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InstallingDebianOn/Ratings

DebianOn is an effort to document how to install, configure and use Debian on some specific hardware. Therefore potential buyers would know if that hardware is supported and owner would know how get the best out of that hardware.

The purpose is not to duplicate the Debian Official Documentation, but to document how to install Debian on some specific hardware.

Models covered
Freescale QuickStart

Overall Status

Freescale QuickStart board is a development board. It is ARM architecture. The SoC is Freescale i.MX53.

System as sold

It comes without any OS on it. On Freescale's website you can download the BSP which is based on Ubuntu.

Linaro support

By installing linaro-image-tools and running the linaro-fetch-image-ui we can easily create an Ubuntu image for this hardware. Thus if we want to install Debian, the easist way is to create a Debian binary rootfs with the a hwpack for Debian and then use linaro-media-create to create the final image for this hardware.

Installation steps (by linaro-image-tools)

Environment

Please use Debian sid or Debian Wheezy or later version because we need latest linaro-image-tools and live-build.

Prepare Debian binary rootfs

In this section we create a Debian sid armhf rootfs.

  1. We use live-build to create Debian binary rootfs. The first step is make an empty directory, for example, '/tmp/live_cd'
  2. Enter the created directory by "cd /tmp/live_cd"
  3. Execute "lb config --apt-indices none --architectures armhf --binary-images tar --binary-filesystem ext3 --bootloader "" --bootstrap-flavour standard --cache false --chroot-filesystem none --debian-installer-gui false --distribution sid --parent-distribution sid --parent-debian-installer-distribution sid --gzip-options '--best --rsyncable' --initramfs none --linux-flavours none --linux-packages none --bootstrap-qemu-arch armhf --bootstrap-qemu-static /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static"
  4. Edit ./config/bootstrap and modify the following parameters
    • LB_BOOTSTRAP_INCLUDE="apt-transport-https gnupg initramfs-tools"
  5. Create ./config/hooks/01_set_root_passwd.chroot as an executable shell script: 
    • #!/bin/sh
echo "I: update password"
echo "root:linaro" | chpasswd
  6. Create ./config/hooks/02_getty_on_ttymxc0.chroot as an executable shell script: 
    • #!/bin/sh
echo "I: add ttymxc0 to inittab"
echo "T0:2345:respawn:/sbin/getty -L 115200 ttymxc0 vt102" >> /etc/inittab
  7. "chmod a+rx ./config/hooks/*"
  8. Re-run "lb config"
  9. Run "sudo lb build"
    • And we should have a binary-tar.tar.gz generated now.

Make a hwpack

In this section we create a hwpack that contains Debian mx5 kernel and mx53loco u-boot.

  1. create a config file "/tmp/linaro-debian-mx5" as following: 
    • [hwpack]
format=2.0
name=linaro-debian-mx5
architectures=armhf
origin=Linaro
maintainer=Ying-Chun Liu (PaulLiu) <paul.liu@linaro.org>
support=unsupported
packages=linux-image-3.2.0-3-mx5 u-boot
mmc_id=0:2
u_boot_package=u-boot
u_boot_file=usr/lib/u-boot/mx53loco/u-boot.imx
u_boot_in_boot_part=Yes
u_boot_dd=2
serial_tty=ttymxc0
kernel_addr=0x70000000
initrd_addr=0x72000000
load_addr=0x70008000
partition_layout=reserved_bootfs_rootfs
kernel_file=boot/vmlinuz-*-mx*
initrd_file=boot/initrd.img-*-mx*
#dtb_file=boot/dt-*-mx*/imx53-qsb.dtb
#dtb_addr=0x74000000
boot_script=boot.scr
extra_serial_options=console=tty0 console=ttymxc0,115200n8
loader_start=1

[debian]
sources-entry=http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ sid main
  2. Run "linaro-hwpack-create /tmp/linaro-debian-mx5 1"

Now we have a good hwpack for Debian image

Build the image

We can use linaro-media-create to build the Debian image.

And now we got a image file called linaro-debian.img. Just use dd to write it to a microSD card.

Boot

Just insert the microSD card into QuickStart board and boot. After several seconds we'll get a login prompt from the serial console. And then we use root to login. The root password is "linaro".