Please let us know if you do try it.

Fastinit and eeeXubuntu would be nice.

I'm just about to have a go... Though reading through it, it looks like it is beyond my abilities. I'd be really interested if someone worked it out though! I think the worst thing about eeeXubuntu compared to easy mode Xandros is boot time. The rest I love!

ok,played a bit with the latest version (18.04.2008) of finit.
mainly played with a vmware image but my last compile works on eeepc too

what finit does:
- mount fs
- basic otherstuff
- login as a spezifc user
- startx

the problem i have with that, i have more than one user and i want to have a loginpromt.
so i started to modding the finit-alt.c file.

i started first to just replace some paths and starting /etc/init.d/gdm instead of a login and startx.
it worked, but i ran into trouble (later what kind).
so as this does not work i tried to login at tty3 (basic finit spawns only tty3) and do a startx. but startx also crashes.
so i started to stay on the console for a while and adding spawning of more than one tty and also add a respawn function if you logout.

so my status is: (working stuff)
- getting tty1-4 running (more possible but for testing 4 are enough)
- respawn a tty if you logout
- autoswitch to tty1 after boot (about 10 sec)

problems:
- gdm starts but after i login i get an error telling me i started with setuid (http://www.gtk.org/setuid.html)
- startx starts but xsession crashes with a "prng is not seeded" error. but i init the random-seed file and /dev/urandom and /dev/random
- mouse does not working but thats minor stuff. (need to load more libs)
- usplash bar only have ~5 percent and than booting is done,  how do i mod the bar and why does usplash_write displays nothing

i will post my source with installguide later i hope someone could help me with my problems

edit:
startx problem solved but gdm still does not work

Last edited by smurfy (2008-04-24 7:03:05 pm)

Short answer: Maybe
Long one: You must add defines and maybe add some commands Also must change Makefile.

-----------------

And here my status and plans for eeexubuntu finit:

Status:
- gdm works and you can login and use firefox, update you dist...
- getting tty1-5 running (you could set it via define)
- respawn a tty if you logout
- autoswitch to tty1 after boot (about 10 sec)
- starting some init.d scripts like hal, dbus, networking
- adding some modules to support mouse

Problems:
- terminal on the x does not work
- usplash still isnt really usefull

Plans:
- release my source
- test wlan and other eeepc special stuff.
- use a simple configfile etc. to allow customizion without knowing C

if someone could tell me what could be the problem with the terminal on x (shell does not come up)

Sending finit-mdv the USR1 signal means shutdown and USR2 signal means reboot - you can use the kill command for this. The original EEE OS uses an ACPI Event script to achieve it.

If there is a splash screen then it'll either be in the kernel or initrd and could be removed.

The code to spawn X is:

    if (!fork()) {
        /* child process */

        vhangup();

        close(2);
        close(1);
        close(0);

        if (open("/dev/tty1", O_RDWR, 0))
            exit(1);

        sigemptyset(&act.sa_mask);
        act.sa_handler = SIG_DFL;

        sigemptyset(&nmask2);
        sigaddset(&nmask2, SIGCHLD);
        sigprocmask(SIG_UNBLOCK, &nmask2, NULL);

        for (i = 1; i < NSIG; i++)
            sigaction(i, &sa, NULL);

        dup2(0, 0);
        dup2(0, 1);
        dup2(0, 2);

        touch("/tmp/nologin");

#ifdef AGPDRV
        system("/sbin/modprobe agpgart");
        system("/sbin/modprobe " AGPDRV);
#endif
        
        while (access("/tmp/shutdown", F_OK) < 0) {
            debug("start X as " DEFUSER);
#ifdef DEBUG
            system("su -c startx -l " DEFUSER);
            system("/bin/sh");
#else
            system("su -c startx -l " DEFUSER " &> /dev/null");
#endif
        }

        exit(0);
    }

it closes pipe 0, 1 and 2 (stdin, stdout and stderr respectively), opens stdin on /dev/tty1, then duplicates the open fd (file descriptor) to stdout and stderr.

If you comment out the

        close(2);
        close(1);
        close(0);

        if (open("/dev/tty1", O_RDWR, 0))
            exit(1);

and

        dup2(0, 0);
        dup2(0, 1);
        dup2(0, 2);

lines then the terminal on X should work fine. Personally I just use /dev/tty7.

Hope this helps!

Last edited by metalshark (2008-04-25 11:22:05 am)

smurfy - I tested your finit-mdv you linked to above, thanks for your interest in this project! Unfortunately I can only help by testing what you have done...

I timed boot from pressing the on button to the time when I established a connection to my wireless network. Standard eeeXubuntu took 1 minute 23 seconds, finit-mdv took 1 minute 06 seconds. A good improvement, but I noticed it could no longer read information from my battery. And as you mentioned, shutdown does not work. I will report other issues as I find them.

Is the anything in particular I can try out to help you develop this?

On another note, may I suggest you and anyone else developing fastinit for eeeXubuntu leave the possibility of automatic log-in as I think most people use their EEE as a single-user machine for little more than portable web browsing. Not having to log in is very good in this situation. Also, how should I shut down without holding the power button and risking corrupting open files?

Thanks again for the work you have done!

Instructions in post 9 steve!

richardkemp wrote:

Instructions in post 9 steve!

I know sorry, I meant once I get time to sit and read/play

Shutting down finit-alt

If you type in

kill -l

it lists the signals you may send to a process.

Finit listens on signals INT and USR1 for reboots and USR2 for shutdowns.

So the command

kill -SIGUSR2 1

will send the process with a pid (process id) of 1 a USR2 signal.

The original EEE uses BusyBox to make sure fastinit is pid 1 (last line of this quote from the finit README):

* Eeepc boot process

The essential steps in the boot process carried out in initramfs are:

ROOT=`sed 's!.*root=\([^ ]*\).*!\1!' < /proc/cmdline`
mount -t proc proc /proc
mount -t ext2 -o ro $ROOT /mnt-system
mount -t ext3 -o rw /dev/sda2 /mnt-user
mount -t unionfs -o dirs=/mnt-user=rw:/mnt-system=ro unionfs /mnt
mount --move /mnt-system /mnt/mnt
umount -l /mnt-user
umount /proc
exec switch_root /mnt /sbin/fastinit "$@" </mnt/dev/console >/mnt/dev/console

we can also check this by typing:

ps ax | grep finit-alt

and noting the pid in the left hand column (it may appear more than once, pick the lowest number and ignore the "grep finit" line).

ASUS use an /etc/acpi script to handle this called powerbtn.sh:

#!/bin/sh
# /etc/acpi/powerbtn.sh
# Initiates a shutdown when the power putton has been
# pressed.

if ps -Af | grep -q '[k]desktop' && test -f /usr/bin/dcop
then
    dcop --all-sessions --all-users ksmserver ksmserver logout 1 2 2 && exit 0
elif ps -Af | grep -q 'AsusLauncher'
then
    if [ ! -f /home/user/.doingLogin ]
    then
      DISPLAY=:0 su -c /opt/xandros/bin/shutdown_dialog user &
    fi
else
    /bin/kill -SIGUSR2 1
fi

The login screen and kdesktop bits will probably need some tinkering for other window managers. Feel free to PM me if you get stuck.

Last edited by metalshark (2008-04-29 5:43:46 pm)

Ok, here is my newest release:)

http://www.smurfy.de/files/finit30042008b.tar.gz

i also attached a INSTALL readme file inside.

There is a precompiled version also. I hope the precompiled version also works for you, because i compiled it with hardy (on the eeepc).

only glitch so far i don't like is the reboot/shutdown stuff.
My Desktop with finit + custom kernel + gdm + crypthomedisk comes up in 40sec (from grub) with login and a long cryptsetup keyprase (i'm a two 1/2 finger typer )

Last edited by smurfy (2008-04-30 2:55:37 pm)

Ok, using the precompiled on gutsy causes a kernel panic.

i uploaded "finit30042008b.tar.gz" (see lastpost) with a precompiled version for hardy and gutsy.

for the missing package.. its in the universe ubuntu archive.

a "sudo apt-get install libconfig0-dev" works for me on my eeepc (hardy) and vmware (gutsy)

Last edited by smurfy (2008-04-30 2:58:07 pm)

Well that looked impressive, at first.

Normal boot is about 50 seconds to desktop from grub, and about 1 minute to 1:10 to wireless connected.

Finit left the loading splash screen at about 33 seconds (normally about 40)!  Wow! Thought I.  Now I just see a screen full of:

NetworkManager: <debug> [1209584155.xxxxxx] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added {hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/pci_8086_2668_{various different things like _alsa_playback_0, _oss_pcm_0_0, etc}').

Last edited by SteveLawUK (2008-04-30 3:43:12 pm)