[ZilverZurfarn]

All aPad rom cooks: Is it possible to get rid of the cramfs /system partition, and use an R/W fs? If the files of /system fit the partition uncompressed, it ought to be doable. Even if not, resizing partitions could be an option.Having a modifyable /system partition makes tweaking so much easier.

 

[xaueious]

It should be, but you have to change the registers as well as the kernel initialization scripts in init.rk?.rc and init.rc I believe located in the boot partition. Might be a performance booster too.

 

[ZilverZurfarn]

Might be a performance booster too.

Didn't think of that, but yes, it should be, as cramfs is basically a zipped up file structure (and stuff inside has to be unzipped to be used).

 

[alex_speed]

Do you know if the kernel has support for yaffs2 or jffs2 ? I still haven't received my device.By the way, I think if we would like to change it, we should change a bunch of files (HWDEF, parameter, boot.img:/init.rk28board.sh, and system.img) so we have enough space in each partition.

 

[ZilverZurfarn]

I think some of the partitions are yaffs2, but can't check, as I have no aPad atm. Seems like the system partition is 120 MB, and the uncompressed /system files weigh in at only 66 MB so there should be plenty of space. Hell, even ext2 should do!

 

[xaueious]

Let's hope there is, because we can't rebuild the kernel ourselves. So we'd need that yaffs2 filesystem driver in the kernel there already.

 

[rogerbraun]

There should be enough space anyway. There are 2gb of internal flash if I remember correctly, that would be big enough to just use ext2 on all partitions.

 

[alex_speed]

The problem is that we can't modify the init.rk28board script which is in the boot.img file. It has hardcoded mount option with cramfs.

 

[alex_speed]

Hello,I've some bad news, the kernel used here doesn't support YAFFS2.

#cat /proc/filesystemsnodev	sysfsnodev	rootfsnodev	bdevnodev	procnodev	debugfsnodev	sockfsnodev	usbfsnodev	pipefsnodev	anon_inodefsnodev	futexfsnodev	tmpfsnodev	inotifyfsnodev	configfsnodev	devpts	ext3	ext4dev	ext2	cramfsnodev	ramfs	msdos	vfatnodev	nfsnodev	mqueuenodev	rpc_pipefs

 

[ZilverZurfarn]

[quote name='alex_speed;9812]Hello' date='I've some bad news, the kernel used here doesn't support YAFFS2.[/QUOTE'] Not good, but then again no showstopper. EXT2 or EXT3 should work too.

 

[rogerbraun]

Okay, I modified the partition layout to make space for a 200 mb system partition, created a 150 mb ext3 image (smaller just to be sure) with the system files in it, edited init.rk28board to uses ext3 for the system partition and flashed. It did not work. It will go to the reformat screen and format some stuff, but then will not boot up anymore. You can still reflash it, though. Any ideas?

 

[xaueious]

I was trying this today actually. It wouldn't even flash with that big of a system image for me. My partition layout is for 80MB system. We are going to be using /data mostly anyways. My system image stands at 70MB. It's the same one in my latest HyrbidKangXau, except expanded to ext2/3. When /cache is ext2, it bootloops into recovery. I don't know why. I kept that init.rc line the same. I haven't tried many combinations for system yet. Try sticking to ext3 everything, but I'm not sure if the update-script is even flashing the system partition properly.I'm going to stop trying today. I shattered my touch panel on my Apad by dropping it. But the unit still works so I can still contribute.If not we naobsd is working on a rootfs system on the SDCard. If we can replicate something like that, we can have a pseudo recovery image boot (either from RAM otherwise) just to flash images.

 

[3exponl]

For flashing single partitions only you can google for RKAndroidtoolJust changing init.rk28.. and flashing a ext3 filesystem did did also not work, now trying to mount the fs from sd card

 

[xaueious]

[quote name='3exponl;12434]For flashing single partitions only you can google for RKAndroidtoolJust changing init.rk28.. and flashing a ext3 filesystem did did also not work' date=' now trying to mount the fs from sd card[/QUOTE'] Is the update-script even dumping the .img file properly? Or is it a problem with the mount?

 

[Asure]

Perhaps we can use some knowledge from this thread for the WDTV 'ext3' where they run ext3 root.bin files on a USB device so that they have read/write for the OS and all stuff they need ?The system is similar: kernel+cramfs roms read-only in flash, with one extra check, the files on the root are checked at boot versus a 'md5sum.txt' file. We don't need the md5sum, just change the root to r/w..http://wdtvforum.com/main/index.php?topic=964.15Edit: forgot to mention root.bin is just ext3 in a .bin file, and our kernel has ext3 support.

 

[3exponl]

I managed to add an additional partiton on the flash. The problem is I can not mount it as I can not format it, and con also not load an image into it, as I do not have a tool to for it.any suggestions?

 

[Takiyon]

If someone would actually get rid of the packed file system for an ext3 system I think it would be a real performance booster. However for developement purposes so that it is readable on windows machines would it be possible to use a FAT32 or FAT based file system? This way we could just change and move files around and start hacking away. It would make this 10x easier.

 

[Asure]

Fat32 or Fat based filesystems do not support long file names and other linux-special items like symlinks etc. You can never run Android from a FAT based partition.. sorry As for other partitions in flash, perhaps the flash driver is not really happy with read/write. We could still run ext2/3 .bin as our filesystem from SD card, USB stick or whatever.. You need to pivot the root / init correctly, an example of which is outlined in the WDTV link i posted. Since i haven't recieved my Apad yet, i can not try anything, just posting (in my opinion) usefull suggestions.

 

[3exponl]

[quote name='Asure;13831]As for other partitions in flash' date=' perhaps the flash driver is not really happy with read/write.[/QUOTE'] /data and /cache are mounted as rw mtdblock 6 and 7 respectively. So mounting as rw should be possible.

 

[cyrustajik]

guess this has come to dead end ?