Process to go from Raspbian boot files to PiNet boot files

This guide is mainly written as a reminder for the PiNet team on the process of building SD card images for PiNet.

WARNING - This guide was written mainly for myself to on steps to build the SD card boot files. The guide may be missing parts or may be out of date. This guide is not an officially supported piece of documentation, follow at your own risk.

Steps

Getting up to date files

1. Enter chroot sudo ltsp-chroot.
2. Update the package lists apt-get update.
3. Make sure overlay is in /opt/ltsp/armhf/etc/initramfs-tools/modules.
4. Download the updated boot file wget http://bazaar.launchpad.net/~ltsp-upstream/ltsp/ltsp-trunk/download/head:/ltsp-20111101201947-dgapvhpfim127xu6-2/ltsp -O /opt/ltsp/armhf/usr/share/initramfs-tools/scripts/init-bottom/ltsp.
5. Install most recent kernel package, simplest way is usually apt-get install linux-image-rpi-rpfv linux-image-rpi2-rpfv in the Raspbian chroot. If you need to regenerate the initramfs’s, uses sudo ltsp-chroot update-initramfs -k all -u.
6. It also would be a good idea to update the firmware packages, so also run apt-get install raspberrypi-bootloader.
7. Exit the chroot exit.
8. Clone the current repository git clone https://github.com/PiNet/PiNet.git --depth 1.
9. Make a new folder to work in mkdir newBootFiles.
10. Copy current files from the repository cp -r PiNet/boot/* newBootFiles/
11. Copy new firmware files cd /opt/ltsp/armhf/boot followed by cp -r bcm2708-rpi-b.dtb bcm2708-rpi-b-plus.dtb bcm2709-rpi-2-b.dtb bootcode.bin overlays start_cd.elf start.elf start_x.elf fixup_cd.dat fixup.dat fixup_x.dat /home/$USER/newBootFiles/ then cd.
12. Copy the kernels. Remember you will need to change the names if you are using a different version other than 3.18. cd /opt/ltsp/armhf/boot followed by cp vmlinuz-3.18.0-trunk-rpi vmlinuz-3.18.0-trunk-rpi2 initrd.img-3.18.0-trunk-rpi initrd.img-3.18.0-trunk-rpi2 /home/$USER/newBootFiles/ then cd.

Adding OverlayFS support to boot files - No longer needed

This section is kept for reference but is no longer needed.

In the 3.18 kernel release, overlayfs was renamed to overlay, which breaks LTSP support for it. We must manually fetch a more up to date version of the script.

1. Make a new folder to work in mkdir pi1Initrd.
2. Copy initramfs to the folder cp initrd.img-3.18.0-trunk-rpi pi1Initrd/.
3. Change directory to the working folder cd pi1Initrd.
4. Unzip the initramfs gzip -dc initrd.img-3.18.0-trunk-rpi | cpio -id.
5. Remove initramfs rm -f initrd.img-3.18.0-trunk-rpi.
6. Grab new script file wget http://bazaar.launchpad.net/~ltsp-upstream/ltsp/ltsp-trunk/download/head:/ltsp-20111101201947-dgapvhpfim127xu6-2/ltsp -O /home/$USER/ltsp-script.
7. Copy script to required location cp /home/$USER/ltsp-script /home/$USER/newBootFiles/pi1Initrd/scripts/init-bottom/ltsp
8. Zip the folder back up again find . | cpio -o -H newc | gzip -9 > ../initrd.img-3.18.0-trunk-rpi.
9. Repeat for Pi2 (initrd.img-3.18.0-trunk-rpi2)

Final steps

The boot files should now be ready. Verify the cmdline files have 1.1.1.1 in them and that the config.txt files are correct. Then copy to an SD card and test.