[SOLVED] Migrating Entware to /jffs

[mad_ady]

Hello all. I have a RT-AC56U and I was wondering if there's any reason why not to move my entware installation to /jffs? I've installed the packages I need (tcpdump and knockd) and together with entware take up about 10MB. Instead of hogging my 32MB SD card I got for free with my camera, I was thinking of moving it to /jffs and adjusting the startup scripts accordingly.

I don't plan on having a lot of writes in /jffs, but apart from wear, why shouldn't I do this? Is there any reason that I can't think of?

Thanks

 

[ryzhov_al]

This is an old idea with some serious (dis)advantages.

Pro:

• Free USB port,

Contra:

• Slow and small,
  
• Drains life time of the flash memory,
• /jffs can be wiped out during upgrade,
• Custom scripts like services-start/services-stop aren't working with /jffs.

Should I use <10MB of space (on RT-N66U) when I can plug normal USB storage?

 

[mad_ady]

Slow I understand, but they are tools not in use normally. Lifetime - I take it it depends on how many writes you do to jffs, right? Reads should not matter as far as I know...
I'll have to look into services-start/services-stop, but the only problem I can see is that the scripts depend on jffs mount time so they may not execute with the same precedence as when launched from USB - but I suspect USB is mounted after JFFS, so shouldn't matter.

Thanks

 

[RMerlin]

USB thumbdrives are nearly given away for free these days. Most people have one or two unused sitting in a drawer, might as well use it with your router.

 

[mad_ady]

Sorry RMerlin - it seems I have too many devices that need USB to be properly hackable - two WDTVs, one Samsung TV and a couple of webcams . I'm looking forward to free USBs... maybe Santa can help Anyway, it pains me to see a 2GB USB drive with just 20MB used...

 

[RMerlin]

Sorry RMerlin - it seems I have too many devices that need USB to be properly hackable - two WDTVs, one Samsung TV and a couple of webcams . I'm looking forward to free USBs... maybe Santa can help Anyway, it pains me to see a 2GB USB drive with just 20MB used...

Hackable WDTV? What the heck is that?

 

[mad_ady]

Check your shelves - I'm sure you can still find it

 

[RMerlin]

Check your shelves - I'm sure you can still find it

In a drawer, actually. Same one that also has an HPG media player

My shelves are occupied by this, these days:

http://www.lostrealm.ca/temp/the-lab-20151212.jpg

 

[alienx2]

Hello all. I have a RT-AC56U and I was wondering if there's any reason why not to move my entware installation to /jffs? I've installed the packages I need (tcpdump and knockd) and together with entware take up about 10MB. Instead of hogging my 32MB SD card I got for free with my camera, I was thinking of moving it to /jffs and adjusting the startup scripts accordingly.

I don't plan on having a lot of writes in /jffs, but apart from wear, why shouldn't I do this? Is there any reason that I can't think of?

Thanks

I wish this feature can but its not possible. but Router has very small space size. JFFS partition has max 32MB only then entware need 200mb+ space. i hope in the future of Router will have microSD will be great for this entware.

 

[mad_ady]

Hmm, I guess it depends on the router. Mine has ~62M of jffs and I only need a few packages from entware - no need to install 200MB worth of packages. I'll let you guys know how it goes after I migrate it.

 

[mad_ady]

Update: Once the entware setup was done and I didn't plan on adding anything else I moved it to jffs by using rsync to preserve symlinks:

admin@arcturus:/jffs# rsync -av /tmp/mnt/Entware/entware.arm /jffs/
admin@arcturus:/jffs# sync

Next I added /jffs/init-start to mount entware at startup (the post-mount script was left intact, but its not active since the stick is missing):

admin@arcturus:/jffs/entware.arm# cat /jffs/scripts/init-start
#!/bin/sh

#Enable Entware from inside jffs

if [ -d "/jffs/entware.arm" ]
then
  ln -nsf /jffs/entware.arm /tmp/opt
fi

Sync, reboot with the stick unplugged and everything works fine! Thanks for the help!
Also, jffs is compressed, and entware is taking up less space then when on the stick, but you pay the price of decompression on the fly when using the programs. For now, I have tcpdump, knockd, rsync and mc installed. They will be programs which run infrequently so I don't mind them being a bit slower.