Emdebian for arm

Emdebian  

Bootstrap Lenny for your ARM board.

This document explaind how to bootstrap yourself a nice armel emdebian "grip" install for your ARM board.

Create a debootstrap with emdebian base minimum system

 /opt/debian-armel% sudo debootstrap --arch armel --foreign lenny grip/   

The resulting directory contains just whats needed to boot and populate a snall debian.

 /opt/debian-armel% ll grip 
total 64
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Apr 29  2008 bin
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Dec  4 09:23 boot
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Mar  6 13:12 debootstrap
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Nov  8 07:43 dev
 drwxr-xr-x 30 root root 4096 Mar  6 13:12 etc
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Dec  4 09:23 home
 drwxr-xr-x 10 root root 4096 Apr 29  2008 lib
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Dec  4 09:23 mnt
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Dec  4 09:23 proc
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Dec  4 09:23 root
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Apr 29  2008 sbin
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Sep 16 08:48 selinux
 drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Aug 12  2008 sys
 drwxrwxrwt  2 root root 4096 Dec  4 09:23 tmp
 drwxr-xr-x  9 root root 4096 Apr  6  2008 usr
 drwxr-xr-x 11 root root 4096 Aug 12  2008 var
 

Create a compressed file with the content of this directory, so you can use it again.

 /opt/debian-armel% (cd grip ;  tar jcf ../emdebian-grip-090306-armel-debootstrap-lenny.tar.bz2 .) 
/opt/debian-armel% ll -h 
total 35M
 drwxr-xr-x 18 root   root   4.0K Apr  6  2008 grip
 -rw-r--r--  1 michel michel  34M Mar  6 13:13 emdebian-grip-090306-armel-debootstrap-lenny.tar.bz2
 

Insert your SD card in the host. You can detect what device name it is mapped on by doing :

 /opt/debian-armel% dmesg|tail -20 
...
  sd 6:0:0:0: sdd 1939456 512-byte hardware sectors: (993 MB/947 MiB)
  sd 6:0:0:0: sdd Write Protect is off
  sd 6:0:0:0: sdd Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
  sd 6:0:0:0: sdd Assuming drive cache: write through
   sdd: sdd1 sdd2 sdd3
 

So we know it's sdd here, so lets partition the card again the way we want it.

First partition of 50MB will be /boot, vfat, and the rest is /, ext3. Here is the complete session in fdisk:

 /opt/debian-armel% sudo fdisk /dev/sdd 
Command (m for help): o 
Building a new DOS disklabel with disk identifier 0x3e53813f.
 Changes will remain in memory only, until you decide to write them.
 After that, of course, the previous content won't be recoverable.
 
Warning: invalid flag 0x0000 of partition table 4 will be corrected by w(rite)
 
Command (m for help): p 
Disk /dev/sdd: 993 MB, 993001472 bytes
 31 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1009 cylinders
 Units = cylinders of 1922  512 = 984064 bytes
 Disk identifier: 0x3e53813f
 
   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
 
Command (m for help): n 
Command action
    e   extended
    p   primary partition (1-4)
 p 
Partition number (1-4): 1 
First cylinder (1-1009, default 1):
 Using default value 1
 Last cylinder, +cylinders or +size{K,M,G} (1-1009, default 1009): +50MB 
Command (m for help): n 
Command action
    e   extended
    p   primary partition (1-4)
 p 
Partition number (1-4): 2 
First cylinder (53-1009, default 53):
 Using default value 53
 Last cylinder, +cylinders or +size{K,M,G} (53-1009, default 1009):
 Using default value 1009
 
Command (m for help): p 
Disk /dev/sdd: 993 MB, 993001472 bytes
 31 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1009 cylinders
 Units = cylinders of 1922  512 = 984064 bytes
 Disk identifier: 0x3e53813f
 
   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
 /dev/sdd1               1          52       49941   83  Linux
 /dev/sdd2              53        1009      919677   83  Linux
 
Command (m for help): t 
Partition number (1-4): 1 
Hex code (type L to list codes): L 
 0  Empty           1e  Hidden W95 FAT1 80  Old Minix       bf  Solaris
  1  FAT12           24  NEC DOS         81  Minix / old Lin c1  DRDOS/sec (FAT-
  2  XENIX root      39  Plan 9          82  Linux swap / So c4  DRDOS/sec (FAT-
  3  XENIX usr       3c  PartitionMagic  83  Linux           c6  DRDOS/sec (FAT-
  4  FAT16 <32M      40  Venix 80286     84  OS/2 hidden C:  c7  Syrinx
  5  Extended        41  PPC PReP Boot   85  Linux extended  da  Non-FS data
  6  FAT16           42  SFS             86  NTFS volume set db  CP/M / CTOS / .
  7  HPFS/NTFS       4d  QNX4.x          87  NTFS volume set de  Dell Utility
  8  AIX             4e  QNX4.x 2nd part 88  Linux plaintext df  'BootIt'
  9  AIX bootable    4f  QNX4.x 3rd part 8e  Linux LVM       e1  DOS access
  a  OS/2 Boot Manag 50  OnTrack DM      93  Amoeba          e3  DOS R/O
  b  W95 FAT32       51  OnTrack DM6 Aux 94  Amoeba BBT      e4  'SpeedStor'
  c  W95 FAT32 (LBA) 52  CP/M            9f  BSD/OS          eb  BeOS fs
  e  W95 FAT16 (LBA) 53  OnTrack DM6 Aux a0  IBM Thinkpad hi ee  GPT
  f  W95 Ext'd (LBA) 54  OnTrackDM6      a5  FreeBSD         ef  EFI (FAT-12/16/
 10  OPUS            55  EZ-Drive        a6  OpenBSD         f0  Linux/PA-RISC b
 11  Hidden FAT12    56  Golden Bow      a7  NeXTSTEP        f1  'SpeedStor'
 12  Compaq diagnost 5c  Priam Edisk     a8  Darwin UFS      f4  'SpeedStor'
 14  Hidden FAT16 <3 61  SpeedStor       a9  NetBSD          f2  DOS secondary
 16  Hidden FAT16    63  GNU HURD or Sys ab  Darwin boot     fb  VMware VMFS
 17  Hidden HPFS/NTF 64  Novell Netware  b7  BSDI fs         fc  VMware VMKCORE
 18  AST SmartSleep  65  Novell Netware  b8  BSDI swap       fd  Linux raid auto
 1b  Hidden W95 FAT3 70  DiskSecure Mult bb  Boot Wizard hid fe  LANstep
 1c  Hidden W95 FAT3 75  PC/IX           be  Solaris boot    ff  BBT
 Hex code (type L to list codes): b 
Changed system type of partition 1 to b (W95 FAT32)
 
Command (m for help): p 
Disk /dev/sdd: 993 MB, 993001472 bytes
 31 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1009 cylinders
 Units = cylinders of 1922  512 = 984064 bytes
 Disk identifier: 0x3e53813f
 
   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
 /dev/sdd1               1          52       49941    b  W95 FAT32
 /dev/sdd2              53        1009      919677   83  Linux
 
Command (m for help): w 
The partition table has been altered!
 
Calling ioctl() to re-read partition table.
 
WARNING: If you have created or modified any DOS 6.x
 partitions, please see the fdisk manual page for additional
 information.
 Syncing disks.
 

Now, lets create file systems on these 2 new partitions, one vfat, one ext3

 /opt/debian-armel% sudo mkfs.vfat /dev/sdd1 
mkfs.vfat 2.11 (12 Mar 2005)
 /opt/debian-armel% sudo mkfs.ext3 /dev/sdd2 
mke2fs 1.41.3 (12-Oct-2008)
 warning: 543 blocks unused.
 
Filesystem label=
 OS type: Linux
 Block size=4096 (log=2)
 Fragment size=4096 (log=2)
 57568 inodes, 229376 blocks
 11495 blocks (5.01%) reserved for the super user
 First data block=0
 Maximum filesystem blocks=234881024
 7 block groups
 32768 blocks per group, 32768 fragments per group
 8224 inodes per group
 Superblock backups stored on blocks:
         32768, 98304, 163840
 
Writing inode tables: done
 Creating journal (4096 blocks): done
 Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done
 
This filesystem will be automatically checked every 29 mounts or
 180 days, whichever comes first.  Use tune2fs -c or -i to override.
 

 /opt/debian-armel% sudo mount /dev/sdd2 /mnt/arm
 /opt/debian-armel% sudo mkdir -p /mnt/arm/boot
 /opt/debian-armel% sudo mount /dev/sdd1 /mnt/arm/boot
 

This will uncompress the archive into the new ext3 partition on the SD card

 /opt/debian-armel% (cd /mnt/arm;sudo tar jxf /opt/debian-armel/emdebian-grip-090306-armel-debootstrap-lenny.tar.bz2 ; sync )
 

Some space has been taken by the bootstrap. The real amount is irrelevan, as most of it is unninstalled package files.

 /opt/debian-armel% df -h
 Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
 ...
 /dev/sdd2             882M  98M  724M  18% /mnt/arm
 /dev/sdd1              49M     0   49M   0% /mnt/arm/boot
 

If you have a source directory with your compiled kernel, you can already install your modules in their proper space with :

 /usr/src/linus-2.6% sudo make INSTALL_MOD_PATH=/mnt/arm modules_install 
...
   INSTALL sound/usb/caiaq/snd-usb-caiaq.ko
   INSTALL sound/usb/snd-usb-audio.ko
   INSTALL sound/usb/snd-usb-lib.ko
   DEPMOD  2.6.29-rc7
 /usr/src/linus-2.6% ll /mnt/arm/lib/modules 
total 4
 drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Mar  6 12:20 2.6.29-rc7
 2.6.29-rc7
 

The file system needs to be tweaked a bit to boot properly, so we do that with a root shell into the target directory. Be VERY careful not to use any leafing / in your paths!!

 /usr/src/linus-2.6% su - 
root@yap:~# cd /mnt/arm 
root@yap:/mnt/arm# cp /tftpboot/uImage boot/ 
root@yap:/mnt/arm# echo "proc /proc proc none 0 0" >>etc/fstab 
root@yap:/mnt/arm# echo "mini2440" >etc/hostname 
root@yap:/mnt/arm# mknod dev/console c 5 1 
root@yap:/mnt/arm# mknod dev/ttySAC0 c 204 64 
root@yap:/mnt/arm# echo 'deb  lenny main' >>etc/apt/sources.list 

 root@yap:/mnt/arm# cd ..
 root@yap:/mnt/arm# umount arm/boot arm
 

You can either do these steps in qemu, or using your own board. The process is the same, you need to configure the system to boot from your SD card: Set environment variables properly for booting on the memory card:

 MINI2440 # setenv bootargs console=ttySAC0,115200 noinitrd root=/dev/mtcblk0p2 rootwait=4 rw ip=dhcp init=/bin/sh 
MINI2440 # tftp;bootm 

Eventualy, you should arrive at a naked shell prompt.

Do this to finish the debian install. It will take a rather long time, so be patient !

 sh-3.2# mount /proc /proc -t proc 
sh-3.2# export PATH=/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin 
sh-3.2# /debootstrap/debootstrap --second-stage 
...
 

Wait (a long time) -- udev might give you some warnings due to bad blocks on the NAND, in which case you might have to force-reinstall it when it's done :

 dpkg -i /var/cache/apt/archives/udev_0.125-7em1_armel.deb
 

Once that is done, add a bit of niceties to the install:

 root@yap:/mnt/arm# echo ttySAC0 >>etc/securetty 
root@yap:/mnt/arm# printf "T0:123:respawn:/sbin/getty 115200 ttySAC0\n" >>etc/inittab 
root@yap:/mnt/arm# printf "auto eth0\niface eth0 inet dhcp\n" >>etc/network/interfaces 

Reboot, you're done !