Extensions problem after frugal install

Forum: HD Install
Topic: Extensions problem after frugal install
started by: lesliek

Posted by lesliek on Mar. 05 2006,03:44

With much help from people in these forums, I set up for someone else an old computer to use DSL (v 2.2b) via a live cd. All now works satisfactorily on that computer and I've given it to the intended user.

DSL so impressed me that I thought I'd like to have it on a computer of my own. I scrounged from friends an old laptop with: 64MB of RAM; an internal modem, floppy and 4GB hard disks; a USB 1.0 port; and a CD-ROM drive which I haven't been able to get working. I'm not even sure why my friends still had the computer, since they hadn't used it in years.

My inability to get CD-ROM drive working and the computer's inability to be set to boot from a USB drive meant that I had to use a boot floppy and a USB drive to get the equivalent of using a live cd. My experience with the earlier computer made it easy for me to set that up and I was astonished to find how easy it also was to get the computer's internal modem (by happy chance, a Lucent winmodem) going under DSL.

I then decided to do a frugal install. That worked, subject to a problem I've read much about in these forums since encountering it, the fact that I can't get my Opera .uci file to start automatically at bootup.

In doing the frugal install, I followed the "clivesay" document. I may have misunderstood that document, but, when asked to enter boot time options, all I did was to nominate my "catch-all" partition, hda3, as the place to keep my home and opt directories. I did not include the equivalent of an option I'd used with the floppy-USB arrangement, namely, mydsl=hda3. However, later in the process, I did nominate hda3 as the partition for mydsl.

When I boot up now, I do see a message that my settings are being restored from my backup partition (also hda3) and I also see a message that my mydsl things are being searched for (I don't have the words exactly right), followed by "done". What I don't see is what I used to see during boot up when using the floppy-USB drive combination, namely, a reference to Opera loading up. Nor is it loaded when the desktop comes up. I have to load it manually each time by using the mlfm file manager.

Since the message that the file manager gives when I use it to load Opera is that /mnt/hda3/opera850.uci has been successfully mounted, I added a line to /mnt/hda3/opt/bootlocal.sh, telling it to mount that file (I just added "mount /mnt/hda3/opera850.uci"), but that didn't work.

Many tentative suggestions apart from the one I tried were given in posts I searched through, but, as they related to very much earlier versions of DSL and there was talk in the relevant threads of proposed changes to this aspect of using a frugal install, I didn't try them.

Is there a simple answer to my problem with the current version of DSL?

Posted by mikshaw on Mar. 05 2006,03:51

Is hda3 being checked for mydsl extensions, and are the extensions on hda3?

Posted by roberts on Mar. 05 2006,04:14

I would not recommend to mix extensions with home and opt in any circumstance.

Using the setup that you have choosen, persistent home and opt. Both home and opt are now redirected mounts via bind. This is very complex. Now you are attempting to mount a file on the real device which is also redirected via bind mount.

Using a frugal setup it is simple to add extensions to /cdrom, the writeable base directory of the system. You can even use the optional directory under /cdrom or other directories. Much flexibility offered. Then you don't even need a mydsl= boot option.

Of course you could use a separate partition, say hda4, and then you would need the mydsl=hda4 partition.

Posted by lesliek on Mar. 05 2006,05:27

Thanks to both mikshaw and roberts for their replies.

mikshaw, the sole extension I'm concerned with right now, opera850.uci, is on hda3. As to whether hda3 is being checked for extensions, I don't know how to determine that independently. All I can say is that, when I was asked during the running of frugal_install.sh for the partition where MyDSL was to be found, I answered hda3, in accordance with the suggestion to do so in the clivesay document.

roberts, I infer from what you say that subsequent events have overtaken the clivesay document. That document recommended setting up "Seconda[r]y linux (type 83) for the persistent /home, /opt, mydsl extensions, backup/restore, etc ...". It also said, "Type hda9 [hda3, in my case] and press <enter> to assign the MyDSL partition". That's what I did.

I gather that I could just boot up with the floppy-USB drive combination in place again, keep the three hda partitions I've already set up, hda1 (as boot, with filesystem ext2), hda2 (as swap) and hda3 (with filesystem ext2) and then re-run the frugal-install.sh file.

If I can do that, should I be answering "no" when I'm asked "Do you wish to specify a different partition for myDSL (y/..)?"? If I do that, I gather that that would mean that I would have opera850.uci in hda1 at the end of the running of the script.

At that point, I gather I could move opera850.uci from hda1 to the directory /mnt/cdrom. Is that right?

If I do that, is that all I need to do to keep Opera available permanently or is there anything else I should also be doing?

I apologise for asking these questions in this babyish form, but I simply don't have the technical knowledge to understand the underlying basis of your reply.

Thanks again,

Leslie

Posted by roberts on Mar. 05 2006,05:58

I don't know how to comment on this.
There are literally dozens of ways to install and use DSL.

You will find that I am consistent in my answers to try to promote DSL as a frugal and nomadic installation.

If extensions are stored in /home/dsl then typically they would be included in the backup. Since extensions are large static entities this would not be desireable.

Now, the persistent home and opt are like having a hybrid. Part frugal and part hard drive installed. Not very nomadic. Yet, I do not dictate how users might wish to use the system. Personally I don't run a traditionally hard drive install. I do run one system with this hybrid type system. And being consistent with instructions to users across as many install options as possible would dictate maintaining a separation of the extensions from home and opt. While the pdf doc in question may suggest this, it is not something that I, as the developer, would promote. Sorry to have to admit this, but much of the docs, written by users, including the Wiki is not sanctioned by me. Looking at this doc, I also see a backup is being done as well, as the persistent home and doc and extensions, confusing even to me. Now this may work for non UCI type extensions, I don't really know. But UCI are mounts and the setup as described would imply multiple mounts from the same device onto a redirected bind mount. Again, something, I would never think to even attempt. Now, maybe I have confused you even more. Sorry, if true.

Bottom line, DSL has a very unique environment with the frugal concept so therefore I try to maintain consistent ways of using it. Keep extensions separate from home and opt is my mantra.

Posted by mikshaw on Mar. 05 2006,05:58

I think you might be right about changes in persistent home since that document was created. As I remember, DSL at one time simply used the home directory specified if it was already mounted, but now mounts it with a --bind parameter. I might be wrong, of course.

If you're using a persistent home, you could put your mydsl extensions into /home/dsl/something and use mydsl=hda3/home/dsl/something. This is what I do, and it works well. However, it's a bad idea if you also use the backup/restore feature. I don't use /cdrom anymore because I haven't had much good fortune with ext2 as dynamic data storage.

Posted by lesliek on Mar. 06 2006,21:49

This is a response to the latest post by roberts.

As things stand at present, I can, with the file manager, manually get the Opera .uci file running after the boot-up process is complete and then use Opera successfully when dialled-up, so that, to all appearances, everything is fine with my system except for a tiny inconvenience re Opera.

However, I now know from you that everything's NOT fine with my system.

In those circumstances, my preferred course of action is to re-do my frugal install in a way that you don't consider unsatisfactory.

Here are my scattered thoughts about re-doing the install. I'd very much appreciate your comments on them.

I have 64MB of RAM and a 4GB hard drive to work with.

I know I need a boot partition of at least 50MB and I believe I need a swap partition, which I have read should be 128MB, given that I have 64MB of RAM. If I were to create two partitions of those sizes (178MB in total), that'd leave me pretty much the whole of the 4GB for other things.

I want to have: (1) mydsl extensions such as Opera; (2) persistent /home and /opt directories; and (3) a backup.tar.gz file.

I've read through your frugal install bash script. I found a bit about whether I want to specify a different partition for myDSL. If I say yes at that stage, I'm then asked to enter the partition to be used. It seems to me as though if I just press enter without entering a partition to be used, the automatic /cdrom will be used.

I'm assuming that /cdrom is a directory in the boot partition. If that's right, instead of that partition's being 50MB, it should be much bigger, say, 1GB, to hold any future extensions.

Since I'm not supposed to have extensions in the same partition as the /opt and /home directories, I could create a third partition, which would house those directories, and would be the balance of the drive, about 3GB.

Then, there's the backup.tar.gz file. Could that be put either in the boot partition or the third partition? If not, should I create a fourth partition just for it?

I know you said that you don't dictate how users might wish to use the system and I can understand that. However, all I want to do is to set things up in a way you don't positively disapprove of as inconsistent with your scheme.

Thanks very much for your earlier reply.

Leslie

Posted by roberts on Mar. 06 2006,22:30

Wait a sec. I don't disapprove of any users use of DSL.

What I am suggesting is consistency. As the designer of the mydsl system I try to promote the use of the system in a manner that will be consistent in setup whether you are running liveCD w/backup or liveCD+mkmydl-extns w/backup or frugally installed. This system has grown from only a liveCD to be many things to many users.

Many users here are very technical and setup their systems to their lickiing. But to a new user comming from Windows or even a traditional *nix hard drive installed system. It can and does become very confusing. Especially when conflicting advice is given, or advice is given with dependencies. You can do it this way, but then don't try doing that. Hence my mantra of consistency, I personally keep extensions in a separate partition not mixed in with /home or /opt period. Given that it is your choice to place them in the frugal writeable /cdrom for autoloading or in a partition which you would specify with a mydsl=xxxxx option. As far as the backup goes, keep it out of the directories you are backing up and prefeably on an external device. If it is on the same device and that device fails so too is your backup. That said the backup should always be quite small. Since by being consistent our large static extensions are excluded as well as the main compressed OS image. Only our working files of /home, /opt and possible a few other files are included in the backup.

For backup, I use a pendrive and also web backup to my home network.

BTW, I have Opera in my /cdrom frgual setup and it works without specifying anything.