Installing ubuntu on a USB hd

[Francesco Zamboni]

Hi to you... :-)

> Indeed a live CD does not seem too bad for this purpose. The final
> release will also have a life CD.
> 
It's not bad, but it's not optimal also...at the moment in fact I use one of those plus the usb drive, but I'd like to reduce the clutter and speed up the process... I've to often save and rewrite partition images, backup data, launch configuring scripts that change quite often... all things that could be done more easily on a freely modifiable installation than on a fixed one (I use the rescudecd distro..) plus data disk.... Really, I envision the day when I'll be able to lend the usb drive to some techno-drone, send him to link it to my unreachable far client, and knowing that that client will be totally upgraded and backupped without having to go there myself... :-P

> Personally I would not fiddle with an initrd, but this is a matter of
> taste. I would just recompile my own kernel. Google should have a lot
> of tutorials if you never done this. The critical point is to
> statically compile in everything you need for booting (i. e. in the
> kernel config, select 'Y'es, not 'm'odule; modules can be loaded when
> the kernel runs, but not at boot):
> - you need compiled-in support for the file systems you use
>   (ext3/reiserfs/whatever); Ubuntu's standard kernel has modules for
>   everything (only static ext3)
> 
> - you need compiled-in usb support, including "usb-storage"
>
I tried this, but it seems not to work... I read that the problem is that usb drives take some seconds in asynchronous mode to start, and the kernel boot process is too rapid, going in timeout. There is a kernel patch available on the net (for 2.4), but honestly I would prefer being able to suceed without depending on a doubly patched kernel (I use some pc that have some other quite non-standard hardware, recognized by the 2.6, but that need a patch under 2.4....). Luckily there was also suggestions of using all as a module, making an initrd and modding by hand the script to add a delay after the module loading and before partition mounting. Problem is, step-by-step instruction were for RedHat, and when I tried to apply them to ubuntu (or debian 3.1, for what does matter) they did not functioned as claimed... I was simply unable to modifiy the initrd image with the described technique, I mounted it as a loopback device as suggested, but while being able to access it I was unable to m
odify it (moreover, even if I had suceeded modifying it, it was radically different form the example one.... without all the knowledge of the booting process, I fear I would have needed a lot of fiddling). Just so everybody can see of what I'm speaking, here it is the clearest source I've found... http://www.simonf.com/usb/


 
> Good luck!
> 
> Martin
> 
Thank you, if I'll ever suceed I hope I'll find the time to write down some small howto... having been unable to find an extensive (and functioning :-P) one at the moment, maybe it will be appreciated... ;-)