Splashtop on USB stick

[x20mar]

Hi there,

I just heard about what you're doing with splashtop and I'm totally amazed by it. Is there any chance of a how to guide (with files) so that other people can do it to?

Thanks

[Kano]

The needed file "FILE.IMG" you can simply find on the download page for boards like asus p5q. There is only one file with IMG ending in it, so no change to use the wrong one Of course your linux system must have got all tools i used preinstalled - for the IMG direct mod to boot with qemu/vbox you have to fix the links to the grub stage1/2 files if needed.

[drosky]

Hi there,

I just heard about what you're doing with splashtop and I'm totally amazed by it. Is there any chance of a how to guide (with files) so that other people can do it to?

Thanks

There are a number of things that can be done, I will try to summarize them here. Actually, Kano is a more experienced hacker than I am and has done more of the work, but I will try to summarize here.

1. Getting express gate to run on other hardware - Kano has figured this out. Search for the latest of his posts with a script for making a bootable USB stick from update images posted at Asus.com. You will need to be running Linux to use the script and will need some tools that aren't installed by default on many systems, like syslinux and lilo. Note that express gate comes with a limited number of hardware drivers to support Asus's target motherboards, so some important things like networking may be missing on some hardware. For some hardware, fixing this might be as simple as compiling a driver module against the 2.6.20.11 kernel and patching it into splashtop.

2. The other big area is hacking new things into express gate and/or fixing things. Application files are generally stored in .sqx files, which are squashfs archives. You can access them by installing squashfs tools on your system. The archives can be un-squashed by using unsquashfs and can be modified then re-compressed by using mksquashfs. So far, I have been able to get an rxvt terminal and ROX file manager, and kano has done those things plus added xterm and patched Pidgin to enable ICQ. One issue here is that apparently some versions of express gate check the sqx files against MD5 and date info stored in a version file, so you would have to patch that version file.

Basically, you can add files to an sqx archive, or create a new sqx archive, and they get mounted at runtime so that all of the files are available in the file system. The best way to start is by extracting some of them and looking around. Kano has posted a short script that will extract all of the sqx files at once.

I'm a little to busy right now, but at some point I would like to start a wiki on this (if someone else doesn't do it) to collect all of the details and maybe even post additional sqx files that people create, etc.

[Kano]

The check in the version file is against size and md5sum, but when you only use the header then you can edit everything too. I wanted to show the structure of the file - not that somebody thinks I do not know what it does

dd of=version bs=1 seek=32 count=0

[packman_jon]

Hi there,

I just heard about what you're doing with splashtop and I'm totally amazed by it. Is there any chance of a how to guide (with files) so that other people can do it to?

Thanks

Me too...I'd love to have this on my laptop (since it takes forever to boot being a slower Vista machine )

[Kano]

Just join IRC channel.

[drosky]

Hi there,

I just heard about what you're doing with splashtop and I'm totally amazed by it. Is there any chance of a how to guide (with files) so that other people can do it to?

Thanks

This would be a good idea. Since this is all still at an early phase, I was thinking perhaps a wiki would be even better, so everyone in the community could add/correct things as more info comes in.

[Kano]

I would not say early stage, the only thing I could not test was using a DFI file to update a board with internal ssd (because I do not own one), all other infos you need to start you can find here. Usually in the first post.

[drosky]

I would not say early stage, the only thing I could not test was using a DFI file to update a board with internal ssd (because I do not own one), all other infos you need to start you can find here. Usually in the first post.

You are right, it's not really early stage. What I should have said is that it's at a stage where there is a lot of information here, but not yet collected into a single, concise location. Of course, there may still be new information appearing as well.

[supaJ]

With all due respect guys, I don't get it. What is so special about Splashtop? Distributions like Puppy Linux and Damn Small Linux are many times more powerful and customizable. Don't you agree?

Anyways, I tried it on my Abit IP35 Pro MOBO. It boots off the USB drive but nothing happens when I click on the links, Skype, Web, etc. It simply stops at a splash screen displaying 'Asus Express Gate'. Why is that?