[Sugar-devel] GSoC projects

[Jerry Vonau]

Hi Iain:

> On March 19, 2015 at 5:25 PM Iain Brown Douglas
> <iain at browndouglas.plus.com> wrote:
>
>
> Hi James,
>
> Thank you for taking the time to make a thoughtful contribution.
> Perhaps you will forgive me if I brainstorm this a bit.
>
> On Fri, 2015-03-20 at 08:48 +1100, James Cameron wrote:
> > I've often thought of making such an application, because of the
> > difficulties that some people report with downloading files and
> > putting them on USB drive.
> >
> > The problem with an application is one may end up having to explain
> > how to download the application; transferring the issue from the
> > original problem to an application that was supposed to fix the
> > problem.
> >
> > In the meanwhile, I have been working the overall problem as a
> > training and experience issue, and maintaining a structured
> > document:
> >
> >     http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Download
>
> Thanks for that - I believe that systematic approach would be great
> backup for those experiencing difficulties downloading.
>
> (Using curl is a sound idea from the point of view that one set of
> instructions can cover a host of different OS)
> >
> > Some further ideas for what your application might do:
> >
> > 1.  the initial download,
> >
> > 2.  resuming an interrupted download,
> >
> > 3.  verification of download using md5sum or other hashes,
> >
> > 4.  media verification, reading back the files or image to check that
> > writing was successful and the media still works.
> >
> I think I am right that 4 is covered already by livecd-iso-to-disk, so
> (in my model) the user only has to write a bootable CD.
>

Yes

> If one knew that a SoaS CD would always make a "Sugar stick", the
> prospect of selling the CD, (by third parties ?) becomes more doable.
>

Is there any specific branding that you want to use?
 
> > I've no evidence of proportion of people who have problems with
> > downloading files and putting them on media; perhaps it is a
> > non-problem.
> >
> > A more correct approach would be to do research and survey of people
> > before and after such an application is made available.  A GSoC
> > project could be padded out with this research, and easily fill three
> > months.
> >
> > A systems engineering view would change the product so that the files
> > don't have to be written to media in any particular way.  That's what
> > we did with the original XO laptops, but SoaS bootable images are
> > different because of the typical PC firmware being so exacting.
> >
>
> I think this would be achieved if `liveinst` could be persuaded to write
> *only* to an automatically confirmed target USB, with the host hard
> drive locked out during install and during use of the stick, and grub
> instructed to find only the USB SoaS system.
>

One would not use 'liveinst' to create a bootable "live" usb device that is
done as you said with livecd-iso-to-disk. Using 'liveinst' installs a
non-live version of what is booted to a disk, this could be a internal
harddisk or a removable usb drive.

>
> With reasonably priced availability of 8 GB sticks, this would seem a
> preferable option to me.
>

'liveinst' is a thin wrapper around Fedora's installer anaconda, which can
use use a kickstart file to automate all or part the process. With a bit of
wizardry one could feed the needed info for the target's partitioning into
a kickstart file and use that with liveinst.

Once you have a non-live install on a usb drive you could clone the device,
just don't boot it before you clone it. Think I'd be interested in working
out the details to make this work.

Jerry



> Regards,
>
> Iain
> > On Thu, Mar 19, 2015 at 03:54:02PM +0000, Iain Brown Douglas wrote:
> > > On Thu, 2015-03-19 at 12:12 -0300, Gonzalo Odiard wrote:
> > > > Hi Iain!
> > > > GSoC project are for 3 months of work for a university student.
> > > > Do you think that script imply that amount of work?
> > > No :)
> > > > What should be the use case? Auto duplicate SoaS?
> > > > Reagrds,
> > > >
> > > The use case is in the field of Auto duplicate SoaS, yes.
> > >
> > > SoaS Loader [2] is horribly clunky, *but* it is a way to get the
> > > instructions where they are accessible.
> > >
> > > Perhaps I should instead ask here whether anyone would work with me
> > > on
> > > SoaS Loader to make such a script.
> > >
> > > Iain
> > >
> > > > Gonzalo
> > > >
> > > > On Thu, Mar 19, 2015 at 11:38 AM, Iain Brown Douglas
> > > > <iain at browndouglas.plus.com> wrote:
> > > >         Hi All,
> > > >         
> > > >         I wonder if anyone would think it appropriate (or
> > > >         inappropriate) to add this idea to Google Summer of Code
> > > >[1]?
> > > >         
> > > >         To write a script for use with Sugar on a Stick, which
> > > >would
> > > >         probe the capacity of an
> > > >         inserted USB stick,and deliver the livecd-iso-to-disk
> > > >command
> > > >         on
> > > >         confirmation by the user. The command would suit the
> > > >         aspirations of SoaS Loader [2].
> > > >         
> > > >         Regards,
> > > >         
> > > >         Iain
> > > >         
> > > >         [1] http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Summer_of_Code/2015
> > > >         [2] http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/SoaS_Loader
> > > >         
> > > >         _______________________________________________
> > > >         Sugar-devel mailing list
> > > >         Sugar-devel at lists.sugarlabs.org
> > > >         http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > --
> > > > Gonzalo Odiard
> > > >
> > > > SugarLabs - Software for children learning
> > > >
> > >
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Sugar-devel mailing list
> > > Sugar-devel at lists.sugarlabs.org
> > > http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel
> >
>
>
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