The Perfect Desert

To Install the Same Set of Packages as Another Debian Machine

I know this is a well-known trick with the Debian package system, but I'm going to sum it up here. Suppose that you want to install the same set of packages on box A as box B. At box B, type the following command to get the list of installed packages.

dpkg --get-selections > select.txt

Then, take select.txt to box A and run on box A:

apt-get update
dpkg --set-selections < select.txt
apt-get -u dselect-upgrade

Share your Linux desktop with x11vnc

x11vnc is a pretty useful program that you can use to share your Linux desktop with someone far away. To start x11vnc while using X11 windows, issue the following command:

x11vnc -display :0

This command will work in most cases, assuming there is only one instance of X11 Windows server running. However, the display number could be different. To be sure, type the following command:

xdpyinfo | head

x11vnc will output a lot of information, including the port number it runs on:

The VNC desktop is:      bootcd:2
PORT=5902

Subtracting 5900 from the port number (5902), you'll get the display number (2). Use this number to connect to your desktop remotely. I use gvncviewer.

gvncviewer 192.168.200.83:2

Administrator To Monitor Someone's Desktop with X11VNC

Let's assume that you are a system administrator with root privilege and want to monitor a user's X11 Windows desktop. You can't just run “x11vnc -display :0” because you are not the user currently using display :0. In that case, you need access to the X11 Windows' xauth file which is located at one of the following locations:

• /var/lib/gdm
  
• /var/lib/kdm
  
• /var/lib/xdm/authdir/authfiles
  
• /home/USER/.Xauthority
  

Once you locate the xauth file associated with the user's X11 desktop, you can use x11vnc to monitor his desktop activity.

x11vnc -display :0 -auth /var/lib/gdm/\:0.Xauth

Then, on your desktop as administrator, connect to the user's desktop with a vnc client.

gvncviewer 192.168.200.83:2

x11vnc with SSL

x11vnc supports various connection schemes, including SSL. On Debian and Ubuntu, type the following command to create a SSL certificate for use with x11vnc.

cat /etc/ssl/private/ssl-cert-snakeoil.key /etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem > /tmp/x11vnc.pem

Then, start x11vnc with -ssl option to run x11vnc in secure mode.

x11vnc -display :0 -auth /var/lib/gdm/\:0.Xauth -ssl /tmp/x11vnc.pem

ssvnc and gvncviewer can be used to connect to x11vnc via SSL connection. The following example command starts x11vnc in anonymous SSL mode that doesn't require X509 exchange.

x11vnc -display :0 -xauth /var/lib/xdm/authdir/authfiles/A\:0-R2x5Db -xkb -nopw -nc_cr -ssl /tmp/x11vnc.pem -vencrypt newdh:nox509:support

Setting Up XDM on Debian/Ubuntu Linux

XDM, short for X Display Manager, is my favorite login manager for its simplicity. Sure, gdm and kdm are visually pleasant, but why do I have to install all the dependencies if xdm provides the same functionality as them? After all, xdm can launch GNOME and KDE for you — you just need to fix your ~/.xsession file. This post will serve as my notes on installation, configuration and customization of xdm.

All configuration of xdm, except for distribution-specific settings, is done by modifying the files in the /etc/X11/xdm directory. For now, I'll just go over what I have in my xdm files.

/etc/X11/xdm/Xaccess

This file is used to tell xdm who can use xdm. Therefore, if you are happy to let anyone access the X-Windows desktop locally or remotely, then you would just put an asterisk (*) in Xaccess as I did.

*

If you are very keen on security, you would put only the following in Xaccess. This only allows local users to have access to xdm.

localhost
127.0.0.1

However, even if Xaccess is set up as above, remote xdm login may still be possible with SSH X11 forwarding.

/etc/X11/xdm/Xresources

Xresources file is used to fine-tune the behavior and appearance of XDM. Here is what I put in my Xresources file:

Xcursor.theme: redglass

xlogin*login.translations: #override \
 Ctrl<Key>R: abort-display()\n\
 <Key>F1: set-session-argument(failsafe) finish-field()\n\
 <Key>Delete: delete-character()\n\
 <Key>Left: move-backward-character()\n\
 <Key>Right: move-forward-character()\n\
 <Key>Home: move-to-begining()\n\
 <Key>End: move-to-end()\n\
 Ctrl<Key>KP_Enter: set-session-argument(failsafe) finish-field()\n\
 <Key>KP_Enter: set-session-argument() finish-field()\n\
 Ctrl<Key>Return: set-session-argument(failsafe) finish-field()\n\
 <Key>Return: set-session-argument() finish-field()

xlogin*greeting: Welcome to CLIENTHOST
xlogin*namePrompt: Login:\040
xlogin*passwdPrompt: Password:\040
xlogin*fail: Login incorrect

xlogin*greetFace: Serif-21:bold:italic
xlogin*face: Sans-15
xlogin*promptFace: Sans-15:bold
xlogin*failFace: Sans-16:bold

xlogin*geometry: 600x400
xlogin*borderWidth: 1
xlogin*frameWidth: 5
xlogin*innerFramesWidth: 2
xlogin*shdColor: grey30
xlogin*hiColor: grey90
xlogin*background: grey
xlogin*greetColor: Blue3
xlogin*failColor: red
*Foreground: black
*Background: #fffff0

xlogin*logoFileName: /usr/share/X11/xdm/pixmaps/penguin_doll_200x300.xpm
xlogin*useShape: true
xlogin*logoPadding: 10

I think the settings are self-explanatory. This is how xdm would look with the above settings. The penguin image was taken from here.

/etc/X11/xdm/Xresources

The Xresources file allows you to specify how many X servers to run and their command arguments. In my case, I run Xorg and Xvfb. Xorg is the standard X server, and Xvfb is a server that runs totally in memory without depending on the video hardware. To see what's going on with Xvfb, I use x11vnc and gvncviewer.

# Default X.org server
:0 local /usr/bin/Xorg :0 vt7 -br -dpi 96 -nolisten TCP

:1 local /usr/local/bin/Xvfb :1 -dpi 96 -screen 0 1024x768x16

/etc/X11/xdm/Xsetup

Xsetup allows you to write any command to run when xdm displays the login screen. In my case, I run gm to set up the background image and run x11vnc to remotely access Xvfb via VNC.

#!/bin/sh
#
# This script is run as root before showing login widget.

gm display -window root /usr/share/wallpapers/Board_Tile_Gray.jpg
xkbcomp -dflts -I/usr/share/X11/xkb /etc/X11/xkb/server-0.xkm $DISPLAY

PID_XVFB=$(pidof Xvfb)
PID_X11VNC=$(pidof x11vnc)
if [ -n "$PID_XVFB" -a -z "$PID_X11VNC" ]; then
  x11vnc -display :1 -bg -xkb -nopw -nc_cr -forever -listen localhost -auth $(find /var/lib/xdm/authdir/authfiles -name \*:1\*) > /var/log/x11vnc.log 2>&1
fi

/etc/X11/xdm/xdm-config

In xdm-config, there is only one line that I bother to change. This line enables remote xdm logins.

! SECURITY: do not listen for XDMCP or Chooser requests
! Comment out this line if you want to manage X terminals with xdm
DisplayManager.requestPort:     177

/etc/X11/xdm/xdm-options

I think xdm-options is Debian specific. I don't think I made any change in this file.

# configuration options for xdm
# See xdm.options(5) for an explanation of the available options.

no-ignore-nologin
no-restart-on-upgrade
no-start-on-install
use-sessreg

Resetting XDM

There are other files in /etc/X11/xdm directory that you can safely leave as is. After you make any change with the files, have xdm reread the config files.

kill -1 $(pidof xdm)

If you want to force xdm to kill all running sessions and restart, enter the following command.

/etc/init.d/xdm restart

That's all I have to write about xdm for now. In summary, xdm is a simple, yet functional login manager that is easy to set up.

To Create SSL Certificates for Personal / Intranet Use

I'm not a security guru, but I'm writing this as a personal note. Normally, I'll have to pay some company to have my SSL certificate digitally signed for commercial uses. That's because people and businesses won't acknowledge or recognize my SSL certificate in transactions unless it is signed by a reputable company. However, I can create SSL certificates myself for personal / intranet use.

On Debian and Ubuntu systems, after the ssl-cert package is installed, a SSL certificate is automatically created at /etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem, and the corresponding key is created at /etc/ssl/private/ssl-cert-snakeoil.key. You can just distribute ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem to other peer machines to set up SSL connections. To manually create your own SSL certificates, follow these steps. In this guide, we will use the arbitrary filenames: my-site.key, my-site.crt and my-site.pem.

1. Generate a public/private key pair:
   
   

   openssl genrsa -out my-site.key 1024

   
   
   
2. Generate a self signed certificate:
   
   

   openssl req -new -key my-site.key -x509 -days 3653 -out my-site.crt

   
   
   
3. Generate the PEM file by just appending the key and certificate files:
   
   
   

   cat my-site.key my-site.crt > my-site.pem

   
   
   
4. The private key should be kept secret, so change the file permission.




chmod 600 my-site.key my-site.pem





You can distribute the trust certificate server.crt to your SSL client hosts that will connect securely to the SSL-enabled server. The server may need *.crt files from clients for proper client authentication.

Read Also:

• Build OpenSSL with MinGW
  
• Building GNUTLS for Windows
  

Linux: Transmitting a Bunch of Files using socat

socat is a nifty, versatile tool for establishing a secure data channel between two computers. To install socat on Debian, use apt-get:

apt-get install socat

I was trying to use socat and tar to duplicate the contents of an entire filesystem securely between two computers. In this case, I copied all files in partition /dev/sda5 on box A to partition /dev/sdb6 on box B (IP 192.168.200.83).

Using the SCTP protocol

This method does not involve encryption, so it is relatively simple to follow.

1. First, I opened a terminal at box B (192.168.200.83) and changed the current directory to /mnt/sdb6 where I will unpack the incoming stream of files.

   
   

   cd /mnt/sdb6

   
   

   Then, I typed the following command to have socat establish a SCTP connection listening on port 7749. tar would be expecting to receive incoming files.

   
   

   socat EXEC:"tar xzf -" SCTP4-LISTEN:7749

   
   

2. Then, I opened a terminal at box A. Here I would transmit a bunch of files to box B (192.168.200.83). I changed directory to /mnt/sda5 containing files to send.

   
   

   cd /mnt/sda5

   
   

   Then, I typed the following command to transmit all the files in the current directory.

   
   

   socat EXEC:"tar czf - ." SCTP4-CONNECT:192.168.200.83:7749

   
   

Using the SSL connection

This method involves encrypted connection and requires SSL certicates on both sides of the link. Read this post to learn how to create self-signed SSL certificates if you don't already have one.

1. Debian and Ubuntu automatically create a local SSL certificate at /etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem. Both parties of an SSL connection — box A and box B — should exchange each other's ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem in order to have SSL connections between them.
   
   
   
2. On box B, I typed the following command to run socat in SSL listening mode at port 7749.
   
   

   cd /mnt/sdb6
   socat EXEC:"tar xzf -" OPENSSL-LISTEN:7749,reuseaddr,cert=/etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem,key=/etc/ssl/private/ssl-cert-snakeoil.key,cafile=box-A.pem

   
   
   
3. On box A, I typed the following command to run socat in SSL mode while running tar to pack all the files and send them through the pipeline.
   
   

   cd /mnt/sda5
   socat EXEC:"tar czf - ." OPENSSL:192.168.200.83:7749,cert=/etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem,key=/etc/ssl/private/ssl-cert-snakeoil.key,cafile=box-B.pem

   
   
   

Thus I have duplicated the whole directory tree from Box A to Box B. Using socat and tar, I was able to mirror a filesystem over the network. As shown above, socat alone can be a good substitute in situations where ssh, scp and/or netcat are needed. socat has many other features I have yet to explore.

How to Extract Boot Images from Acronis Bootable CD

Acronis Backup and Restore is a great software to purchase for any business that wants to protect and preserve their digital assets from natural or accidental loss. After you purchase Acronis software and deploy it on your computers, you have a chance to create a bootable CD for emergency purpose. The Acronis boot CD will prove useful when you need to restore backups on a compromised or corrupted system.

However, you may want to incorporate Acronis software into your own custom boot CD. The custom CD can be a live Linux CD or live Windows CD. In that case, your ideal CD will have a menu of choices to run Acronis in addition to booting Linux or Windows. To create such a disc, you need to extract boot images from Acronis Boot CD. This post illustrates the steps needed to creat a custom CD containing Acronis software.

1. Bring your Acronis emergency CD and use the following command to create an ISO file. This assumes that you are using Linux. On Windows, you can use the readom program from my cdrkit build.

   
   
   

   readom dev=/dev/sr0 f=ABR11.5AWUR_en-US.iso speed=8 retries=16 -nocorr -noerror

   
   
   

2. Acronis uses a special bootloader called BootWiz. To extract the boot image, you need to find the location of area that begins with BOOTWIZ0 string inside the ISO file. This is a hit-or-miss process. hexedit can be used here.

   
   
   

   hexedit ABR11.5AWUR_en-US.iso

   
   
   

3. In hexedit, press Ctrl+S, then enter 424F4F5457495A30, which translates to BOOTWIZ0. Hit Enter.

   
   
   
   
   

4. Hexedit will find the given string (BOOTWIZ0). Note the address of the line
   (0x1A000). The address (0x1A000) is equivalent to 106496 in decimal, and 208 sectors. After you write down the address, quit Hexedit by pressing Ctrl+C.

   
   
   
   
   

5. Use dd to extract the FAT filesystem image.

   
   
   

   dd if=ABR11.5AWUR_en-US.iso of=abr11.bin skip=208

   
   
   

6. Use WinImage to convert the image file (abr11.bin) — actually a FAT filesystem image — to a hard disk image format with MBR.

   
   
   
   
   

   Normally, you can just put the hard disk image on the CD and boot it using isolinux & memdisk.

   
   
   

   LABEL abr11
   MENU LABEL Acronis Backup & Restore 11
   KERNEL memdisk
   INITRD abr11.bin

   
   
   

7. Alternatively, you can mount the image file (abr11.bin) and extract only the kernel and initramfs.

   
   
   

   mount -t msdos -o loop,ro abr11.bin /mnt
   cd /mnt
   cp dat*.dat /boot

   
   
   

   The following is an example boot entry for isolinux that starts 64-bit Acronis Backup & Restore.

   
   
   

   LABEL abr11x
   MENU LABEL Acronis Backup & Restore 11 (64-bit)
   KERNEL dat5.dat
   INITRD dat4.dat
   APPEND video=vesa:mtrr vga=0x317 product=bootagent media_for_windows quiet

   
   
   

   The kernel parameters to put as APPEND string can be taken from the efi/boot/bootx64.xml.

   
   
   

Aria2 shell script and batch file

I wrote a BASH shell script and a DOS batch file that can be used to download files using aria2 — Aria2 is a command-line tool for downloading files. The script and the batch file take 2 arguments; the first one is for the bittorrent hash in 40-digit hexadecimal number and the second one is for arbitrary one-word description.

• aria2.bat
  
• aria2.sh
  

aria2.bat can be used on Windows, and aria2.sh can be used on Linux and *BSD. Make sure that aria2c is in PATH. For example, if you want to download an ISO file for the OpenSUSE DVD, you would type something like:

aria2.bat 198472f5217d843cceb1a4c82233f009ed6608af opensuse-dvd-586

To find the value of a bittorrent hash (that long hex number), you can cut it from a magnet link you find on a Web site — Magnet links allow you to download actual files without first having to download bittorrent files (*.torrent). When you see a magnet sign, right-click on it to display the shortcut menu and select Copy Link Location.

Then, paste it somewhere, for example, inside the URL address bar. The hash value comes after the btih: string.

After you find the bittorrent hash, use it as the first argument to the script and make up anything for the second argument, as shown in the example above.

isolinux.cfg for a live CD

isolinux is a bootloader included in the syslinux package and is used to boot a CD or DVD. isolinux is one of several popular bootloaders used to create a bootable CD for open-source operating systems, including Linux and FreeDOS. Another bootloader is GRUB, which I rarely use except for booting Windows 7 with BIOS emulation.

To create a bootable CD with isolinux, just copy the file isolinux.bin to a folder that will hold CD contents for ISO mastering. On Debian or Ubuntu, the file is located at the /usr/lib/syslinux folder.

A file named isolinux.cfg needs to be created in order to provide a menu or boot entries. A sample isolinux.cfg is shown below. It makes use of vesamenu.c32 which helps display a nice graphical menu with a background picture. Vesamenu.c32 is also located in /usr/lib/syslinux and needs to be copied too.

# isolinux.cfg
# Configuration for ISOLINUX

# Wait for 60 seconds before booting up the default entry.
TIMEOUT 600
F1 help.txt #ff702640

UI vesamenu.c32
MENU RESOLUTION 640 480
MENU BACKGROUND back642.jpg
MENU COLOR border 30;44 #40dfdfdf #00000000 std
MENU COLOR title 1;36;43 #e0fdff49 #804206ef none
MENU COLOR sel 7;37;40 #e0000000 #40ffffff all
MENU COLOR hotsel 1;7;37;40 #e0af0000 #40ffffff all
MENU COLOR disabled 1;30;44 #ffe4de6f #00000000 std
MENU COLOR scrollbar 30;44 #40000000 #e0af0000 std
MENU TITLE Boot Menu
MENU CLEAR

MENU ROWS 14
MENU TABMSGROW 20
MENU CMDLINEROW 20
MENU TIMEOUTROW 22
MENU HELPMSGROW 24
MENU VSHIFT 1

# The default is to boot the first hard drive.
DEFAULT hd0
ONERROR hd1

MENU BEGIN livecd_menu

  MENU TITLE Linux Live CD Menu

  LABEL livecd_heading
  MENU LABEL Boot Linux live CD
  MENU DISABLE

  LABEL livecd_640x480
  MENU LABEL 640x480 screen
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm 
  APPEND root=/dev/sr0 edd=off vmode=640x480

  LABEL livecd_800x600
  MENU LABEL 800x600 screen
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm
  APPEND root=/dev/sr0 edd=off vmode=800x600

  LABEL livecd_1024x768
  MENU LABEL 1024x768 screen
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm
  APPEND root=/dev/sr0 edd=off vmode=1024x768

  MENU SEPARATOR

  LABEL livecd_console_heading
  MENU LABEL Boot Linux live CD into text console
  MENU DISABLE

  LABEL livecd_console
  MENU LABEL text-mode console
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm
  APPEND root=/dev/sr0 nox

  LABEL livecd_console_old
  MENU LABEL text-mode console for an old computer
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm
  APPEND root=/dev/sr0 acpi=off irqpoll nox

  MENU SEPARATOR

  LABEL exit0
  MENU LABEL Return to the main menu.
  MENU EXIT

MENU END

MENU BEGIN cdram_menu

  MENU TITLE Linux on RAMdisk Menu

  LABEL cdram_heading
  MENU LABEL Boot Linux on RAMdisk
  MENU DISABLE

  LABEL cdram_640x480
  MENU LABEL 640x480 screen
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm 
  APPEND boot=cdrom root=/dev/ram ramdisk_size=573440 edd=off vmode=640x480

  LABEL cdram_800x600
  MENU LABEL 800x600 screen
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm
  APPEND boot=cdrom root=/dev/ram ramdisk_size=573440 edd=off vmode=800x600

  LABEL cdram_1024x768
  MENU LABEL 1024x768 screen
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm
  APPEND boot=cdrom root=/dev/ram ramdisk_size=573440 edd=off vmode=1024x768

  MENU SEPARATOR

  LABEL cdram_console_heading
  MENU LABEL Boot Linux RAMdisk into text console
  MENU DISABLE

  LABEL cdram_console
  MENU LABEL text-mode console
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm
  APPEND boot=cdrom root=/dev/ram ramdisk_size=573440 nox

  LABEL cdram_console_old
  MENU LABEL text-mode console for an old computer
  MENU INDENT 1
  KERNEL 360.lnx
  INITRD initram.lzm
  APPEND boot=cdrom root=/dev/ram ramdisk_size=573440 acpi=off irqpoll nox

  MENU SEPARATOR

  LABEL exit1
  MENU LABEL Return to the main menu.
  MENU EXIT

MENU END

LABEL hd0
  MENU LABEL First Hard Drive
  LOCALBOOT 0x80

LABEL hd1
  MENU LABEL Second Hard Drive
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd1 swap

MENU BEGIN hd0_menu

  MENU TITLE Partition in First Hard Drive

  LABEL hd0_part1
  MENU LABEL 1st partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 1

  LABEL hd0_part2
  MENU LABEL 2nd partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 2

  LABEL hd0_part3
  MENU LABEL 3rd partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 3

  LABEL hd0_part4
  MENU LABEL 4th partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 4

  LABEL hd0_part5
  MENU LABEL 5th partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 5

  LABEL hd0_part6
  MENU LABEL 6th partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 6

  LABEL hd0_part7
  MENU LABEL 7th partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 7

  LABEL hd0_part8
  MENU LABEL 8th partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 8

  LABEL hd0_part9
  MENU LABEL 9th partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 9

  LABEL hd0_part10
  MENU LABEL 10th partition
  KERNEL chain.c32
  APPEND hd0 10

  MENU SEPARATOR

  LABEL exit3
  MENU LABEL Return to the main menu
  MENU EXIT

MENU END

LABEL fd0
  MENU LABEL Floppy Drive
  LOCALBOOT 0x00

LABEL next
  MENU LABEL Next in boot sequence
  LOCALBOOT -1

LABEL memtest
  MENU LABEL Test your computer memory
  LINUX memtest.bin
  TEXT HELP
  Run Memtest86 to test your computer memory
  ENDTEXT

LABEL help
  MENU LABEL Help
  MENU HELP help.txt #ff702640

The example above is one that I use for my live CD, so some settings are specific to my situation. Thus, KERNEL and APPEND settings may have to be adapted for other users. However, all the keywords shown above is standard and acceptable.

Linux: Building X.org Kdrive Server Xfbdev on Debian Wheezy

Kdrive is a minimal X11 server that runs as a single executable with little dependencies. I use Kdrive for my Web-only/Rescue Linux systems. Before compiling Kdrive, I installed the following packages on my box running Debian Sid — which will be eventually rolled into Wheezy release:

• bison


• g++-4.7


• libexpat1-dev


• libpciaccess-dev


• libpixman-1-dev


• libssl-dev


• libudev-dev
  
• libxdamage-dev


• libxfont-dev


• libxi-dev


• libxkbfile-dev


• libxmu-dev


• libxxf86vm-dev


• make


• pkg-config


• x11proto-bigreqs-dev


• x11proto-composite-dev


• x11proto-randr-dev


• x11proto-render-dev


• x11proto-resource-dev


• x11proto-scrnsaver-dev


• x11proto-video-dev


• x11proto-xcmisc-dev


• x11proto-xf86dga-dev


• x11proto-xinerama-dev


• xkb-data

Installing X Protocol Headers

The current RandR protocol headers from Debian didn't meet the required version, so I had to download the latest one from freedesktop.org. I installed randrproto like this.

tar xjvf randrproto-1.4.0.tar.bz2
cd randrproto-1.4.0
./configure --prefix=/usr
make install

Compiling Xfbdev

I got the latest X.org release from freedesktop.org. The following commands will build Xfbdev:

tar xjf xorg-server_1.13.0.tar.bz2

cd xorg-server-1.13.0/

./configure --prefix=/usr --disable-xorg --enable-kdrive --enable-kdrive-evdev --enable-config-udev --disable-aiglx --disable-glx --disable-dri --disable-dri2 --disable-drm --disable-record --with-xkb-path=/usr/share/X11/xkb --with-xkb-output=/var/lib/xkb --with-xkb-bin-directory=/usr/bin --with-default-xkb-rules=xorg --with-default-xkb-model=pc105 --with-default-xkb-layout=us

make

make install

Installed Files

The following files are installed after successfully building a Kdrive server.

/usr/bin/Xfbdev

/usr/bin/Xnest

/usr/bin/Xvfb

/usr/lib/xorg/protocol.txt

/usr/share/man/man1/Xnest.1

/usr/share/man/man1/Xserver.1

/usr/share/man/man1/Xvfb.1

/var/lib/xkb/README.compiled

To Use Xfbdev

An executable file Xfbdev will be created in /usr/bin. To be able to use the Xfbdev server, framebuffer video must be enabled either in the kernel or as a module. If CONFIG_FB_VESA option was enabled in the kernel, you can use the syslinux bootloader in the following way to boot Linux into a framebuffer video mode:

LABEL minimal
KERNEL vmlinuz-2.6.31.5
INITRD initramfs.lzma
APPEND vga=0x314 video=vesafb:mtrr

Once the framebuffer video has been activated, Xfbdev can be started in the following way:

Xfbdev :0 vt7 dpms -ac -br +bs -dpi 96 -mouse evdev,5,device=/dev/input/event2 -2button -keybd evdev,,device=/dev/input/event3 -fp /usr/local/share/fonts,/usr/share/fonts/X11/Type1,/usr/share/fonts/truetype/ttf-dejavu -nolisten TCP

Download my X.org build 1.13.0

Here you can obtain my compiled binaries Xfbdev, Xnest and Xvfb:

• Xfbdev


• Xnest
  
• Xvfb
  

Also Read:

• Logging Into Linux Desktop with Xming, Xnest and Putty
  
• Linux: X.org Kdrive Server on Debian 6.0 Squeeze

My Live CD based on Debian Linux Sid

I created a Live CD from my Debian Linux installation. It is based on the unstable version (Sid). However, the live CD still lacks the capability to automatically configure X-Windows and the network, and uses IceWM for minimalist desktop. It can be downloaded from Google Drive. This Live CD has many uses, such as:

• To troubleshoot and fix computer problems
  
• To create backups and restore them
  
• To partition a hard drive before installing Windows or Linux
  
• To set up GRUB bootloader or enter boot commands
  
• To install Debian, Ubuntu or Fedora
  
• To access a Windows partition when it is unbootable
  
• To survey and diagnose wireless and wired networks
  
• To enjoy the Internet with the Web, IM, IRC and VoIP
  
• To run a simple FTP or HTTP server
  
• To participate in peer-to-peer networks
  
• To do basic word processing and spreadsheet
  
• To listen to music or watch movies
  
• To rip CD's and DVD's

The snapshot above shows idesk icons on the desktop. Idesk is a neat application that displays icons on the desktop for you to quickly launch. Currently, I use IceWM instead of GNOME or KDE desktop to save space on the CD. So idesk is used to provide desktop icons for IceWM.

The snapshot above shows mlterm running. mlterm is my favorite terminal application. It allows me to use many languages.

Gparted is a cool application to have on a live CD. It lets you divide the hard drive into many partitions so you can run multiple operating systems.

IceWeasel is rebranded Firefox from Debian. Sorry, Chrome is not included.

LibreOffice is a fork of OpenOffice.org suite. I use it to create documents or read Microsoft Office documents.

Specifying the locale at boot time

To see your own language with the live CD, select an entry from the menu, click Tab and append LANG= option to the command line. For example, if you speak French, append LANG=fr_FR.UTF-8.

A bokeh wallpaper in a 2560x1600 pixel format from v3wall.com.

Compile xz for Windows using MinGW

xz is the new popular compression format. To build xz tools and libraries, I issued the following commands.

./configure --prefix=/mingw --disable-shared --disable-nls --disable-lzma-links --disable-scripts
make
make install

I got the following files:

lzmadec.exe
lzmainfo.exe
unxz.exe
xz.exe
xzcat.exe
xzdec.exe

Note that xz can be used to create and decompress lzma files also.

Compile libcddb for Windows

libcddb is used to query for information about audio Compact Discs that has been loaded in media players and CD rippers. Compiling libcddb is not so hard with MinGW.

1. First, I installed MinGW. I compiled zlib and libiconv.

   
   
   

2. Then, I compiled libcdio. I downloaded the latest development source from its git web server.

   
   

   ./autogen.sh
   ./configure --prefix=/mingw
   make 
   make install

   
   
   

3. I compiled libcddb like this:

   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install

   
   
   

FLAC for Windows

FLAC, short for Free Lossless Audio Codec, is an audio format similar to MP3, but lossless. Thus, audio compressed in FLAC has no loss in quality. With digital storage getting cheaper everyday, it makes sense to copy or preserve sound in the near-perfect quality. I'm compiling FLAC with MinGW because it's needed by some programs I want to build.

1. I installed MinGW, of course. I also instaled NASM because it was suggested during configure. I just downloaded yasm-1.2.0-win32.exe and renamed it as nasm.exe.





2. I think it's not necessary, but I compiled zlib and libiconv.

   
   
   

3. I built OGG.

   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install

   
   
   

4. Then, I built FLAC.

   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-sse

   
   
   

   The --enable-sse option is for SSE-capable CPU's which mean nearly all new desktop CPU's today. I began make.

   
   
   

   make

   
   
   

   I got errors about SIZE_T_MAX. To fix it, I just changed the line 38 in flac-1.2.1/include/share/alloc.h

   
   
   

   # if defined _MSC_VER || defined __MINGW32__

   
   
   

   I got another error compiling examples/cpp/encode/file/main.cpp. To fix it, I inserted the following line after <stdlib.h> on line 33.

   
   
   

   #include <string.h>

   
   
   

   I got no more error. I installed flac.

   
   
   

   make install

   
   
   

Kung Fu Hustle (2004) 功夫

Kung Fu Hustle is a funny but memorable movie from Hong Kong star Stephen Chow. If you haven't seen it yet, here's your chance to watch the movie.

And the one below is the original Chinese version with English subtitles.

Compile libRTMP with MinGW

The libRTMP library provides online multimedia streaming support for many open-source projects, such as ffmpeg and curl. I am building librtmp for use with ffmpeg and mplayer. I downloaded the latest release tarball from here.

1. First, I compiled zlib as shown in this post.

   
   

   make -f win32/Makefile.gcc
   cp -iv zlib1.dll /mingw/bin
   cp -iv zconf.h zlib.h /mingw/include
   cp -iv libz.a /mingw/lib
   cp -iv libz.dll.a /mingw/lib

   
   
   

2. Then, I built OpenSSL as shown in this post.

   
   

   ./Configure -DHAVE_STRUCT_TIMESPEC -L/mingw/lib -lz -lpthreadGC2 -lws2_32 --prefix=/mingw threads zlib mingw
   make
   make install

   
   
   

3. Then, I built librtmp.

   
   

   make SYS=mingw
   cp -iv *.exe /mingw/bin

   
   

   To build the shared library, I typed:

   
   

   cd librtmp
   gcc -shared -o librtmp.dll -Wl,--out-implib,librtmp.dll.a rtmp.o log.o amf.o hashswf.o parseurl.o -lssl -lcrypto -lz -lws2_32 -lwinmm -lgdi32

   
   

   To install librtmp, I typed the following:

   
   

   cp -iv librtmp.dll /mingw/bin
   cp -iv amf.h http.h log.h rtmp.h /mingw/include/librtmp
   cp -iv librtmp*.a /mingw/lib
   cp -iv librtmp.pc /mingw/lib/pkgconfig

   
   
   

4. Sometimes, librtmp.pc fails to be generated. In that case, make it yourself and copy it to /mingw/lib/pkgconfig.

   
   
   

   prefix=/mingw
   exec_prefix=${prefix}
   libdir=${exec_prefix}/lib
   incdir=${prefix}/include/librtmp
   
   Name: librtmp
   Description: RTMP implementation
   Version: 2.3
   Requires: openssl libcrypto
   URL: http://rtmpdump.mplayerhq.hu
   Libs: -L${libdir} -lrtmp -lz
   Libs.private: -lws2_32 -lwinmm -lgdi32 -lssl -lcrypto
   Cflags: -I${incdir}

   
   
   

Build OpenSSL with MinGW

OpenSSL is an open-source library that provides cryptographic and network security functions. It is used by so many open-source software that require SSL/TLS support. To build OpenSSL for Windows, first install MinGW. There are two flavors of MinGW: mingw and mingw64. Just pick one of the following and set it up accordingly:

• Installing MinGW on Windows
  
• Setting up MinGW64 with Cygwin
  

Then, download the latest source tarball from the OpenSSL website and unpack it with 7-zip. 7-zip should be used because MinGW/MSYS tar has trouble with tarballs containing symlinks. However, cygwin has no problem with tarballs containing symlinks.

OpenSSL optionally incorporates the following libraries when found.

• zlib
  
• pthreads-win32
  

Assuming that you compiled both zlib and pthread as shown in the above links, configure OpenSSL like this.

./Configure -DHAVE_STRUCT_TIMESPEC -DPTW32_STATIC_LIB -L/mingw/lib -lz -lpthreadGC2 -lws2_32 --prefix=/mingw threads zlib mingw

Then, run make.

make

If you run into errors compiling some test codes, just copy dummytest.c over. However, it doesn't happen under Cygwin.

cp -iv test/dummytest.c test/md2test.c
cp -iv test/dummytest.c test/rc5test.c
cp -iv test/dummytest.c test/jpaketest.c

Then, install OpenSSL.

make install

To Build the Live555 library with MinGW

The Live555 streaming media library is an open-source implementation of RTP/RTCP/RTSP/SIP multimedia streaming protocols. I mainly use it with MPlayer. To compile it with MinGW, download the source for live555 library and extract the tarball under /mingw/lib:

cd /mingw/lib
tar xzvf live555-latest.tar.gz
cd live

compile it like this:

./genMakefiles mingw
make

Live555 and MPlayer

Normally, mplayer will detect the live555 library automatically. If not, append --enable-live to the ./configure command.

After running ./configure, open config.mak in a text editor and make the following changes.

• Append the following text to CXXFLAGS= line.
  

  -I/mingw/lib/live/liveMedia/include -I/mingw/lib/live/UsageEnvironment/include -I/mingw/lib/live/BasicUsageEnvironment/include -I/mingw/lib/live/groupsock/include

  
  
• Append the following text to EXTRALIBS= line.
  

  /mingw/lib/live/liveMedia/libliveMedia.a /mingw/lib/live/UsageEnvironment/libUsageEnvironment.a /mingw/lib/live/BasicUsageEnvironment/libBasicUsageEnvironment.a /mingw/lib/live/groupsock/libgroupsock.a -lstdc++

  
  

Creating a Shared Library for live555

To create a shared library from the static live555 libraries, I ran the following command:

gcc -shared -o livemedia.dll -Wl,--out-implib,liblivemedia.dll.a -Wl,--whole-archive liveMedia/libliveMedia.a UsageEnvironment/libUsageEnvironment.a BasicUsageEnvironment/libBasicUsageEnvironment.a groupsock/libgroupsock.a -Wl,--no-whole-archive -lstdc++ -lws2_32

I got livemedia.dll and liblivemedia.dll.a. I copied these files under MinGW.

cp -iv livemedia.dll /mingw/bin
cp -iv liblivemedia.dll.a /mingw/lib

To use these files, I would define environment variables as follows:

CXXFLAGS='-I/mingw/lib/live/liveMedia/include -I/mingw/lib/live/UsageEnvironment/include -I/mingw/lib/live/BasicUsageEnvironment/include -I/mingw/lib/live/groupsock/include'



LIBS='-lstdc++ /mingw/lib/liblivemedia.dll.a'

Bonsai Rock Study #2 - Lake Tahoe, Nevada, USA by Rich Capture

What can I say? Simply hypnotic. Otherworldly. Nice presentation of light and darkness in a serene setting.

Bonsai by Rob Birchard

A wonderful picture of bonsai that presents a miniaturized view of evergreen pine tress over a cliff.

Bonsai Rock Lake Tahoe IV by Joe Y Jiang

A serene scene of the Lake Tahoe with the nice natural blend of water, rock, distant forest and clear sky. Vivid blue and soft red present the viewer with pleasing contrast of color and the elliptical rocks on water are pleasant to watch.

Hilariously Awesome Martial Arts Classic: The Story of Ricky (电影: 力王)

Do you like classic horror movies or a Chinese kung-fu movie? Then, you may like the Hong Kong movie, “Ricki Oh: the Story of Ricky.” It's got both: blood and gore, and awesome kung fu. The fight scenes are gross and brutal like Kill Bill, but otherwise have outrageously cool kung-fu moves. However, I warn that some viewer discretion is advised.

Here's the same movie in Mandarin Chinese.

Building MPlayer and Mencoder for Windows

MPlayer is one of my favorite media players. It is used with a frontend like smplayer, gnome-mplayer and MPlayerGUI to provide a good alternative to Windows Media Player. Although there are already several Win32 builds of MPlayer on the net, I like to build MPlayer on my own using MinGW compiler because I want to optimize my build for my CPU. So I installed MinGW and compiled MPlayer as follows.

1. Build ffmpeg statically or dynamically as shown in this post.

   
   
   
2. (Optional) Compile the lzo library:
   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw && make && make install

   
   
   

3. (Optional) Fribidi is a rendering library for right-to-left scripts, such as Arabic and Hebrew. If you are a speaker of such right-to-left languages, compile fribidi statically as shown below:

   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw --disable-shared --disable-debug
   make
   make install

   
   

   More information can be found here.

   
   
   
4. Download JPEG source from ijg.org and complie JPEG:
   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-static
   make
   make install

   
   
   
5. Compile libPNG:
   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw --disable-shared
   make
   make install

   
   
   
6. Compile libiconv, Freetype, expat and fontconfig statically in that order:
   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw --disable-shared
   make install

   
   
   
7. Compile libdca:
   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install

   
   
   
8. (Optional) Download DirectX headers from any of the following locations and unpack them in /mingw/include:
   
   
   
   
   • http://www.videolan.org/vlc/dx7headers.tgz
     
   • http://www.mplayerhq.hu/MPlayer/contrib/win32/dx7headers.tgz
     
   
   
   
9. Download the latest mplayer source (mplayer-export-snapshot.tar.bz2) and unpack it. (patch 1 and patch 2)
   
   

   tar xjvf mplayer-export-snapshot.tar.bz2
   cd mplayer-export-2010-02-07/

   
   

   Then, run ./configure:

   
   

   CPPFLAGS='-DFRIBIDI_ENTRY="" ' ./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-runtime-cpudetection --enable-static --enable-theora --enable-fribidi --disable-ffmpeg_a --disable-gl --disable-vidix --yasm=/mingw/bin/yasm --extra-libs='-lfribidi'

   
   

   The CPPFLAGS value allows fribidi to be linked statically.

   
   
   
10. Build Mplayer:
    
    

    make

    
    
    

    After successful build, strip the executables:

    
    

    strip m*.exe

    
    
    

    Optionally, compress the executables with upx:

    
    

    upx --best --strip-relocs=0 mplayer.exe
    upx --best --strip-relocs=0 mencoder.exe

    
    
    

11. Download MPlayer codecs from here. The MPlayer codecs for Windows platform has a filename like windows-essential-20071007.zip. Extract the codecs package and you'll get a folder "windows-essential-20071007". Rename it as "codecs" and move the "codecs" folder inside where mplayer.exe file is located.

    
    
    

12. Make sure that HOME environment variable is set to your personal folder(for example, C:\Users\Jocelyn). Upon the first run of mplayer, a new folder named mplayer will be created in your HOME folder. Copy codecs.conf to the mplayer folder. The "config" file stores default options for playing movie files. Open the "config" file and make changes as follows:

    
    

    # Write your default config options here!
    cdrom-device=D:
    dvd-device=D:
    ao=dsound
    vo=direct3d
    font=C:\WINDOWS\FONTS\MALGUN.TTF
    framedrop=yes
    subcp=cp949

    
    

My win32 build of mplayer can be downloaded from here. It is recommended that the zip archive should be extracted in C:\Program Files.

Running MPlayer

Now, let's try mplayer. First, get a movie file ready. In the Command Prompt, type a command in the following form:

mplayer mymoviefile.avi

Alternatively,

mplayer -vo direct3d -ao win32 -font C:\WINDOWS\FONTS\Tahoma.ttf -framedrop mymoviefile.avi

A new window will pop up with the movie playing inside it.

The next step is to get and set up SMPlayer.

Building cdrkit for Windows

cdrkit is another CD/DVD burning tool that was spun off from the cdrtools project. Some say cdrkit is inferior to cdrtools, but I haven't found a problem with cdrkit yet. Although I prefer cdrtools to cdrkit, I'd like to give cdrkit a try. To build cdrkit with MinGW, I had to compile some libraries first.

1. zlib
   

   First, I compiled zlib:

   
   

   tar xzvf zlib-1.2.7.tar.gz
   cd zlib-1.2.7
   make -f win32/Makefile.gcc
   cp -iv zlib1.dll /mingw/bin
   cp -iv zconf.h zlib.h /mingw/include
   cp -iv libz.a /mingw/lib
   cp -iv libz.dll.a /mingw/lib

   
   
   
2. POSIX threads for Win32
   

   New genisoimage seems to use pthread for making checksums. I compiled pthread like this:

   
   

   make clean GC
   cp -iv pthreadGC2.dll /mingw/bin
   cp -iv pthread.h semaphore.h sched.h /mingw/include/
   cp -iv libpthreadGC2.a /mingw/lib
   cp -iv libpthreadGC2.a /mingw/lib/libpthread.a

   
   
   
3. PCRE
   
   

   Then, I compile PCRE:

   
   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-pcre16 --enable-unicode-properties
   make
   make install
   cp /mingw/include/pcreposix.h /mingw/include/regex.h
   cp /mingw/lib/libpcreposix.a /mingw/lib/libregex.a
   cp /mingw/lib/libpcreposix.dll.a /mingw/lib/libregex.dll.a

   
   
   
4. libmagic
   
   

   I built the open-source file command. I configured it like this:

   
   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw

   
   
   

   Then, I added the following lines to config.h:

   
   
   

   #define WIN32 1
   #define MAGIC "magic"

   
   
   

   Compile libmagic:

   
   
   

   make && make install

   
   
   

   I got an error trying to build file.exe, so I modified src/Makefile:

   
   

   file_LDADD = libmagic.la /mingw/lib/libpcreposix.dll.a

   
   
   
5. libiconv
   
   

   I built libiconv like this:

   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install

   
   
   
6. CMake
   
   

   Then, I built CMake.

   
   

   ./bootstrap --prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install

   
   
   
7. cdrkit
   

   I unpacked the cdrkit source and applied the patch that I found at the mailing list. Here are the modified patches of mine.

   
   
   
   • cdrkit-1.1.9-mingw.patch
     
   • cdrkit-1.1.11-mingw.patch
     
   
   
   

   I used the command below to applied the patch.

   
   
   

   patch -p1 -l < ../cdrkit-1.1.9-mingw.patch

   
   
   

   Then, I compiled cdrkit:

   
   
   

   cmake -G "MSYS Makefiles"
   make

   
   

   After successful build, I copied the executable files (*.exe) to my folder.

   
   

Issues and Fixes

1. 
   

   I got an error linking genisoimage. I edited genisoimage/CMakeLists.txt to resolve the issue:

   
   
   

   IF(USE_MAGIC)
    ADD_DEFINITIONS(-DUSE_MAGIC)
    LIST(APPEND EXTRA_LIBS "shlwapi")
    SET(MAGICLIBS magic)
   ENDIF(USE_MAGIC)

   
   
   

2. I got errors compiling sha256.* and sha512.*. I made the following changes.

   
   
   
   • I removed all lines that read #include <endian.h>.
     
   • Assume the target machine is little endian.
     
   • change all occurrences of __THROW to __attribute__ ((__nothrow__)).
   
   
   

3. The code in genisoimage/checksum.c gave me errors linking with pthread-w32. To fix it, I replaced a->thread with (a->thread).p.

   
   
   

4. I found that genisoimage and readom still used /dev/null. I changed it to NUL in genisoimage.c and readom.c.

   
   
   

Download my cdrkit Build

Here's my cdrkit build for Windows.

• cdrkit-1.1.9-win32.zip
  
• cdrkit-1.1.11-mingw.zip
  

Related Links

• Building cdrtools under Cygwin
  
• Using cdrtfe 1.5

Building cdrtools under Cygwin

cdrtools is a powerful open-source CD/DVD/BD burning tool. It is used as backend software for free DVD-burning applications, such as Infrarecorder and cdrtfe. To build cdrtools for Windows, install Cygwin as shown in this post. Additionally, I installed the following Cygwin packages.

• bison
  
• gcc4-core
  
• gcc4-g++
  
• gettext-devel
  
• libiconv
  
• libtool
  
• make
  
• patch
  
• pkg-config
  

I set up some environment variables before I started.

export CC=/usr/bin/gcc.exe
export CC_OPT="-O2"
export CFLAGS="-march=pentium2 -mtune=i586 -mthreads -mms-bitfields"
export LDFLAGS="-L/usr/lib -Wl,--enable-auto-image-base -Wl,--enable-auto-import -Wl,--enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc"

Then, I built smake.

cd smake-1.2
make
make INS_BASE=/usr install

Then, I built cdrtools.

smake
smake INS_BASE=/usr install

Using cdrtools

I tested my cdrtools build. To create an ISO file from a folder, I ran mkisofs:

mkisofs -J -R -hide-rr-moved ~/Downloads > dl.iso

To burn an ISO:

cdrecord -scanbus
cdrecord dev=0,0,0 speed=8 driveropts=burnfree dl.iso

To make a copy of a data CD:

readcd dev=0,0,0 f=dl2.iso speed=8 retries=16 -nocorr -noerror

To scan a music CD, I ran cdda2wav:

cdda2wav -scanbus
cdda2wav dev=0,0,0 cddb=1 -cddbp-server=freedb.freedb.org -cddbp-port=8880 -J -N

To rip the second track of the music CD:

cdda2wav dev=0,0,0 cddb=1 track=2 ~/Music/track2.wav

Download my cdrtools build for Windows

Here you can get my cdrtools build.

• cdrtools-3.01a08-cygwin17.zip

Free cdrtools Graphical Interfaces for Windows

If you don't want to deal with the command line, there are, of course, user-friendly GUI frontends for cdrtools.

• Infrarecorder
  
• cdrtfe
  

Related Links

• Setting Up Cygwin For C/C++ Software Development on Windows
  
• Using cdrtfe 1.5
  

Compiling CMake with MinGW

CMake is a portable build system. CMake can be used to replace the traditional GNU build process, as in:

./configure

make

make install

Compiling CMake is fairly simple. After you install MinGW (as shown in this post), download and unpack the CMake source tarball. Run the following commands in order.

tar xzvf cmake-2.8.9.tar.gz
cd cmake-2.8.9
./bootstrap --prefix=/mingw
make
make install

To Compile ffmpeg with MinGW

ffmpeg is an important component of many open-source projects, such as MPlayer and VLC. I am compiling ffmpeg so that I can use it to transcode multimedia files. This guide shows how to use MinGW to compile ffmpeg either statically or dynamically. Installation of MinGW is explained in this post. The example commands below are meant to be entered into an MSYS window (not Command Prompt). I downloaded the FFmpeg source and unpacked it.

Preparing External Libraries for FFMpeg

FFMpeg can be linked with external libraries to add features to FFmpeg. I am adding most features to FFMpeg by compiling additional libraries. Most of these libraries are also covered in my posts on compiling MPlayer and Mencoder.

1. Compression Libraries: Zlib and bzLib
   
   Get the zlib source (zlib127.zip), unzip and compile it:
   
   

   unzip zlib127.zip
   cd zlib-1.2.7/
   make -f win32/Makefile.gcc
   cp -iv zlib1.dll /mingw/bin
   cp -iv zconf.h zlib.h /mingw/include
   cp -iv libz.a /mingw/lib
   cp -iv libz.dll.a /mingw/lib

   
   
   

   Optionally, get bzip2 source from bzip.org and compile it like this:

   
   

   tar xzvf bzip2-1.0.6.tar.gz
   cd bzip2-1.0.6
   make
   cp bzlib.h /mingw/include/
   cp libbz2.a /mingw/lib

   
   
   
2. libgsm
   
   Download gsm-1.0.13.tar.bz2, unpack and compile it as follows:
   
   

   tar xzvf gsm-1.0.13.tar.bz2
   cd gsm-1.0-pl13/
   make

   
   

   Just ignore the compile errors with fchmod and fchown when trying to build applications. Copy the header and static library to /mingw:

   
   

   mkdir /mingw/include/gsm
   cp inc/gsm.h /mingw/include/gsm
   cp lib/libgsm.a /mingw/lib

   
   
   
3. LAME is an excellent MP3 encoder. LAME makes use of the nasm assembler if available. So download yasm and save it as /mingw/bin/nasm.exe. Then, download the LAME source from lame.sf.net and compile it like this.
   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-expopt=full
   
   make
   
   make install

   
   
   
4. OGG, Vorbis, Speex and Theora
   

   The source code for these libraries can be obtained from xiph.org. Compile them each like this:

   
   

   ./configure --prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install

   
   

   As for speex, use the version 1.2rc1 or later.

   
   
   
5. FAAC
   

   FAAC is an MPEG-4 AAC audio encoder. Get the source (faac-1.28.tar.gz) and unpack the package. Then, edit Makefile.am:
   

   SUBDIRS = include libfaac

   
   

   Also, edit the line beginning with AC_OUTPUT in the file configure.in:
   

   AC_OUTPUT(libfaac/Makefile include/Makefile Makefile)

   
   

   Then, compile FAAC like this
   

   sh bootstrap
   ./configure --prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install

   
   
   
6. XviD is a popular video encoder used to create movie files distributed in p2p networks. Xvid can use yasm assembler to build optimized binaries if found (/mingw/bin/yasm.exe). Get the XviD source from xvid.org and compile as follows:
   
   

   tar xzvf xvidcore-1.3.2.tar.gz
   cd xvidcore/build/generic
   ./configure --prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install

   
   
   

   If you encounter "unrecognized command-line option -mno-cygwin" errors, open the file platform.inc in a text editor and delete "-mno-cygwin". Then, run make and make install again.

   
   
   

   Copy the import library for xvidcore.dll:

   
   

   cp -iv \=build/xvidcore.dll.a /mingw/lib/libxvidcore.a

   
   
   
7. x264 is yet another good video encoder. x264 requires YASM to build an optimized executable. So get yasm and save it as /mingw/bin/yasm.exe. Then, compile x264 like this:
   
   

   configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-win32thread --extra-cflags="-DX264_VERSION=20100422"
   
   make
   
   make install
   
   cp -iv x264.h x264_config.h /mingw/include
   
   cp -iv libx264.a /mingw/lib
   
   cp -iv x264.pc /mingw/lib/pkgconfig

   
   
   
8. Compile librtmp as shown in this post.
   
   

Building FFMpeg Statically

You need pr.exe from MYS coreutils package (coreutils-5.97-3-msys-1.0.13-ext.tar.lzma). I configured ffmpeg with the following command:

CPPFLAGS='-DHAVE_INT32_T' ./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-gpl --enable-nonfree --enable-postproc --enable-avfilter --enable-w32threads --enable-runtime-cpudetect --enable-memalign-hack --enable-bzlib --enable-libfaac --enable-libgsm --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libspeex --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libx264 --enable-libxvid --enable-zlib --disable-debug

-DHAVE_INT32_T is used to allow static FAAC to be linked. Then, I began compilation and installation:

make
make install

Compiling FFmpeg Dynamically

Some Windows applications, such as Audacity, uses FFmpeg libraries when available. If you want to compile FFmpeg dynamically, append --enable-shared --disable-static to the ./configure command for FFmpeg.

./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-gpl --enable-nonfree --enable-postproc --enable-avfilter --enable-w32threads --enable-runtime-cpudetect --enable-memalign-hack --enable-bzlib --enable-libfaac --enable-libgsm --enable-libmp3lame --enable-librtmp --enable-libspeex --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libx264 --enable-libxvid --enable-zlib --enable-shared --disable-static --disable-debug

If you get "int32_t" error when compiling libfaac.o, open /mingw/include/faac.h and insert the following line:

#include <stdint.h>

When I built mplayer with --enable-static and --disable-ffmpeg_a options to force linking with shared ffmpeg libraries, I had to rename ffmpeg libraries so their names end in *.a.

cd /mingw/lib
cp -iv libavcodec.dll.a libavcodec.a
cp -iv libavformat.dll.a libavformat.a
cp -iv libavutil.dll.a libavutil.a
cp -iv libpostproc.dll.a libpostproc.a
cp -iv libswscale.dll.a libswscale.a

Using cdrtfe 1.5

cdrtfe is free CD/DVD/BD burning software for Windows. cdrtfe actually use the command-line program cdrtools as its burning engine. I have used cdrtools on Linux to create ISO images and burn or rip CD. I'd like to have cdrtools on Windows also. Fortunately, cdrtfe includes cdrtools Win32 binaries along with the nice-looking GUI application.

To install cdrtfe, I downloaded the cdrtfe zip archive (cdrtfe-1.5.zip) and unpacked the zip archive. Double-clicking on the cdrtfe file will start the cdrtfe program. (Warning: Running the Cygwin terminal and cdrtfe at the same time can cause a problem due to cygwin1.dll incompatibility, so close the Cygwin terminal before starting cdrtfe.)

So far, I have only tried ripping music CD's with cdrtfe. I will add more as I get to know more about cdrtfe.

Ripping Audio CD's

To rip a music CD, click on the DAE tab and click the Options button. Check to make sure the options are okay.

Back to the main window, click Read TOC to update the track list, check the Save tracks to folder, and click Start to begin ripping.

Setting Up Cygwin For C/C++ Software Development on Windows

Cygwin provides a Unix-like environment for Windows users. Cygwin is useful for people who want to learn Unix or popular Linux without having to install Unix or Linux. Cygwin can also be used to port Linux applications to Windows or develop genuine Windows applications. To install Cygwin, download setup.exe from the Cygwin website and run it.

Cygwin Packages for Software Development

In addition to the default packages, select the following packages for common development environment:

• bison
  
• gettext-devel
  
• libtool
  
• make
  
• patch
  
• pkg-config
  

To select a package for installation, type the name of the package in the Search box, expand the categories by clicking a plus, and clicking on the package until its version number shows up.

If you want to develop software applications that depend on cygwin1.dll (which emulates Unix on Windows), install one of the following packages. This is when you want to port Linux applications to Windows with little modification.

• gcc-g++
  
  outdated version 3.4.4
  
• gcc4-g++
  
  GCC 4.x that links applications with cygwin1.dll

If you want to develop pure Windows applications, install one of the following packages.

• mingw-gcc-g++
  
  The original MinGW compiler from mingw.org can't build 64-bit applications.
  
• mingw64-i686-gcc-g++
  
  New MinGW compiler from mingw-w64.sourceforge.net.
  
• mingw64-x86_64-gcc-g++
  
  Install these to develop 64-bit Windows applications.
  

When you see the Resolving Dependencies window, just accept and click Next.

Setting HOME Variable

Setting the environment variable %HOME% is useful for various reasons. First of all, it allows regular users to compile freely in their user folder without requiring access to C:\Cygwin. Secondly, it allows users to save user-specific configuration in their user folder. For example, user configuration files such as .profile, .gtkrc-2.0, .fonts.conf and .pango-aliases can be saved in the folder specified by %HOME%.

Setting Up mingw* compiler for Cygwin

The file C:\Cygwin\etc\fstab is used to set up mount points in Cygwin. If you installed mingw64 packages, open the file C:\Cygwin\etc\fstab in a text editor and append the following line.

/usr/i686-w64-mingw32/sys-root/mingw /mingw none bind

Start the Cygwin terminal and type the following commands to set up Cygwin for Windows compilation.

ln -s /usr/bin/i686-w64-mingw32-g++.exe /usr/i686-w64-mingw32/bin/g++.exe
ln -s /usr/bin/i686-w64-mingw32-gcc.exe /usr/i686-w64-mingw32/bin/gcc.exe

Also, set up some environment variables.

export CFLAGS="-march=pentium2 -mtune=i586 -mthreads -mms-bitfields -O2"
export CXXFLAGS="-march=pentium2 -mtune=i586 -mthreads -mms-bitfields -O2"
export CPPFLAGS="-I/mingw/include"
export LDFLAGS="-L/mingw/lib -Wl,--enable-auto-image-base -Wl,--enable-auto-import -Wl,--enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc"
export PATH=/mingw/bin:/usr/i686-w64-mingw32/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin
export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=/mingw/lib/pkgconfig

Setting Up gcc* Compiler for Cygwin

If you installed the gcc4 compiler (as opposed to mingw*), set up some environment variables to customize your build environment. I usually type the following commands:

CC="/usr/bin/gcc.exe"
CFLAGS="-march=pentium2 -mtune=i586 -mthreads -mms-bitfields -O2"
CPPFLAGS="-I/usr/include"
CXXFLAGS="-march=pentium2 -mtune=i586 -mthreads -mms-bitfields -O2"
LDFLAGS="-L/usr/lib -Wl,--enable-auto-image-base -Wl,--enable-auto-import -Wl,--enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc"
export CC CFLAGS CPPFLAGS CXXFLAGS LDFLAGS

To Create a Live Linux CD/DVD

A live CD is a bootable CD that contains the whole operating system and any applications you want to run from the CD. With the increasing popularity of DVD and Blu-ray drives, there is even a live DVD. A live CD is useful when you want to copy your existing Linux system to a CD and run it on multiple computers. In this post, I show how I normally create a live CD.

Rebuild a kernel with SquashFS and UnionFS patch

A new kernel should be built with SquashFS and UnionFS patches. The live CD will have a huge file that is actually a SquashFS image containing a copy of your existing Linux system. We will use UnionFS so that any changes to the read-only SquashFS will be saved to the volatile memory. Download the patches from the following locations.

• squashfs.sourceforge.net
  
• unionfs.filesystems.org
  

After patching the kernel and rebuilding it, install the new kernel.

Make a SquashFS image of an existing Linux system

A SquashFS image needs to be created from an existing Linux system. Copy the contents of the Linux filesystem to an empty directory, assuming the filesystem is mounted at /mnt.

mkdir /tmp/livecd
cd /mnt
tar cf - . | (cd /tmp/livecd; tar xf -)

Empty the contents of fstab so that the live CD will not mount any hard disk partition, including the original root partition.

cp /dev/null /tmp/livecd/etc/fstab

Create a squashfs image.

mksquashfs /tmp/livecd /tmp/linuxfs.sqz -comp xz -b 262144 -Xdict-size 196608 -no-xattrs -e boot lost+found selinux srv

Create a Custom InitRamFS image

This is a tricky part of the job. Basically, the init script of the initramfs image will mount the CD-ROM, then mount the SquashFS image, and then mount a UnionFS. Refer to this post on building an initramfs image.

Create a Live CD structure.

Create an empty directory which will be the contents of live CD. The live CD will contain:

• SquashFS image (named linuxfs.sqz, for example)
  
• isolinux.bin and isolinux.cfg
  
• kernel
  
• initramfs image
  

Finally, create an ISO image for the live CD.

genisoimage -V LIVECD -b isolinux.bin -c boot.cat -no-emul-boot -boot-load-size 4 -boot-info-table /tmp/isofs > ~/livecd.iso

Burn the ISO image.

cdrskin -v dev=/dev/sr0 speed=8 driveropts=burnfree ~/livecd.iso

Manually Creating initrd / initramfs to Boot Linux

Initrd and initramfs files are used together with a Linux kernel and a bootloader (such as GRUB and syslinux) to start up Linux and boot it in many different ways. Many Linux distributions provide prepackaged kernels and convenient tools for creating initramfs, but I like to build my own kernel and initramfs because it allows me to customize the boot process. For instance, one can choose to boot from the local disk or network-mounted disk with the help of initramfs and some user-defined boot parameters. Here's a list of things that I'd like to achieve with my custom initramfs.

1. Boot from a live CD
   
2. Boot from a read-only filesystem image, compressed with SquashFS
   
3. Copy the filesystem image to a RAM disk and run Linux entirely on memory
   
4. Boot Linux from a USB flash drive or a Firewire disk
   
5. Boot Linux from a local disk partition
   
6. Boot Linux from a network drive
   
7. Run a rescue shell without booting Linux
   
8. Start a kdrive X-server and run gparted, partclone or partimage
   

In this post, I show how I normally create initrd / initramfs files. For this tutorial, the following Debian/Ubuntu packages are needed:

• busybox
  
  provides small essential utilities for booting and rescue shell.
  
• cpio
  
  is used to create the actual initramfs format.
  
• dash
  
  provides a minimalist shell for running the init script and the rescue shell.
  
• e2fsprogs, jfsutils, etc.
  
  provides fsck to check Linux filesystems and replay any stale journal
  
• lzma or xz-utils
  
  compresses the initramfs
  
• module-init-tools
  
  is used to load kernel modules necessary to activate hardware and mount the filesystem
  
• pciutils
  
  is used to detect PCI hardware
  
• unionfs-fuse
  
  makes it possible to use read-only Linux systems, such as live CD and filesystem images
  
• unzip
  
  is used to apply customized settings and changes to the unionfs boot mode
  
• v86d
  
  is used to set the screen resolution for the framebuffer screen
  

First, create a text file with a list of files to put in initramfs. The following is an example of such file:

bin/busybox
bin/dash
bin/mount
etc/filesystems
etc/fuse.conf
etc/group
etc/modprobe.d
lib/ld-linux.so.2
lib/libacl.so.1
lib/libattr.so.1
lib/libblkid.so.1
lib/libbz2.so.1.0
lib/libcom_err.so.2
lib/libc.so.6
lib/libdl.so.2
lib/libe2p.so.2
lib/libext2fs.so.2
lib/libfuse.so.2
lib/libkmod.so.2
lib/libmount.so.1
lib/libm.so.6
lib/libpci.so.3
lib/libpthread.so.0
lib/libresolv.so.2
lib/librt.so.1
lib/libselinux.so.1
lib/libsepol.so.1
lib/libuuid.so.1
lib/libx86.so.1
lib/libz.so.1
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/ata
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/block/loop.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/cdrom/cdrom.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/connector/cn.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/firewire/firewire-core.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/firewire/firewire-ohci.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/firewire/firewire-sbp2.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/i2c/algos/i2c-algo-bit.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/scsi/sd_mod.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/scsi/sr_mod.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/usb/host/ehci-hcd.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/usb/host/ohci-hcd.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/usb/host/uhci-hcd.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/usb/storage/usb-storage.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/drivers/video
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/ext3/ext3.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/ext4/ext4.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/fat/fat.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/fat/vfat.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/fuse/fuse.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/isofs/isofs.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/jbd2/jbd2.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/jbd/jbd.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/jfs/jfs.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/nls/nls_cp437.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/nls/nls_iso8859-1.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/nls/nls_utf8.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/reiserfs/reiserfs.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/squashfs/squashfs.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/fs/xfs/xfs.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/lib/crc16.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/kernel/lib/crc-t10dif.ko
lib/modules/3.5.3/modules.dep
lib/modules/3.5.3/modules.dep.bin
lib/modules/3.5.3/modules.pcimap
sbin/blkid
sbin/e2fsck
sbin/jfs_fsck
sbin/modprobe
sbin/v86d
usr/bin/pcimodules
usr/bin/unionfs-fuse
usr/bin/unzip

Then, create an empty directory, for example, /tmp/initrd and copy the files listed in the above-mentioned text file (called rd354.txt) to the new directory.

mkdir /tmp/initrd
cd /
tar cvhf - -T rd354.txt | (cd /tmp/initrd; tar xf -)

Then, create the necessary directory structure under /tmp/initrd:

cd /tmp/initrd
mkdir -p dev media mnt proc root sys tmp

Since I chose to use busybox, I need to create symbolic links to busybox in /bin. Busybox provides incomplete functionality for modprobe, mount, sh and unzip, so I removed their symbolic links.

cd /tmp/initrd/bin
for f in $(./busybox --list); do [ -e $f ] || ln -s busybox $f ; done
rm modprobe unzip

Then, create essential device nodes in /tmp/initrd/dev:

cd /tmp/initrd/dev
MAKEDEV std fb0 fd0 sda sdb scd
mknod console c 5 1
mknod fuse c 10 229
chmod 666 fuse

Now, create an init script. The contents of this init script is crucial for customization of the boot process. The following is the script I use. This script is capable of booting a live CD and running Linux within memory in addition to booting Linux from hard drives and USB flash.

#!/bin/dash

# Define a function to parse kernel command line options.
get_opt() {
  echo $@ | cut -d "=" -f 2
}

# Define a function to load drivers.
loadmod() {
  for i in $@ ; do
    for j in $(grep $i /tmp/pcimodules.txt); do
      modprobe $j
    done
  done
}

# Define a function to guess the partition type.
gpart() {
  for i in $(blkid | grep $1); do
    case $i in
      *\=*)
        eval $i
        ;;
      *)
        true
        ;;
    esac
  done
}

# Define a function for mounting the root partition.
mountr() {
  if [ $uuid ]; then
    if [ $# = 2 ]; then
      mount -r -U $uuid $2
    elif [ $# = 1 ]; then
      mount -r -U $uuid $1
    else mount -r -U $uuid /mnt
    fi
  elif [ $label ]; then
    if [ $# = 2 ]; then
      mount -r -L $label $2
    elif [ $# = 1 ]; then
      mount -r -L $label $1
    else mount -r -L $label /mnt
    fi
  else
    gpart $1
    case $TYPE in
      ext*)
        e2fsck -p $1
        [ $# = 2 ] && mount $1 $2 || mount $1 /mnt
        ;;
      jfs)
        jfs_fsck $1
        if [ $# = 2 ]; then
          mount -t jfs -o ro,iocharset=utf8 $1 $2
        else mount -t jfs -o ro,iocharset=utf8 $1 /mnt
        fi
        ;;
      vfat)
        if [ $# = 2 ]; then
          mount -t vfat -o ro,gid=100,dmask=2,fmask=113 $1 $2
        else mount -t vfat -o ro,gid=100,dmask=2,fmask=113 $1 /mnt
        fi
        ;;
      *)
        [ $# = 2 ] && mount -r $1 $2 || mount -r $1 /mnt
        ;;
    esac
  fi
}

# Create a union filesystem
union() {
  mount -t tmpfs none /opt/tmp
  modinfo unionfs > /dev/null 2>&1 &&
  mount -t unionfs -o dirs=/opt/tmp=rw:/opt=ro none /mnt ||
  ( mkdir /opt/tmp/.change
    modprobe fuse
    unionfs-fuse -o allow_other,use_ino,suid,dev,nonempty,kernel_cache \
     -o cow,chroot=/opt,max_files=32768 /tmp/.change=RW:/=RO /mnt )
}

# Mount proc and sysfs.
mount -t proc none /proc
mount -t sysfs none /sys

# Find the available PCI hardware
mount -t tmpfs none /tmp
pcimodules > /tmp/pcimodules.txt

# Populate /dev (Needs kernel >= 2.6.32)
mount -t devtmpfs none /dev
mkdir -m 755 /dev/pts
mount -t devpts -o gid=5,mode=620 none /dev/pts

# Set default values
boot=ata
root=/dev/sda6

# Find the root=, label=, uuid= and boot= values on kernel command line.
for i in $(cat /proc/cmdline); do
  case $i in
    root\=*)
        root=$(get_opt $i)
        case $root in
          /dev/cdr* | /dev/dvd* | /dev/sr* | /dev/scd*)
            boot=cdrom
            ;;
          0x200)
            root=/dev/fd0
            ;;
        esac
        ;;
    label\=* | uuid\=* | boot\=* | vmode\=* )
        eval $i
        ;;
    single)
        RUNLEVEL=single
        ;;
    nox)
        RUNLEVEL=2
        ;;
  esac
done

# Activate framebuffer display devices.
if [ $vmode ]; then
  if [ $boot = cdrom ]; then
    modprobe uvesafb scroll=ywrap mode_option=$vmode-16
  else for i in $(grep fb /tmp/pcimodules.txt); do
    case $i in
      atyfb)
        modprobe $i mode=$vmode-16
        ;;
      nvidiafb | rivafb)
        modprobe nvidiafb mode_option=$vmode bpp=16 hwcur=1
        ;;
      radeonfb | savagefb)
        modprobe $i mode_option=$vmode-16
        ;;
      sisfb)
        modprobe $i mode=$vmodex16 mem=12288 font=SUN12x22
        ;;
      viafb | vt8623fb)
        modprobe viafb viafb_mode=$vmode viafb_bpp=16
        ;;
      *)
        modprobe $i
        ;;
    esac
  done
    if grep -q i915 /tmp/pcimodules.txt; then true
    else [ -c /dev/fb0 ] || modprobe uvesafb scroll=ywrap mode_option=$vmode-16
    fi
  fi
fi

case $boot in
    cdrom)
        # Boot Linux from a live CD.
        loadmod ata_ ahci pdc_adma ^.hci-hcd
        modprobe usb-storage &&
        modprobe sr_mod &&
        sleep 7
        modprobe isofs
        mount -t iso9660 /dev/sr0 /media
        [ -d /media/isolinux -o -d /media/boot/isolinux ] || 
          mount -t iso9660 /dev/sr1 /media
        if [ -f /media/*.[Ss][Qq]* ]; then
          SQF=$(ls -t /media/*.[Ss][Qq]* | head -n 1)
          if [ $root = /dev/ram ]; then 
               echo "Please wait until the RAM disk is ready."
               dd if=$SQF of=/dev/ram1 bs=2048 &&
               mount -t squashfs /dev/ram1 /opt
          else modprobe loop
               mount -t squashfs -o loop $SQF /opt
          fi
        else
          mount --move /media /opt
        fi
        union
        ;;
    loop)
        # Boot Linux from an image file.
        loadmod ata_ ahci pdc_adma ^.hci-hcd
        modprobe usb-storage &&
        modprobe sd_mod &&
        sleep 7
        mountr $root /media
        modprobe loop
        if [ -f /media/*.[Ss][Qq]* ]; then
          SQF=$(ls -t /media/*.[Ss][Qq]* | head -n 1)
          mount -t squashfs -o loop $SQF /opt
        elif [ -f /media/*.[Ii][Ss][Oo] ]; then
          ISO=$(ls -t /media/*.[Ii][Ss][Oo] | head -n 1)
          modprobe isofs
          mount -t iso9660 -o loop $ISO /opt
        fi
        union
        ;;
    ram)
        # Boot Linux from ramdisk.
        loadmod ata_ ahci pdc_adma ^.hci-hcd
        modprobe usb-storage &&
        modprobe sd_mod &&
        sleep 7
        mountr $root /media
        echo "Please wait until the RAM disk is ready."
        if [ -f /media/*.[Ss][Qq]* ]; then
          SQF=$(ls -t /media/*.[Ss][Qq]* | head -n 1)
          dd if=$SQF of=/dev/ram1 &&
          mount -t squashfs /dev/ram1 /opt
        elif [ -f /media/*.[Ii][Ss][Oo] ]; then
          ISO=$(ls -t /media/*.[Ii][Ss][Oo] | head -n 1)
          dd if=$ISO of=/dev/ram1 bs=2048 &&
          modprobe isofs
          mount -t iso9660 /dev/ram1 /opt
        fi
        union
        ;;
    usb*)
        # Boot Linux from a USB drive.
        loadmod ^.hci-hcd
        modprobe usb-storage &&
        modprobe sd_mod &&
        sleep 7
        mountr $root
        ;;
    ata*)
        loadmod ata_ ahci pdc_adma &&
        modprobe sd_mod &&
        mountr $root
        ;;
esac

# Make sure that init exists and is executable.
if [ -x /mnt/sbin/init ]; then
  mount --move /dev /mnt/dev
  mount --move /proc /mnt/proc
  mount --move /sys /mnt/sys
  umount /tmp

# Start init from the root filesystem.
  cd /mnt
  [ -f /media/updates.zip ] && unzip -o /media/updates.zip
  case $boot in
    cdrom)
      [ $root = /dev/ram ] && umount /media
      [ $RUNLEVEL ] || RUNLEVEL=3
      ;;
    loop | ram)
      umount /media
      [ $RUNLEVEL ] || RUNLEVEL=3
      ;;
    *)
      [ $RUNLEVEL ] || RUNLEVEL=5
      ;;
  esac
  [ -d initrd ] && pivot_root . initrd
  exec chroot . /sbin/init $RUNLEVEL
fi

# Start a shell as a last resort.
echo "Error booting from the root filesystem. Starting a shell."
exec /bin/dash

Copy the init script to the initrd folder (Assuming its filename is init.sh).

cp init.sh /tmp/initrd/init
cp init.sh /tmp/initrd/etc
chmod 775 /tmp/initrd/init

Now, use cpio and lzma to create an initramfs file. This assumes that the kernel was compiled with CONFIG_RD_LZMA option enabled.

cd /tmp/initrd
find . | cpio -H newc -o | lzma -c > ../initram.lzm

A file named initram.lzm will be created. If you want to create an old-style initrd file instead, use the mkcramfs command. This assumes your kernel has built-in cramfs support (CONFIG_CRAMFS):

mkcramfs /tmp/initrd /boot/initrd.bin

Copy the kernel and the initramfs file to your boot directory (whereever it is). I use SYSLINUX which I installed at /dev/sda1 partition. Finally, edit the boot configuration file. The following is the contents of a sample syslinux.cfg:

LABEL debian
KERNEL 314.lnx
INITRD /initrd/initram.lzm
APPEND root=/dev/sda7

LABEL sid
KERNEL 314.lnx
INITRD /initrd/initram.lzm
APPEND boot=usb label=SID edd=off vmode=800x600

LABEL bfile
KERNEL 314.lnx
INITRD /initrd/initram.lzm
APPEND boot=loop root=/dev/sda1

LABEL ram
KERNEL 314.lnx
INITRD /initrd/initram.lzm
APPEND boot=ram ramdisk_size=524288 root=/dev/sda1