You can install a full debian installation on the Asus devices. This has been tested on the WLHDD with internal harddisk, and the WL500g with an external USB harddisk (which is very slow).
Requirements:
- Custom firmware (tested with 1.9.2.7-1 on WLHDD, and 1.9.2.4 on WL500g).
- Probably some swap space (tested with 32 MB).
- Debian on a PC (or cdebootstrap for Asus device).
Installation:
There are two possible installation procedures:
1. Using Debian on a PC
1.1 Steps on PC with Debian (sarge)
- Create debian-distro directory on PC which will contain the distribution.
- cdebootstrap -amipsel sarge debian-distro
http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian - That will fail after a while leaving you with a skeleton.
- Copy entire directory tree to the Asus harddisk, e.g. /tmp/harddisk/distributions/debian.
1.2 Steps on Asus
- ssh to your Asus device
- change to debian directory ? where is debian directory? , e.g. /tmp/harddisk/distributions/debian?
- create etc/fstab hosts resolv.conf apt/sources.list
chroot /tmp/harddisk/distributions/debian /bin/sh
- (The first three steps are only needed if you need swap space, wl500g needs it)
- mkdir /swap
- dd if=/dev/zero of=/swap/16Mb bs=1024 count=17000
- mkswap /swap/16Mb
- swapon /swap/16Mb
- mount -t proc none /proc
- mount -t devfs devfs /dev
- cd /var/cache/apt/archives/ (if there are no packages here, try also /var/cache/cdebootstrap/ and /var/cache/bootstrap)
- dpkg --force-all -i libc6*deb
- dpkg --force-all -i dpkg*deb
- dpkg --force-all -i libc6*deb
- dpkg -iGREB . (repeat this step until the number of errors have stabilized, most likely at zero)
- check remaining dpkg errors if any
- /usr/sbin/base-config
- you have now an entire Debian installation (incl. apt-get etc.)
2. Using cdebootstrap on Asus device
- If you already have a cdebootstrap on the Asus device, run cdeboostrap there. (This has not yet been tested).
Run debian applications
- You can switch to it by running chroot /tmp/harddisk/distributions/debian.
- Have fun with your debian distribution.
- New applications like lynx, mc, ettercap... can all be installed with apt-get. No recompiling necessary. Enjoy!
- how to setup a wifi presentation gateway as the monitor? how can i install keyboard/mouse?
other applications that need huge space?
- caching proxy server? (squid)
- mail server? with anti virus & spam
- web/ftp server
- Digital Video Recorder? (DVR) to record from all connected webcams
What to do if you don't have debian linux but have another redhat-like distribution? You can install a chrooted debian on your system.
- First install the debootstrap rpm: http://azhrarn.underhanded.org/debootstrap-0.2.23-1.i386.rpm
- creating a sarge debian instalation won't work. So install a woody first, then upgrade to sarge
- su
- debootstrap woody woody-rootfs http://ftp.fr.debian.org/debian
- chroot woody-rootfs /bin/sh
- mount -t proc proc /proc
- echo "deb
ftp://mir1.ovh.net/debian sarge main contrib" > /etc/apt/sources.list - apt-get update
- apt-get upgrade (this will reinstall everything, lots of questions) (maybe this is optionnal, and you might skip to the next step)
- now you should be on a sarge system
- apt-get cdebootstrap
- follow the previous instructions