[Sugar-devel] [SoaS] MacBook_Persistent_SoaS_v5_and_SoaS_v6_EFI_Boot_USB ( boots directly from USB )

[Bert Freudenberg]

On 02.11.2011, at 13:03, Peter Robinson wrote:

> On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 11:49 AM, Bert Freudenberg <bert at freudenbergs.de> wrote:
>> 
>> On 02.11.2011, at 12:38, Peter Robinson wrote:
>> 
>>> On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 11:27 AM, Bert Freudenberg <bert at freudenbergs.de> wrote:
>>>> On 02.11.2011, at 11:28, Peter Robinson wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>> On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 7:16 AM, Caryl Bigenho <cbigenho at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>>> 3) Can I create the persistent usb on my MacBook using the instructions I
>>>>>> found in item 4 on this page?
>>>>> 
>>>>> You can create persistent images with overlays (you always have been
>>>>> able to).
>>>> 
>>>> But only under Linux, so far. The livecd-iso-to-disk tool has not been ported to OS X. The iso can be used directly on the Mac but won't have persistence.
>>> 
>>> You can under windows as well.
>> 
>> Which doesn't help Mac users ;^)
> 
> My point was that its not ONLY linux. And mac users can dual boot into
> either Window or Linux or even run one or the other as a VM and use
> USB passthrough....

Mac geeks can do that. Mac user don't.

>>>> Disk Utility on the Mac should be able to put a preconfigured image onto a USB stick. May be such an image file (created on Linux) could be made available for Caryl to download?
>>> 
>>> No idea, I don't own a Mac of any description. Donations welcome.
>> 
>> 
>> That might be well-spent, indeed.
>> 
>> However, running the livecd-iso-to-disk tool to create an EFI disk image with persistence only requires a Linux box. Maybe this could even be part of the regular automated build process?
> 
> the EFI disk image is build automatically. The addition of persistence
> requires a USB key. I presume you mean a image to dd out?

Yes.

> If so what sizes do we do? How many variants?

The smallest reasonable size. SoaS is .4 GB, add .5 GB user space, makes a .9 GB image. That should fit on any 1 GB or larger stick. No variants.

> How long do we keep them

If space is really a concern, it could just be a stable image for using and a bleeding-edge one for testing. So two images, that's 1 GB compressed disk space needed.

> and who's going to provide the disk space and bandwidth for hosting of them?

Sugarlabs maybe? 

> This is the same discussion I have regarding the creation of images
> for the various virtualisation images.

Indeed. Having one VirtualBox image (or two, for bleeding edge testing) would be very helpful for non-geek Sugar users with Macs.

> At this point in time the only
> universal standard is still ISO and it can be created from most
> platforms easily enough. I don't tend to encourage the use of dd
> simply due to the fact I've seen too many end users blow away their OS
> using it.

That's why I mentioned Disk Utility (Apple's graphical shell for disks/images/cds/backups etc). Hopefully that could be used instead of dd or the image-write-mac shell script.

- Bert -