Debian on Archos gen(6?)7
Debian is a universal operating system used on many other embedded devices, and also on home computers. Using Debian on the Archos 5 gen7 gives access to the huge army of software packaged in the Debian repositories, already compiled for the arm processor.
For an existing Debian/Ubuntu? user, using Debian on Archos makes unit a very familiar, trustworthy and flexible place to hack in.
/!\ I wrote a big script to install a full debian on gen6 (will probably work on gen7/gen8 with minor tweaks), more info: http://www.bawab.ch/archos5/debian -- imc
A guide on how to get Debian on Gen8 devices is availible at Debian gen8
Requirements
For debian installing, we need:
1) Archos gen7 device (gen6 not tested) with OpenAOS boot menu and at least 1G free space on disk.
2) Linux distribution (SDE, for example) already installed on Archos, or some arm-eabi based device with linux.
3) Computer with Linux - "host" - if you doesn't have direct internet connection on archos, or want to use normal shell (SSH).
4) And of course, the Internet!
Enable SSH and share the internet on SDE
If you have direct internet connection on your archos, you can skip this part.
1) In SDE root shell type:
rmmod musb_hdrc modprobe musb_hdrc mode_default=2 modprobe g_ether
This will enable usb networking.
2) Connect the USB cable on the host machine and to configure the new network USB (as root):
ifconfig usb0 192.168.0.200 netmask 255.255.255.0
3) Enable Internet sharing
on host machine (as root):
iptables -A POSTROUTING -t nat -j MASQUERADE -s 192.168.0.0/24 sysctl -w net.ipv4.ip_forward=1
on Archos:
echo nameserver XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX > /etc/resolv.conf
where XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX - your DNS ip (use 192.168.0.200 if you have an dns relay on host)
4) Test connecction on Archos:
# ping google.com PING google.com (74.125.232.19) 56(84) bytes of data. 64 bytes from 74.125.232.19: icmp_seq=1 ttl=56 time=78.7 ms 64 bytes from 74.125.232.19: icmp_seq=2 ttl=56 time=78.3 ms 64 bytes from 74.125.232.19: icmp_seq=3 ttl=56 time=78.9 ms 64 bytes from 74.125.232.19: icmp_seq=4 ttl=56 time=79.5 ms
Installing Debian
Login to Archos using ssh (ssh on host) or just open root terminal in SDE (bad idea).
Prepare image and fs
Create image file (be careful with dd!!!):
dd if=/dev/zero of=bs=1M count=1024
Format it to ext3:
mke2fs -j
Mount:
mkdir /mnt/debian mount -o loop/mnt/debian
Install debootstrap
wget http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian/pool/main/c/cdebootstrap/cdebootstrap-static_0.5.6_armel.deb ar -x cdebootstrap-static_0.5.6_armel.deb data.tar.gz tar -xz -C / -f data.tar.gz rm data.tar.gz cdebootstrap-static_0.5.6_armel.deb
Note: You can change http://ftp.de.debian.org to your prefered debian mirror.
Install base system using debootstrap
cdebootstrap-static --flavour=minimal --allow-unauthenticated --include=ifupdown,udev,procps,netbase,vim-tiny,module-init-tools,wget,openssh-server,screen,apmd squeeze /mnt/debian/ http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian/
Note: You can change http://ftp.de.debian.org to your prefered debian mirror.
You can change squeeze (testing) to sid (unstable) or lenny (stable), but there might be a problems.
Debootstrap will download 100-200 MB of packages and install it to /mnt/debian.
Now you have debian-armel rootfs, but it not ready to work propely on Archos.
Configuration
Install modules
cp -R /lib/modules/* /mnt/debian/lib/modules
Configure network and hostname
echo "archos" > /mnt/debian/etc/hostname
cat > /mnt/debian/etc/network/interfaces <<__END__
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
auto usb0
iface usb0 inet static
address 192.168.0.202
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 192.168.0.0
gateway 192.168.0.200
up echo nameserver XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX >/etc/resolv.conf
__END__
Where XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX - you DNS (see above)
This runscript will start USB networking:
cat > /mnt/debian/etc/init.d/g_ether <<__END__
#!/bin/sh -e
. /lib/lsb/init-functions
case "\$1" in
start)
/sbin/modprobe g_ether
sleep 2
ifup usb0
log_end_msg 0
exit 0
;;
stop)
ifdown usb0
/sbin/rmmod g_ether
log_end_msg 0
exit 0
;;
restart)
ifdown usb0
/sbin/rmmod g_ether
/sbin/modprobe g_ether
ifup usb0
;;
*)
echo "Usage: $0 {start|stop|restart}" >&2
exit 3
;;
esac
exit 0
__END__
chmod +x /mnt/debian/etc/init.d/g_ether
Atmega issue
Atmega pinger:
cat > /mnt/debian/sbin/ping_atmega <<__END__ #!/bin/sh while true; do echo 1 > /sys/devices/platform/atmegag7-io/charge_rate sleep 60 done __END__ chmod +x /mnt/debian/sbin/ping_atmega
Atmega pinger runscript:
cat > /mnt/debian/etc/init.d/atmega <<__END__
#!/bin/sh -e
. /lib/lsb/init-functions
case "\$1" in
start)
/sbin/ping_atmega &
;;
stop)
killall ping_atmega
;;
*)
echo "Usage: /etc/init.d/ping_atmega {start|stop}"
exit 1
esac
exit 0
__END__
chmod +x /mnt/debian/etc/init.d/atmega
APT config
cat > /mnt/debian/etc/apt/apt.conf.d/99no-install-recommends << __END__ APT::Install-Recommends "0"; __END__
/etc/fstab
mkdir /mnt/debian/media/data cat > /mnt/debian/etc/fstab << __END__ rootfs / ext3 defaults,errors=remount-ro,noatime 0 1 /dev/sda1 /media/data ext3 defaults,noatime 0 0 __END__
Your data will mount to /media/data in Debian.
Finalazing
Chroot to debian:
chroot /mnt/debian /bin/bash
Change root password:
passwd
Remove debootstrap:
apt-get --yes --purge remove cdebootstrap-helper-rc.d
Add our scripts to autostart:
update-rc.d g_ether defaults update-rc.d atmega defaults
Install locales:
apt-get update apt-get install locales
Edit /etc/locale.gen file and uncomment needed locales, than execute
locale-gen
exit umount /mnt/debian
Congratulations!!! You have a debian on your Archos! Don't forget to add debian to menu.lst. After reboot you'll able to connect Debian throught SSH.
Now you can install a thousands of programs from Debian repositories using apt-get.
GUI
All commands below must be run at target debian after reboot and login throught ssh as root
X server
Install Xorg and touchscreen module:
apt-get install xorg xserver-xorg-input-tslib libts-bin nodm
Configure Xorg:
cat > /etc/X11/xorg.conf <<__END__
Section "Device"
Identifier "Configured Video Device"
Driver "fbdev"
EndSection
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Touch"
Driver "tslib"
Option "TslibDevice" "/dev/input/event2"
EndSection
__END__
Calibrate you touchscreen:
TSLIB_TSDEVICE=/dev/input/event2 ts_calibrate
XFCE + Matchbox
My preferred variant. Install XFCE and matchbox:
apt-get install xfce4 matchbox
Configure you X session:
cat > ~/.xsession <<__END__ #!/bin/sh exec matchbox-window-manager -use_titlebar no -use_cursor no & xfce4-session __END__
Start GUI:
/etc/init.d/nodm start
Enjoy!
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