Quick Ubuntu based Porteus (x64) - UPortabilizer ;)

[francois]

I will see tomorrow or in the following days, I first need to get them all.

porteus.sgn file, where does it resides within the porteus.iso structure?

[francois]

Have a look at what fanthom did in the old days, porteus pclinus hybrid:
Porteus video section

[Rava]

porteus.sgn file, where does it resides within the porteus.iso structure?

No longer we do have a porteus.sgn file, nowadays it's a .cfg

In Port 5.0 x86-64 it sits here

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porteus.iso/porteus/porteus-v5.0-x86_64.cfg

Porteus-XFCE-v5.0-x86_64.iso Mounted via mloop:

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root@porteus:/# ls -o /mnt/loop/porteus/porteus-v5.0-x86_64.cfg 
-rw-r--r-- 1 root 681 2019-11-17 03:32 /mnt/loop/porteus/porteus-v5.0-x86_64.cfg

[francois]

.sgn file was to provide a rapid access to the the exact system one would like to mount, if my memory is right. Why it became obsolete, I do not understand.

porteus.cfg is another thing. It has to do with syslinux and presentation of the system at bootup. And tome provides the syslinux instructions in his first post.

As added above, the filesystem.squashfs for ubuntu is huge 2.1 Gig file. I will not provide it. And there is some rights on this material. I think it is preferable that people get these files on their own if they want to build their own ubuntu-porteus-hybrid.

I am not a syslinux user but rather a grub2. I have to figure out the syntax of one or the other to get the ubuntu-porteus-hybrid to boot.

How do you see things?

[Ed_P]

the filesystem.squashfs for ubuntu is huge 2.1 Gig file

Why would anyone want this?

[Rava]

As added above, the filesystem.squashfs for ubuntu is huge 2.1 Gig file. I will not provide it. And there is some rights on this material. I think it is preferable that people get these files on their own if they want to build their own ubuntu-porteus-hybrid.

I had no idea that
1) filesystem.squashfs for ubuntu is a 2.1 GB file
and
2) there are some rights on this material

So I agree with you, sharing that 2.1 GB file especially when it's not free to do so (as in beer AND freedom) is indeed out of the question.

I am not a syslinux user but rather a grub2. I have to figure out the syntax of one or the other to get the ubuntu-porteus-hybrid to boot.

How do you see things?

I used to be a grub user when my SM-Witless-7 was still alive (it's now dead for many many moons and I not seem to miss it even a tiny bit. SCNR SM-Witless-Company by the name of "SM" ) I used grub4dos since that was the only solution back then when I got that notebook and needed to put a real OS on it (as in: either a Linux or a FreeBSD) aside from that pre-installed colourful waste of time, money and soul called "SM-Witless-Whatever-Version-Number-They-All-Suck" but now since fate / coincidence / pure luck got rid of SM-Witless-7 for me Rava is only using syslinux or more precise: porteus.cfg

Added in 4 minutes 49 seconds:

Why would anyone want this?

Feel free to teach us noobs (as in Rava and francois) to get Ubuntu based Porteus up and running without that filesystem.squashfs.
Please do, we would like to be able to do it without that 2.1GB - at least I do and I am sure francois would also prefer when we can get ubun2porteus running without that 2.1 GB thingy.

[ottone]

This initrd.xz is not the best because it doesn´t shutdown cleanly if systemd is used .
Best and simple way : Download Slax 11.4.0 iso from slax.org.
Make a folder named slax . can be on usb or hd.
Download any Debian iso you want to use . Copy xx.filesystem.squashfs which is in that iso into the created folder slax. Rename xxx.filesystem.squashfs to 01-filesystem.sb I boot my Porteus system from usb, so i made a folder slax on my stick . Copy initrfs.img + vmlinuz form downloaded slax iso into it . In my porteus /boot/syslinux/porteus.cfg I wrote:
Label slax
KERNEL /slax/vmlinuz
APPEND vga=769 initrd=/slax/initrfs.img load_ramdisk=1 prompt_ramdisk=0 rw printk.time=0 apparmor=0 slax.flags=perch
ENDTEXT .
Et voila you have persistence , the system is so stable that once I updated debian buster to sid - runs stable .
otto

[ottone]

Forgot to say : before using, you have to make a folder changes in slax . Then folder usr in it. In folder usr a new folder lib . In lib a new folder modules .
In this comes the kernel from slax iso , you have either extract iso to get or run slax and copy modules . It must look like /usr/lib/modules/5.10.92 in changes folder.
So you can use slax kernel .
otto

[Rava]

This initrd.xz is not the best because it doesn´t shutdown cleanly if systemd is used .

Which initrd are you addressing here?

[francois]

@ottone:
This provides a slax-ubuntu hybrid and not a porteus-ubuntu hybrid.

In the first post tome provides a solution to shutdown cleanly. isn´t?

[ottone]

@Rava : initrd.xz from slax15 iso is best if stable persistence is wanted . It creates a folder changes where everything is stored. Slax is the father of porteus, both
use aufs . Now Porteus is more sophisticated because more persons are involved . But you can rename sb modules from slax to xzm and they will work in porteus and
vice versa. The magic is that even alienbobs liveslak sxz modules can be renamed to xzm or sb and will also work. Testing tomes solution , at shutdown the system
claims umount yyy, but also cannot umount xxx because system is busy . This is the case if systemd is used.
otto

[bour59]

be carefull using slax15

Tomas F 2022-08-20 10:35
Slax 15.0.0 freezes at 6 and 8core AMD. It stops at "Triggering udev:"

[Rava]

Now Porteus is more sophisticated because more persons are involved . But you can rename sb modules from slax to xzm and they will work in porteus and
vice versa. The magic is that even alienbobs liveslak sxz modules can be renamed to xzm or sb and will also work.

That is some interesting info. Thanks for that.

Where does one find alienbobs liveslak sxz modules? - I found these via DDG:
https://docs.slackware.com/slackware:liveslak
https://git.slackware.nl/liveslak/

Added in 4 minutes 35 seconds:
And just as heads up, I downloaded the newest liveslak-1.6.0.1.tar.xz via wget https://git.slackware.nl/liveslak/snaps ... 0.1.tar.xz and looked inside.

This is its makemod script:

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#!/bin/sh
# Create squashfs module from a directory or a Slackware package.
# Module can then be added to liveslak/addons directory.

# By default, overwrite destination module file without asking if it pre-exists.
INTERACTIVE=NO

function help() {
  cat <<EOH

-- Usage:
   $(basename $0) [-i] <packagename|directory> modulename.sxz
-- Option parameters:
   h :    This help.
   i :    Interactive mode will not overwrite destination file by default.
-- Description:
   The first parameter is either the full path to a Slackware package,
   or else a directory.
   If a packagename is supplied as first parameter, it will be installed
   into a temporary directory using Slackware's "installpkg".
   The content of the temporary directory will be squashed into a module
   by the "squashfs" program.
   If a directoryname is supplied, its content will be squashed into
   a module by the "squashfs" program.
   The second parameter is the full pathname of the output module
   which will be created.

EOH
}

# Option parsing:
while getopts "hi" Option
do
  case $Option in
    h ) help; exit
        ;;
    i ) INTERACTIVE="YES"
        ;;
    * ) help; exit
        ;;   # DEFAULT
  esac
done
shift $(($OPTIND - 1))
# End of option parsing.
#  $1 now references the first non option item supplied on the command line
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

# Input check:
if [ "x$1" = "x" ]; then
   help
   exit 1
elif [ "x$2" = "x" ]; then
   help
   exit 1
elif [ -f "$2" -a "$INTERACTIVE" = "YES" ]; then
  read -p "-- Destination file '$2' already exists. Overwrite Y/N (y): " ANSWER
  if [ "x$ANSWER" = "xN" -o "x$ANSWER" = "xn" ]; then
    echo "-- Aborting now."
    exit
  fi
fi

MODEXT=$(echo "$2" |rev |cut -d'.' -f1 |rev)
case $MODEXT in
  sxz) COMPR=${COMPR:-"xz"} ;;
  sgz) COMPR=${COMPR:-"gzip"} ;;
  szs) COMPR=${COMPR:-"zstd"} ;;
  xzm) COMPR=${COMPR:-"xz"} ;;  # Porteus module extension and compressor
    *) echo "-- Unsupported module extension '$MODEXT'" ; exit 1 ;;
esac 

if [ -d "$1" ]; then
  echo "Creating .${MODEXT} module from directory using '$COMPR' compression."
  TMPDIR=$(mktemp -t -d makesxz.XXXXXX)
  PKGDIR="$1"
else
  echo "Creating .${MODEXT} module from package using '$COMPR' compression."
  TMPDIR=$(mktemp -t -d makesxz.XXXXXX)
  PKGDIR="$TMPDIR"
  if [ ! -d $PKGDIR ]; then
    echo "-- Failed to create temporary directory for extraction!"
    exit 1
  fi
  # Extract the package:
  /sbin/installpkg -root $PKGDIR "$1"
  if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then
    echo "-- Error installing package!"
    exit 1
  fi
fi

mksquashfs "${PKGDIR}" "$2" -noappend -comp ${COMPR} -b 256K $3 $4 $5 $6 $7 $8 $9
if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then
  echo "-- Error creating squashfs compressed module"
  exit 1
fi

# If we extracted a package, clean up now:
[ ! -z "$TMPDIR" ] && rm -rf $TMPDIR

Added in 1 minute 32 seconds:

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  xzm) COMPR=${COMPR:-"xz"} ;;  # Porteus module extension and compressor

[roro]

Hi ottone,
I would like to try it

ottone wrote
"It must look like /usr/lib/modules/5.10.92 in changes folder"
what is 5.10.92
Is this the slax kernel?

How can I find the kernel here:

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guest@porteus:~/Downloads$ 7z e slax-64bit-11.4.0.iso 
guest@porteus:~/Downloads$ ls -a
./               ../            01-core.sb              01-firmware.sb
02-xorg.sb       03-desktop.sb  04-apps.sb              Boot/
Boot-NoEmul.img  EFI/           boot/                   bootinst.bat
bootinst.sh      bootlogo.png   bootx64.efi             changes/
extlinux.x32     extlinux.x64   help.txt                initrfs.img
isolinux.bin     isolinux.boot  ldlinux.c32             ldlinux.e64
libcom32.c32     libutil.c32    mbr.bin                 menu.c32
modules/         pxelinux.0     readme.txt              runadmin.vbs
samedisk.vbs     slax/          slax-64bit-11.4.0.iso*  syslinux.cfg
syslinux.com     syslinux.efi   syslinux.exe            vesamenu.c32
vmlinuz          zblack.png

[ncmprhnsbl]

How can I find the kernel here:

vmlinuz is the kernel and just guessing, 01-firmware.sb might be the equivalent of our 000-kernel.xzm ...depends if slax allows for kernel upgrades..
in porteus, rename 01-firmware.sb to 01-firmware.xzm and use: lsxzm 01-firmware.xzm to see what's in it ..or mount it or extract it..