Baslinux mailing list

[David Moberg <davidjmoberg AT gmail.com>]

On 12/6/05, sindi keesan <keesan AT sdf.lonestar.org> wrote:
> On Tue, 6 Dec 2005, David Moberg wrote:
>
> > I have just uploaded a new linux-usb.tar.gz file. In the 1440.img
> > file, I trimmed busybox and /dev, and added e3, libvga.config,
> > USB keyboard, and loop support (for chrooting to BL3). reboot
> > now behaves like BL3 (it unmounts everything properly).
>
> What else comes in usb now, external floppy and hard drives?

Yes to both. In fact, I have a USB floppy drive and have been able
to boot the 1440.img disk with it on a newer computer. Once booted,
you can mount the floppy disk. This may be the first Linux floppy disk
that actually can 'run' from a USB floppy drive.

Unfortunately, Linux still cannot low-level format disks with USB.
:( (I also tried DOS but could not get it to work, either. Windows
and FreeBSD supposedly work.)

> Are they usb-storage?

Yes. There are also usb-storage adapters which let you plug in an
ordinary IDE CD or hard drive to the USB port (they need to get power
from an AC adapter, though)

> I tested this on a computer without usb ports [...]
> I noticed the message about pressing Enter, thanks.

You likely will not notice it if a camera is plugged in. This
still should be fixed.

> > I know that I promised more disk images, but there is still just
> > one. Perhaps I will add more images in the next release.
> >
> > Instead of another disk image, I added a small initfs.gz to boot
> > BL3 loop. It is currently untested.
> >
> > /etc/vga/libvga.config has chipset VGA as the default,
> > because zgv works in VGA mode and there are a large
> > number of VGA-compatible chipsets. You can change it if it
> > is too low-res for you.
>
> I suggest shortening libvga.config to only a few lines.

I will consider this.

> For zgv -M, include '#mouse microsoft'

Is that a PS/2 mouse? The manpage was not very clear.

> and 'mouse PS2' (unless your kernel supports other mice),

You can insmod serial (included). IMPS2 might be useful...

> and change mouse_accel_type power to mouse_accel_type off (because some mice
> act really screwy with power).

OK. That section can definitely be trimmed down.

> I doubt any USB computers have plain VGA video,

I doubt that any 586+ PCs do not have a VGA-compatible card.

> so I suggest omitting that
> long list of chipsets and using:
> chipset VESA
> (improves resolution for Trident, Tseng, SiS and Virge, but messes up some
> other video chips, so maybe remark it out.)

It would only take a few bytes if I listed the other chipsets in
space-delimited form. And I can only access VESA modes with
chipset VESA.

> #chipset VGA  (I hope this will work with ATI cards, which
> require special modelines).

Works with this ATI card. Special modelines?? I have not encountered
any of that.

> You could put in a few lines explaining what might need to be edited, in
> this file and maybe in a readme of some sort somewhere else, with
> additional instructions on mounting /dev/sda1 and /dev/hda1 etc.

And maybe some additional scripts/aliases for mounting.

> You can leave out the rest.  Save 16K

The 16K is uncompressed.

> and put back 'more'.

How about 'less' instead?

> I notice you have three types of ppp*.o module, but not slhc.

Oops.

> What do we do with the ppp's?

Nothing yet. I should remove them until I actually build a pppd
that will work with them.

> I will take one of these disks to test with mice, keyboards, webcams and
> printers on Thursday.

webcams will not work. Sorry. Maybe next release.

> What is mdev?

It specifies where your mouse is. I have an example line in
the libvga.config.

> Do you want to ln -s psaux mouse as a default?

Maybe. Or set mdev in libvga.config.

> And set PS2 as default in the .config file?

OK.

> Are more computers using PS/2 than serial mice now?

I believe so. Laptops are mostly PS/2 for internal mice, aren't they?

> > printer.o + standard USB hci and usbcore
> This 1-floppy kernel plus printer.o?

Yes.

> > First you need to mknod /dev/usblp0 or /dev/usb/lp0
> Thanks.  Should you include that in /dev, next edition?

No, you will want a big distribution for printing.

> > I have not seen a USB printer that will print plain text. Usually you
> > need to get gs and set that up to actually print anything. You might
> > need something else too, depending on the printer model. Some
> > printers might print PS or PCL.
>
> So you can't use the single-floppy linux to test most usb printers?

Right. You might be able to use ghostscript to convert some files to
printer language, and then bring them along with you somehow (did
you notice parport, ppa, and imm.o?)

> >> usb-serial?
> >
> > I included the generic module. It should work with most devices
> > after you mknod. If it fails to insert, you can use the vendor= and
> > product= options to specify the USB device ID of the device that
> > you are trying to use.
>
> Do you do this at boot time?

No, only at insmod time.

> Is this for usb modems?

No. They need acm.o.

> > Yes.
> >
> > echo "chipset VGA" >libvga.config
> > echo "mouse PS2" >>libvga.config
> > echo "HorizSync 40 70" >>libvga.config
> >
> > etc.
>
> These lines get added at the end?

Yes. One '>' erases whatever is in libvga.config first.
Two '>' will append to the end of the file.

> >> Does busybox have a line editor?
> >
> > It has vi and ed, but neither are very newbie-friendly.
>
> I see you now have a separate vi (link to e3?).

It's a script because of the way e3 handles links (i.e. poorly)
Steven fixed this with an alias or two...

> BL2 busybox has no vi.

BL2 only has nano in the default install.

> > Press 'Z' while you are viewing an image to make it the same size as your
> > screen. I need to add a manual for zgv...
>
> Z appears to toggle the resolution.

It appears to toggle the zoom level for me.

> After using e3pi to edit libvga.config, press ] to increase resolution.
> zgv -z (zoom) shows everything screen-size.

Once you add a mouse, you can right-click and get a menu.

David