menu item to do this automagically:

EDIT: Just in case you didn't notice, I have a special affection for xfce4; I pestered JohnX about making it the default window manager for bootable Debian, and it was the first WM I got running using this method, see this post back on the first page.


http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2059/...4603f6b4d1.jpg

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

I also forgot to add that you may need to chmod +x /usr/bin/wmxfce - shouldn't if it was copied from an executable; but it might be necessary as I haven't tried it in practical application on this yet...

To add an icon the panel you can do one of two things.. Install Personal Menu; go into the Control Panel; and edit "Personal Menu"..

The other thing is to copy the /usr/share/applications/hildon/debwm.desktop to something like /usr/share/applications/hildon/wmxfce.desktop .. Edit it; and change the Title and Commands to their respective ones.

ETA: I did some googling and I think the command is actually xfce4-session .. not xfce-session... so try that one inside of wmxfce..

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Qole - quick thought;
in your next edition/release.. any chance you could make debwm take 4 arguments, and change xpice to something more generic (startwm) and have it take 2 arguments..

debwm IceWM startwm IceWM icewm-session

this makes it dynamic.. your shortcuts and stuff will still launch iceWM by default.. but this makes it so users can simply add their own menu icon by running:

debwm xfce4 startwm xfce4 xfce4-session

The code would look something like this:

There might be a way to clean that up a bit .. obviously the first and third arguments need to be the same as they both represent the window managers title.. if there was some way to pass that title using just the first argument would be nice but I haven't tried any of this on my table.. i might do it while I'm bored here at work though..

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Ok.. it was a little harder than I originally thought...I added this to the beginning of xpice:

Then there is 2 wmctrl lines that reference IceWM.. must replace both those lines with $title.. the Xepyr line becomes:
The launcher line becomes:

And then in the debwm file..


I don't know if you'd be even remotely interested in doing this.. but that's what I had to do to get it working. Then of course the changes to the launcher in the menu system in the post above. Makes it dynamic for the end user to launch their own WM.. however it obviously requires the end user to know things like the wm launcher command.. and to keep $1 and $3 of the debwm the same... so not sure if it's much better or not lol.

Re: Running Debian in a chroot
 

Xfce is the first you got working, that's right (forgot it). I couldn't get openwindow.py working, is it one of your other script ? (I quickly reread the thread but couldn't find it, I'm really not good at coming in the middle of a thread), I wasn't able to find it either with a <sudo find / -iname 'openwindow.py'> so it isn't in my system.