HDD Live Install ...... Poorman's Install

[Archie]

Sorry to be so late for the party. The forum has become a jungle and I'm really having a ball replying to "new replies to your posts" and "Show unread posts since last visit", which I normally just go over a couple of pages.

Anyway, I am very interested in this project as well, I did not know it existed. Sign me up for tester, CO.

[Just17]

Hi, Archie, better late than never    Glad to have your interest 

The project has been on hold for a little while, but has progressed well from the user perspective.

There are one or two difficulties at present, which, I hope, can receive some concentrated attention when the big changes that are happening presently are completed.

Essentially the scheme works, but it does not unmount the partition correctly and so the stored data may be open to corruption.

regards.

[Archie]

Essentially the scheme works, but it does not unmount the partition correctly and so the stored data may be open to corruption.

That explains a lot, CO. But I will leave it in your capable hands and lemme know when you got some alphas that need testing. Thanks for the welcome.

By the way, using the LiveUSB procedure, I copied /isolinux and livecd.sqfs onto my / and had booted into Test2 a couple of times. I only needed to change a couple of boot params. Didn't set it persistent though. Only problem is shutdown. This method is faster than the ways I've known so far.

[Just17]

Essentially the scheme works, but it does not unmount the partition correctly and so the stored data may be open to corruption.

That explains a lot, CO. But I will leave it in your capable hands and lemme know when you got some alphas that need testing. Thanks for the welcome.

By the way, using the LiveUSB procedure, I copied /isolinux and livecd.sqfs onto my / and had booted into Test2 a couple of times. I only needed to change a couple of boot params. Didn't set it persistent though. Only problem is shutdown. This method is faster than the ways I've known so far.

If I could make a suggestion Archie .......  try to set aside a small partition, say up to 1GB for one ISO or bigger if you wanted to put more there, for testing live.

I would definitely discourage the use of an installed OS's root partition ....  just in case 

I have sometimes used my /home or /Data or such, but I would not be comfortable with using / for such tests.

I will let ye know if there are any developments 

regards.

[Archie]

I understand what you mean, Just19. These days, when the sweet aroma of a newly baked ISO from Texstar's oven, I can risk borking my six-month install. Actually, I almost did it with a kernel oops but that got solved, otherwise I might have installed and used the Test ISOs.

I will surely take your advise seriously. I will reformat my old P4 desktop with partitions for testing, install the official KDE and use this discovery to boot into other PCLinuxOS DEs and WMs.

Thanks. I will be waiting patiently for any developments.

BTW. We should have a complete list of options and parameters (with explanations) for PCLinuxOS Live Boots. Only after Googling did I know about fromhd. I'm sure others will benefit from concise explanations of what livecd=livecd, etc. I am not knowledgeable enough to do this.

[Just17]

...

BTW. We should have a complete list of options and parameters (with explanations) for PCLinuxOS Live Boots. Only after Googling did I know about fromhd. I'm sure others will benefit from concise explanations of what livecd=livecd, etc. I am not knowledgeable enough to do this.

Neither am I 

Maybe start here with the  fromhd  and it can be added to and then eventually a full selection of boot codes can be compiled, that are applicable to PCLOS.

Or start a new thread which could be added to ....  compile the contributions, copy to a new thread and delete the old one?

regards.

[Just17]

Let me start with a simple one .....

livecd=livecd

This boot option determines the name of the .sqfs file that will be used by the booting session.
It also accepts a path to the file. So the following is valid

livecd=myremaster

livecd=/liveos/myremasters/myremaster

Renaming the livecd.sqfs file to something more recogniseable and unique is sometimes necessary to ensure that a partitular file is the one used by the booting OS.

For instance if you have several files with the name   myremaster.sqfs   on different partitions in your system, then the booting OS will use the first file that meets the /path/name criteria.
If all you use is the name as in

livecd=myremaster

then the first 'myremaster.sqfs' file located will be the one used .....  not necessarily the one you might wish to be used.

Thus using unique names for the livecd.sqfs files is advantageous where you may have several such sqfs files stored.

regards.

[djohnston]

I'm confused. Was_Just19 is now Just19? Do you have access to a time machine? Please pass the flux capacitor.

Please sign me up as a tester. I can test in VirtualBox, from a pendrive, or from a dedicated test box. I'm the proud new owner of an older Compaq with a 900 mHz Duron and 320MB of RAM. It's not connected to the net, and right now it's running a very old version of Knoppix games.

[Just17]

I'm confused. Was_Just19 is now Just19? Do you have access to a time machine? Please pass the flux capacitor.

Please sign me up as a tester. I can test in VirtualBox, from a pendrive, or from a dedicated test box. I'm the proud new owner of an older Compaq with a 900 mHz Duron and 320MB of RAM. It's not connected to the net, and right now it's running a very old version of Knoppix games.

Well I have been playing with time for a while now .....  started out as an Oldie, became a Boy and then became Just19 .....  did a small trip which meant I Was_Just19 .....  and when I returned I am Just19 again.
See?  Very simple and logical   

***

Thanks for the interest in the project. 
As mentioned it is presently on hold, but I will reactivate it as soon as some things get sorted out.

regards.

[Archie]

FYI.... One important part of any boot stanza is the root location, and many users (even intermediate and advanced users) often get confused on where is where which might end up with kernel oops. We usually start off with (hd0,0) which is hda1 or sda1. Then then use of UUID adds to the confusion when a user has to manually create/modify the boot stanza.

The following is an extract from by GRUB menu. This is the part where I boot from the extracted contents of a LiveCD:

Code: [Select]

title PCLinuxOS 2011 Live
kernel (hd0,5)/isolinux/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=PCLinuxOS_2010_Live livecd=livecd fromhd root=UUID=a91d1e78-f777-48d5-b339-bfdd4707282e
splash=silent quiet vga=788
initrd (hd0,5)/isolinux/initrd.gz
It's a good, old-fashioned live boot with no persist and home wasn't even assigned.

[Just17]

Archie,
               can you give some details on what the boot code 'fromhd' adds to the booting sequence compared to when it is absent?

What does it affect?

Thanks

regards

[Archie]

In this verse, (?)

kernel (hd0,5)/isolinux/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=PCLinuxOS_2010_Live livecd=livecd fromhd root=UUID=a91d1e78-f777-48d5-b339-bfdd4707282e

we could determine that the /isolinux and livecd.sqfs files are not on a LiveCD or a LiveUSB. Nevertheless, it boots in a similar manner.

IMO fromhd would be the next best thing to an actual install. The livecd.sqfs, although still in its uncompressed format is already on the HD yet akin to like booting the LiveCD. It should be better than booting fromiso.


from http://www.knoppix.net/wiki/Cheat_Codes

With this cheatcode the CD-Roms are ignored, so you can finally boot your "poor mans install" with just the original cdrom. Version 2003-09-05 and later. note - Cheatcode "toram" and "fromhd" work now together. Usage fromhd=/dev/hda1.

toram that would be another cheatcode worth looking at.

[JALU]

Archie,
               can you give some details on what the boot code 'fromhd' adds to the booting sequence compared to when it is absent?
What does it affect?
Thanks
regards

If I might politely wade in to this conversation ...
Please read here> Cheat_Codes

tohd
    You can now do a "poor mans install" on vfat and ext2-Partitions with, knoppix tohd=/dev/hda1 Version 2003-09-22 and later.

fromhd
    With this cheatcode the CD-Roms are ignored, so you can finally boot your "poor mans install" with just the original cdrom. Version 2003-09-05 and later. note - Cheatcode "toram" and "fromhd" work now together. Usage fromhd=/dev/hda1.  

Cages

[Archie]

hello darkages.

Glad you could chime in. I would think (unless I am wrong again ) that the purpose of this discussion is to separate Poor Man's boot options from that of the LiveCD/LiveUSB's. Although it would seem that most boot options will work either way, pointing out how each specific cheatcode works could provide a better understanding to those of us who use it.

Perhaps my previous explanation was a tad short of its goal, and that leaves questions to be asked.

In the boot line I have provided, the /isolinux and livecd.sqfs are part of the / tree. Of course it could be anywhere else, and as Just_19 cautiously pointed out, it is not the best practice. I have extensively experimented with /ob-isolinux + ob-livecd.sqfs plus (hd3,5)/tests/lxde-isolinux often with misses and hits.

Knoppix's boot options are only to be regarded as a reference and we won't be using much of what is listed in the list of cheatcodes, I believe it is beneficial for us to understand the few that we are actually going to use.

[Just17]

I will try to put things down here as I understand them ....

when booting live, the system checks all connected storage devices in sequence for the livecd.sqfs file to mount it.

It begins with optical drives, then fixed HDDs and then USB drives.

It will do this without any specific boot code I think.

Apparently then using the boot code   fromhd   would cause the boot sequence to skip the optical drives in its search for the livecd.sqfs file.

That indeed could be useful .....  both as a time saver when not using optical media, and also to specifically skip the loop image on the CD when booting from a CD, so that the search is directed to other devices.

I have never tested this boot option so it will be interesting to see how it changes the behaviour of the boot.

Thanks for the info

EDIT:
             I tried the 'fromhd' boot option when running live from USB.
It did NOT cause the search to skip the optical device.
Nor did it have any apparent affect on the booting.

I guess it might have some affect when booting from CD .....  I did not check that as I don't use CDs for booting live sessions (except rarely on old hardware).

Also, specifying the keyboard type by using 'keyb=xy' has no effect when booting as above. The keyboard choice is still presented to the user with the US default keyboard highlighted.

regards.