[ILUG-BOM] challenge: customise ubuntu basic system to run from USB disk

[jtd]

On Tuesday 19 September 2006 00:48, krishnakant Mane wrote:
> hello all.
> I am putting this challenge with reference to my portable book
> reader project. I want a way to customise my basic ubuntu system
> and run it from a USB flash card that is put in mobiles or in
> cameras.
> or may be a pen drive?

What size ?
There are ready distros that run on 64 mb. U could also customize 
knoppix. Knoppix use compression while storing the image, so can pack 
more than normal stuff on the usb. There is a knoppix customization 
howto available and is fairly easy to customize.
You could also customize kubuntu, but imo knoppix is better since the 
heavy lifting is already done..

>
> then some how may be format the USB disk with ext2 and then put it
> on there.  
Making the usb pendrive bootable with grub is a pain. U need a 
bootable usb or floppy with grub only. Floppy is easier, but floppies 
being just that will flop a boot or 2 later.
With floppy
mkfs.<filesystem that you want on the usb> /dev/fd0
copy /boot/grub to the floppy maintaining directory structure.
grub-install /dev/fd0.
cfdisk /dev/sda1. Delete the dos partition and create a linux 
partition.
mkfs.<filesystem that you want on the usb> /dev/sda1
copy /boot/grub to the pendrive maintaining directory structure.
enable usb boot on the mobo setup - usually enable legacy usb support 
or usb dos.
boot from floppy with usb plugged in. At the grub prompt press c
u will be dropped into grub shell.
At the shell 
root (fd1). Grub will rspond with xyz file system found on /dev/fd1. 
Also the led on pendrive will filckr indicating that grub read the 
pendrive and not the floppy.
setup (fd1)
grub will respond with the result.
Remove floppy and reboot. U should get the grub menu.
Now reboot from your hardisk and add stuff to pendrive. Then reboot 
with pendrive into your pendrive distro.

There is another method using dd but i found that to be unreliable.

-- 
Rgds
JTD