DoudouLinux CD

Hello,

Is your system really running an x86 compatible processor? Usually this message is for processors that are not compatible with the kernel, eg. x86_64 kernel loading on an x86_32 processor. Note that we're using a kernel compiled for 686 (Pentium 2?) and above, not 486 nor 586. This may be another explanation. Have you ever run Debian successfully on this hardware?

Regards,
JM.

Thank you for your reply.

Yes, I have run several Linuxes (debian, ubuntu (server), Slax, Damn
small, puppy) on this machine.

However the Geode processor is a bit of a funny x86 compatible
processor.. I think I does require a i586 kernel, but I am not
completely sure (all the other distributions never gave any issues).

The device it self is a thin client (very low power, pc built in to a
monitor) running of an CF card, so ideal for my kids and no noise in
the living room (other than the kids #;-)).

Right now I am running Slax linux with childsplay and some other edu
packages, but I really think DouDou would be perfect for them, both for
speed and supported edu packages.

Would you consider building DouDou with more elaborate CPU kernel support?

Hi Stefan,

Please reply to the ticket online :).

Shortly I can try to build a CD with a 486 kernel and upload it to our
dailybuild section. I suppose you'd be interested in a Dutch version? We
don't use this kernel because we suspect the 686 build to give better
performances on more recent hardware. But there shouldn't be any issue
in telling the build process to use a 486 kernel instead.

Regards,
JM.

Hi JM,

I would be really interested to try DouDou on my geode system, I think a 486 kernel should work. So if you would want to do a build for me I would be very grateful. The thinclient does not have a CD drive so could you build a usb key version?

Dutch (and English) support would be great!

Thank you for you troubles.

Regards,

Stefan.

Note that if you're at ease with the command line (you seem too :) ), I'm about to publish in the coming week a post on our blog about how to really install the DoudouLinux development version starting from a minimal Debian install. If you're interested in, just check that you can run the Debian installer on your Geode.

Sorry, I forgot to tell you that an 486 build is available on our dailybuild section:

http://download.doudoulinux.org/dailybuild/

Alternatively, you may want to make a real install of DoudouLinux. A possible way is to first install a minimalistic Debian as explained in our very recent post:

http://blog.doudoulinux.org/post/2012/02/28/Using-Debian-to-install-DoudouLinux

Good luck!

Hi JM,

Thank you for the great support. I tried the usb img with the 486 kernel and it worked a charm. The Thinclient booted just fine and DouDou started. I also could install to the internal CF card (Hooked up to IDE via an adapter), so the whole thin client now even starts relatively well (although still to slow for my daughter #;-))..

All I am missing is Flash support so we can load www.kneebouncers.com, but after reading the support pages I gather you left flash out for a reason..

The thin client is still bit slow but for now it will do.

I was wondering however if the ARM support for DouDou will also extend to the Raspberry Pi (www.raspberrypi.org) board in the future. That would be interesting!

Regards and thanks,

Stefan.
p.s. I did not try the clean Debian install because when I read the documentation, the amount of required disk space would be to high. The thin client only has a 2Gb CF card on the IDE port and no power cables to add a HDD.. I did have a ubuntu server installed on this card before so I might try the DouDou install some day..

Hi Stefan,

Great news! Happy to see that you have it running now :).

For flash you can try to install Gnash from the official Debian repositories that are part of DoudouLinux. You have to use the command line for this:

$ sudo apt-get update
 $ sudo apt-get install gnash

To me the main issue with flash is its bypassing of content filtering, you're now aware!

Concerning ARM, yes the Raspberry Pi is one of our targets. Our main ARM developper has purchased one recently, but shipping delays are long. We won't have it run before months in my opinion.

JM.

Hi,

In the meanwhile the Thinclient has been happily working with DouDou. Unfortunately the boot times are a bit too slow for young children. So I decided an old out of work laptop would do better.. Now I can at least use the latest DouDou.

However the flash problem has not been resolved yet. I can not get kneebouncers to work with gnash. Any chance I can add the Adobe Flash in to the repository somehow?

Regards,

Stefan.
p.s. My toddler is happily playing with Doudou. Thanks a million for such a great project.

Hi Stefan,

Thanks for your kind words :). I'd be interested in knowing the boot time you had on Geode. I recently bought a low-end laptop for my older girl and the development version is booting in 20 seconds (Intel bi-core). On our development ARM laptops, it boots in less than 30 seconds I think, but the system is then much slower than on the Intel laptop. It seems the boot process spends most of its time to wait, I can't see another explanation.

Concerning flash, if you really need the Adobe one, I think at most you need to declare the Debian non-free section in your file /etc/apt/sources.list. The Debian repositories are already part of the DoudouLinux distribution, most likely you haven't any change to do, just invoke the installation command from the console:

$ sudo apt-get install flashplugin-nonfree

Look at Debian documentation for additional information. I must say I install it as rarely as possible!

Hi Jean-Michel,

The boot times on the 800mhz single code geode are relay slow. Somewhere in the 3 min range. About 1 minute until start of the locale generation, half a minute on generating the locales and then some 1,5 minute for booting (with the DouDou screen visible and the very entertaining little music tune (My toddler actually was humming and sort of dancing on the tune #;-))). I am am not entirely sure this has to do with the geode tough. I also have limited ram and its booting of a CF card in on the IDE bus. The overall performance on GCompris and such is not to bad though although I had some issues with the mouse speed not being consistent with all the programs. Even web browsing is manageable.

I will try the flash install, thank you for the information. I am also not a big fan of the bloated and security issues flash plugin stuff, but I have no choice if I want to access Kneebouncers. The site is very particular about flash.

Regards,

Stefan.

You're right the boot time is really long. The worse I've ever seen is around 2 minutes, on a computer at least 10 years old with a Live CD and around 200 MB RAM. You could get a smaller boot delay by using a real installation of the development version because Squeeze is faster booting then Lenny (on which Gondwana 1.x is based) and because there is no Live stuff at boot, like locales generation.

Your flash card may also be responsible of poor storage access bandwidth. We now have some experience with flash cards since we're working with them on ARM devices. They tend to get slower with time and may need a complete reformatting to get better performances. We also noticed high performance differences between models but are not able to tell how to choose your card.

Concerning the boot music, hey, nice to read this :), thanks! I've recorded it at home using real instruments: guitar, recorder, shaker and triangle. No need of a sophisticated studio!

NB: we may soon have a new contributor to port DoudouLinux on Raspberry Pi, stay tuned!

Regards,
JM.

Stefan,

The system that I have been working on for my son sounds similar to what you have been working on for your daughter. If you are willing to pick up a slightly larger capacity flash card (10GB was more than enough for me), I had a fantastic performance increase (~5x faster boot) by doing a Remastersys install of DoudouLinux (http://blog.doudoulinux.org/post/2011/04/09/Clean-install-of-DoudouLinux-on-hard-disk). I have posted my solutions to problems I ran into on my old hardware in the comments below the install guide.

I never could get the minimal Debian install method to work on my system, but the Remastersys method seems to be more straight forward anyway.

Robert Stiles

Hi thanks for the information.. Unfortunately my time is very limited so I think the current setup will stay as is. I recently converted an old laptop with a dead battery to the "new" children's Pc. Now I only need to find some time to update the DouDou on the USB drive and add flash support..

I might opt to buy a raspberry pi if performance is ok though..