new grml2hd features, status of 2.6.13-grml
Today I worked a lot on grml2hd (the grml-installer) and it’s features. First of all it’s possible to use grml2hd with grml-small now. This means you can get a linux installation on a >=200MB harddisk system. ;-)
I also integrated the grml-autoconfig framework within grml2hd. There’s a script namend grml-autoconfig which is the interface to the grml-autoconfig framework’s configuration file /etc/grml/autoconfig. And finally there are some other small improvements not visible to the user but useful for the bootup sequence. I also improved the grml-autoconfig-framework itself - some parts of the config-framework have been merged into the code. I also worked on the script mkpersistenthome and the home=…-bootparam: both are essential parts of the config-framework and have to work with grml 0.5.
Kernel 2.6.13-grml works quite fine but it does not work on the live-cd-system yet. The reason is that there’s one bug left in unionfs and therefor I’ll have to wait until unionfs-developers resolve the bug and release a snapshot supporting kernel 2.6.13. In the meanwhile I’m working on the config-framework…
grml on laptops
Today I created a new page in the grml-wiki: grml on laptops
The target of the page is to collect information regarding problems with laptops. Often it’s just a short commandline, bootoption or keypress which strongly improves hardware support/the situation in general with grml.
If you have some spare time please contribute!
2.6.13-grml available
I just finished main work on 2.6.13-grml including all the extra modules. Now I’ll update documentation on grml.org/kernel-devel/ and will integrate the kernel in chroot of grml 0.4-3. I’m running 2.6.13-grml already on my develmachine, works very fine so far.Testing and feedback are welcome (as usual): download .debs from kernel-repository
german grml-paper available
A german paper about grml is available online: grml-grml.paper (170kB, PDF) That’s 24 pages about technologies used at grml and some main information about grml itself.
BTW: If (upcoming beta-tester) Carl St-Jacques reads this entry: please contact me with another e-mail address. I can’t reach you with the provided one (connect to mx.francolinux.ca[24.157.60.86]: Connection timed out). Thanks.
2.6.13-grml and status information
Currently I’m working on shortening the todolist. Nearly no serious issues are left, just some improvements on some scripts have to be done. grml2hd needs to be extended and the grml-configframework is the last release stopper. Now I’m working on 2.6.13-grml:
mika@grml ~ % uname -a
Linux grml 2.6.13-grml #1 Tue Aug 30 10:15:41 CEST 2005 i686 GNU/Linux
mika@grml ~ %
It supports squashfs, reiser4 and vesafb-tng already. If everything goes fine with all the extra-modules (ipw, ndiswrapper,…) I will ship grml 0.5 with 2.6.13-grml. BTW: I’ve a new developer machine now: a Samsung X20 XVM 1600 V laptop.
grml in the press: linux-user 09.2005
grml is mentioned in the article “Wechsel zur Zsh - Shell plusplus” by Simon Kölsch in the current edition [09.2005] of the german magazine “Linux-User”. Great! :-) The article is about the Zsh. grml and zsh-lovers are mentioned on page 89 (quoting, german only - sorry): […] Eine hervorragende Quelle für weitere Informationen bietet die deutschsprachige Zsh-Liebhaber-Seite von Michael Prokop und Mattias Kopfermann. Hier finden sich viele Beispiele für die tägliche Arbeit sowie zahlreiche weiterführende Links. Michael Prokop ist auch der Projektleiter der Linux-Live-CD GRML, welche die Zsh als Default-Shell verwendet. Das kleinere, englischsprachige Projekt Zsh-Lovers sammelt Beispiele zu den in der Man-Page beschriebenen Funktionen und stellt sie als Zsh-Lovers-Manpage zur Verfügung. […]
booting grml via firewire
grml boots via firewire. Thanks to Martin Buchleitner for helping me to locate the problem, now we will officially support booting grml via firewire starting with the upcoming release(s).
BTW: I renamed the usb-cheatcode to scandelay and slightly improved it. Now it’s possible to add a delay of some seconds to the boot sequence so the modules in the initrd have enough time to access the devices. Currently scandelay uses a default of 10 seconds, using a parameter makes it more flexible - e.g. scandelay=3 will add a delay of only 3 seconds.
grml and bootchart
I just booted grml via a new bootparam called ‘bootchart’ inspired by an article on debian-administration.org.
To generate the picture you will have to save /var/log/bootchart.tgz and copy it to the same location on a system where bootchart-view is available. As you can see in the picture it takes 54 seconds to boot the grml(-large).iso via CD-ROM using default options on my laptop.
release-decisions, packaged kexec-tools and several updates
We decided to release grml 0.5 as soon as the config-framework is “finished” (I’m still working on it). In the meanwhile kernel 2.6.13 should be released. 2.6.12-grml is working quite well on grml-small, (the still unreleased) grml-usb and grml(-large). SMP is causing some troubles with cpufreq and ACPI :-(( - so it will be deactivated in the next release. BTW: Tobias is doing a great job with packaging udev (currently version 0.065) for the grml-system, thanks to him! Yesterday I packaged kexec-tools so we can test it with 2.6.13 as soon it is available. As usual it’s available in the grml-repos.
Yesterday I wrote a small script named grml2usb to install a grml-iso to an usb-stick. The script should work on any linux-system and reduces the necessary manual steps. Testing and feedback welcome! Several updates, bugfixes and improvements have taken place in grml-autoconfig, grml-scripts and grml-etc. And I just implemented the bootoption ‘startx’ so grml can boot directly into the X window system using grml-x.
grml2hd-utils 0.1 available
grml2hd-utils is a collection of some scripts which might be useful for people who installed grml to harddisk. For example remove-packages-server is a script which will remove server packages on your grml-system, useful for people who want to use grml as a plain workstation-system. grml2hd-utils itself is a frontend for the provided scripts. Just take a look at it (it’s available via the grml-repos) and report feedback. Suggestions for additional scripts you would like to see are welcome too of course.
integrity of grml-packages via apt 0.6
I just activated the integrity-testing of grml-packages via the apt-0.6-mechanism. See the debian-section in the grml-wiki for further information.
plans for upcoming releases
I’m busy working on the new grml-config-framework. As soon as it’s finished and work on 2.6.12-grml too I’ll release grml 0.5. To make the progress more transparent I created a new page in the grml-wiki: ‘Plans for upcoming releases’ - there you will also find a list of packages which will be removed in the upcoming release. Please let us know if you think a package should not be removed. If you have any special wishes just write it down in the wiki-wishlist-page.
packaged minised
I just packaged minised (a smaller, cheaper, faster SED implementation), as usual it’s in the grml-repos.
packaged ncp and nat-traverse
I packaged ncp (a utility for copying files in a LAN) on request by wuehlmaus a few days ago. Today I packaged nat-traverse (establish connections between nodes behind NAT gateway). You can find them in the grml-repos.
working on grml-usb
grml-small (the 50MB-ISO) is already available, now I’m working on grml-usb. The goal is to provide a grml-ISO with less than 250MB which fits on a 256MB usb stick. Please provide feedback which tools you would like to see on grml-usb. Take a look at the package list to see what’s current status.