[Sugar-devel] GSoC projects - SOAS

[Iain Brown Douglas]

On Fri, 2015-03-20 at 12:06 +0800, Tony Anderson wrote:
> Hi, 
> 
> Is this proposal to make SOAS a live stick capable of installing Sugar
> on conventional systems (Trisquel, ...)?
> 
> We have a live version of this problem on the server side.
> 
> Jerry Vonau wrote a script mkusbinstall based on live-cd. OLE Nepal
> switched to unetbootin for NEXS 6_31 (OS-7 on CentOS 6.4).
> I have been trying to make this work cleanly with BERNIE - to no
> avail.
> 
> One problem is that the user needs to be root. This is not possible
> for a script unless it is launched by a live user. Unetbootin is 
> a gui implementation.
> 
> What I am looking for is a way to make a bootable usb stick that is
> ready to install XS without user having to supply any configuration 
> information (like path names to image or /dev for usb stick) - sort of
> an all-in-one unetbootin.

Does lili [1] fail to do this? Where does it fail?

[1] http://www.linuxliveusb.com/

(Of course this is just the organ grinder's monkey replying.)

I had rather wanted to install XS to my cubieboard. I think it would be
doable (but probably beyond my available learning time).

This would give the potential to put XS on a cheaply available set top
box.

Regards,

Iain
> 
> The steps require formatting the usb device (as would be true for
> SOAS), copying the image to the disk,  and running live_cd to create
> the environment on the 
> usb stick. 
> 
> In the SOAS case, the usb stick presumably runs live and has the
> option to install for some target platforms.
> 
> Tony
> 
> On 03/20/2015 06:26 AM, sugar-devel-request at lists.sugarlabs.org wrote:
> 
> > Message: 6
> > Date: Thu, 19 Mar 2015 22:25:55 +0000
> > From: Iain Brown Douglas <iain at browndouglas.plus.com>
> > To: James Cameron <quozl at laptop.org>
> > Cc: sugar-devel at lists.sugarlabs.org
> > Subject: Re: [Sugar-devel] GSoC projects
> > Message-ID: <1426803955.2592.56.camel at vey-waldorf>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
> > 
> > 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.
> > 
> > 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.
> > 
> > > > 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.
> > 
> > 
> > With reasonably priced availability of 8 GB sticks, this would seem a
> > preferable option to me.
> > 
> > Regards,
> > 
> > Iain
> 
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