About optware, entware and entware-ng

[Gedeon30]

Hi everyone.

I just acquired an AC66 B1 and one of my goals is to use it as an emule downloader.

Sadly the download master solution seems a bit crappy and unstable and I'd like to give a try to another amule version, the 2.3.2 (it seems to be available under entware-ng).

And I'm a bit confused about which frameworks/libraries are already installed in the Asus original firmware and in the Merlin version, and possible incompatibilities among them.
I found a few posts but some of them seem outdated, I'm just not sure.

Not really afraid to test things and putting time, I'm just a noob in this specific context (no big issues with Linux, SSH, etc.. but new in routers) and I just don't want to "break" the basic router routines while testing.

Another question is about where to install them. I'd like to use USB storage to avoid problems with flash memory. And if there are some guide to make logs and other temp files to be located in USB instead flash could be great.

Thanks in advance!
(I sadly think this won't be my last question...)

 

[JDB]

Entware etc is only able be installed on USB media, and it doesn’t interfere with the core router functions.

Just install the latest Entware and crack on. If you’re comfortable with Linux it’s easy. The router functions are just Linux stuff anyway (iptables etc).


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Gedeon30]

Entware etc is only able be installed on USB media, and it doesn’t interfere with the core router functions.

Just install the latest Entware and crack on. If you’re comfortable with Linux it’s easy. The router functions are just Linux stuff anyway (iptables etc).


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thanks for your answer.

I'll certainly dig into it, but still a bit confused about the 2-3 frameworks installed (and running ?) in the same machine (entware, entware-ng, optware...).

 

[JDB]

You only install 1 of the frameworks, or more accurately, package managers at a time. Think of them as the same as yum or apt-get, they just point to a repo and install/update/remove packages for you easily.

Optware is the old outdated one that Asus still use, but definitely not recommended. It get's installed if you enable the Download Manager in the GUI. I believe removal is a case of formatting the USB and tidying up the JFFS scripts - there make also be a handy GUI based Uninstall, but I never bothered to even try this package manager because...

Entware is kept up to date and is certainly preferred over Optware. It recently went through a major merge to bring together the few different Entware* options that were out there. See post here http://entware.net/2018/03/01/Changelog.html

I'm pretty certain the latest Merlin firmware already has the updated entware-setup.sh script to point at this new merged version. Just put a formatted USB stick in and follow these instructions https://github.com/RMerl/asuswrt-merlin/wiki/Entware

 

[Gedeon30]

You only install 1 of the frameworks, or more accurately, package managers at a time. Think of them as the same as yum or apt-get, they just point to a repo and install/update/remove packages for you easily.

Optware is the old outdated one that Asus still use, but definitely not recommended. It get's installed if you enable the Download Manager in the GUI. I believe removal is a case of formatting the USB and tidying up the JFFS scripts - there make also be a handy GUI based Uninstall, but I never bothered to even try this package manager because...

Entware is kept up to date and is certainly preferred over Optware. It recently went through a major merge to bring together the few different Entware* options that were out there. See post here http://entware.net/2018/03/01/Changelog.html

I'm pretty certain the latest Merlin firmware already has the updated entware-setup.sh script to point at this new merged version. Just put a formatted USB stick in and follow these instructions https://github.com/RMerl/asuswrt-merlin/wiki/Entware

I see. It seems a clear route to start with.

I'll give it a try.

Thanks.