Moblin, Eeebuntu 4.0 beta, etc

Just got back from Cebu GNU Linux Users Group meeting. I saw someone using Moblin. Three thumbs up! The UI is very intuitive, and will have no problems with mainstream customer adoption.

Meanwhile, Eeebuntu 4.0 is not even ready for early adopters. The installation stopped somewhere at around 95% and complained about failed GRUB setup. I'm currently downloading Ubuntu 9.10 Netbook Remix because my Eee is left with a broken OS. Let's see how this goes.

FreeBSD on Eee

I've managed to install FreeBSD 8.0 on my Eee. I was planning to install NetBSD 5.0, but I found out that I had to convert the ISO to a memory stick image before I can dd it. For some reasons, unetbootin doesn't work with NetBSD's ISOs. There's a script that converts NetBSD ISOs to memstick images, but it seems that it only works on an existing *BSD system. I could have just SSH'd into a remote NetBSD system so that I can run the script there, but I realized that the output would be too big. SSH access is a privilege and not a right; abusing it with large file transfers is a big no-no.

I tried to manually create an image using Mac OS X, but I couldn't initialize my USB stick's MBR (i.e., I couldn't boot from the USB). It says that it couldn't find "/usr/standalone/i386/boot0". I searched for it at the Mac OS X' original install discs, but I couldn't find it there either.

It is possible to install NetBSD using Mac OS X, but I was like, FreeBSD is already available as a memstick image from its FTP site. Why not use it? Thus, I downloaded it, dd'd it to my USB stick, and installed it on my Eee. Everything was straightforward.

Straightforward is boring. I'll try to recompile the kernel to see if I can further reduce its boot time (it boots less than 20sec from GRUB to login). I strongly suspect that I'll just reduce its space but not its boot time, but I'll never know until I try. I'll also try to install NetBSD via PXE, once I'm done playing with FreeBSD. I haven't tried doing it yet.

Eeexperiments

Moblin

I've finally got around installing Moblin. I've copied the image to a USB stick and attempted to boot the OS. The boot process didn't continue though. I got the following error:

/dev/sda does not contain a rootfs
/dev/sdb does not contain a rootfs
/dev/sdc does not contain a rootfs
/dev/sdd does not contain a rootfs

I might try tweaking the kernel configs some time to see if it would work. Meanwhile, I'll just install NetBSD.

Boot Booster

Eee's BootBooster reduced the boot time by skipping the pre-boot sequence. Eeebuntu wasted installed a swap partition when I first installed it, but I never used it because I know that swapping would increase the number of writes to my Eee's SSD. Increasing the number of writes would shorten its life span. Thus, I deleted my swap and installed an EFI partition in its place. Once the BIOS detected the new partition, the BootBooster option magically appeared.

coreboot

A quick googling revealed that coreboot is unsupported on an Eee PC 701. I've also stumbled upon flashrom's source code (Linux bios flasher), and it explicitly stated that Eee PC 701 has been verified to be unsupported. Oh well.

Moblin

I'm attempting to compile Moblin OS so that I can try it on my Eee. Moblin supposedly incorporates techniques for making Linux boot in 5 seconds, techniques which were presented on a Linux conference some time ago. According to its official site, Moblin doesn't support non-SSE3 CPUs. My Eee uses a Celeron M ULV 353 CPU, so yeah it's a non-SSE3 CPU. But what the heck, I'll go ahead and try it anyway. It's not like it's going to explode anyway. There must be some patches out there that would it enable it to work.

If it works, I'll try to use Boot Booster so that I can further shorten the time it takes to turn my PC on and load GRUB.

BTW, I'm also interested to know if coreboot works with Eee. Since I would need to mess with its ROM, there would be a real danger of bricking it, and turning it into a very expensive paper weight. Blah...

vimperator for Chrome

I need to have total keyboard for Chrome. I'll experiment with vimperator-like clones for Chrome...

OC

Behold, for Eee customization is such a dangerous territory. It has activated my latent OC tendencies, and now I can't sleep. Hurrrr...

Eee FSB

I'm not sure if I should overclock my Eee by default. So far, the performance is good (that is, when I switched to Chrome). I think I'll just let it be, unless I really need it since I run the risk of frying my CPU. I've already fried a CPU once... Anyway, I've found a Quicksilver clone for Linux-- it's called gnome-do. Very cool...

Eeebuntu

I've always wanted to customize my Eee PC, but I'm too lazy to do it. Anyway, I've come up with a list of usability problems that I need to fix so that I can use my Eee more effectively.

• Unresponsive browser. At first, I tried using Opera, but I realized that its UI is very ugly, and its speed wasn't as fast as I hoped to be. I was able to solve this by replacing Firefox with Chrome. Chrome's speed can really be felt on an Eee.
• Small screen. I've solved this by using fluxbox instead of Eeebuntu's default desktop environment, which is GNOME. I've eliminated most elements that waste screen estate, such as the window decoration, taskbar, and other stuff. I wanted to add a cool dock-like app, but I realized that it would waste screen estate and would require a mouse anyway.
• Crappy touchpad. The solution to this problem is dependent on other solutions (i.e., using a keyboard friendly WM and app launcher). I wanted to do a touchscreen hack, but I can't find the necessary parts here in Cebu. Of course, I can always use a mouse, but it defeats the purpose of using a portable netbook. I don't want to bring a mouse wherever I go.
• Non-straightforward way of launching apps. I'm not really a fan of Netbook Remix's UME launcher, but I realized that I need something similar to it. Perhaps I need to use something like Quicksilver (a very useful Mac OS X app that lets you run apps anywhere by simply typing its name).