What is the fromiso=… parameter, and when/how do you use it?

[Member rayluo]

Hi antiX tribe,

I came across this FAQ kind-of mentioning “fromiso” parameter: https://download.tuxfamily.org/antix/docs-antiX-17/FAQ/boot-params.html#_other_booting_options

Yes the doc did say “deprecated”, but it seems it is behavior is still there. At least, if I try to dynamically type that param with a path, the boot behavior would be different (though I ended up with a Fatal Error in my experiments). Can anyone give an example of how to use it, and when to use it? Could it possibly be used when booting from LiveUSB, and then we tell antiX to load a different ISO, potentially an ISO of other-than-antiX image, i.e. starts with antiX boot process to load a different OS?

Regards,
Ray

[Forum Admin anticapitalista]

Helpful

Up

0

::

fromiso boot ‘cheat’ allows user to directly boot the downloaded iso file.
No need to put the iso file on a disk or usb. So it saves one step.

For those with very old hardware and no usb device (or even a cd/dvd),
it is possible to download the iso, boot it and install.
This is much faster and less taxing on such old hardware.

Here is part of my grub for fromiso boot.

menuentry "antiX-19 32 ISO boot" {
     echo Boot disk address is: $root

     set iso='/antiX-19.2_386-full.iso'
     set bootparms='from=all quiet persist nocheckfs'

     search -f $iso --set=root

     echo ISO root is:          $root
     echo ISO is:               $iso
     echo Boot parms are:       $bootparms
     echo
     loopback loop $iso
     linux (loop)/antiX/vmlinuz fromiso=$iso $bootparms
     initrd (loop)/antiX/initrd.gz
     echo Booting $iso}

Hope this helps.

Philosophers have interpreted the world in many ways; the point is to change it.

antiX with runit - leaner and meaner.

[Member rayluo]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Thanks for the super quick response, AntiCapitalista! Are the grub menu required? Can this param be used “the other way around”, i.e. I copy a different OS’s ISO file into my antiX liveUSB’s Live-usb-storage folder (because the root folder “/” of the liveUSB seems not writable), and then during the antiX boot time, I dynamically type in “fromiso=/live/iso-dev/Live-usb-storage/demo/xyz.iso” and then boot into that XYZ OS? I tried but ended up with a Fatal Error. Perhaps I did not get the path right and I could give it more try, but do you know whether such direction is ever possible?

[Forum Admin anticapitalista]

Helpful

Up

0

::

@rayluo – Unfortunately I also haven’t found a way to do what you want via liveusb.
I’m sure there is a way with a bit of grub/syslinux manipulation on the live medium.
Maybe some other users have a solution.

Philosophers have interpreted the world in many ways; the point is to change it.

antiX with runit - leaner and meaner.

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

Helpful

Up

0

::

anticapitalista wrote:

@rayluo – Unfortunately I also haven’t found a way to do what you want via liveusb.
I’m sure there is a way with a bit of grub/syslinux manipulation on the live medium.
Maybe some other users have a solution.

I don’t know if this is possible from a read only live image, but if you are somehow able to remount the drive read-write, it might be possible.

The mount command does have a remount provision but I am not sure how to do it from the live device. If someone can figure it out that might be a possibility.

--
Brian Masinick

[Anonymous]

Helpful

Up

0

::

I dynamically type in “fromiso=/live/iso-dev/Live-usb-storage/demo/xyz.iso” and then boot

At that point during early boot, I reckon switch_root has not yet occurred ~~ the path you are typing does not yet exist. Try adding a boot cheat code Breakpoint 3 and browse what paths {{{ /dev/sdb1 ? }}} are recognized at that point, then revise your typed path accordingly.

[Member rayluo]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Thanks Brian and Skidoo for trying to help.

That “breakpoint=3” thing was a new toy in itself but, alas, it does not really bring me closer.

During boot, one of the previously-existing message was “Mounted boot device. Mounted device /dev/sdb1 at /live/iso-dev”, so my choice of “fromiso=/live/iso-dev/Live-usb-storage/demo/xyz.iso” seem correct. But the next line of error message is still this, and its last line seems leaving a hint here 🙂

Fatal Error
File /live/iso-file/antiX/linuxfs not found on device /dev/sdb1
     Searched devices: /dev/sdb2 /dev/sdb1 /dev/sdb /dev/sr0
       Searched types: usb,cd
    All block devices: /dev/sdb2 /dev/sdb1 /dev/sdb /dev/sr0 /dev/sda3 /dev/sda2 /dev/sda1 /dev/sda

Please contact BitJam at https://www.antixforum.com/

@bitjam ?

[Anonymous]

Helpful

Up

0

::

https://github.com/BitJam/Live-initrd/blob/master/init
init#Line1957
tracing through the functions, I can sense the problem (mountpoint + {squashfs vs iso} path)…

oldForum search (via duckduckgo): fromiso
^—v

https://antixlinux.com/forum-archive/using-plop-boot-manager-to-boot-antix-from-pendriv-t2248-s30.html#p18157
BitJam
posted: 2010-11-17

I ran into this problem a while ago and it drove me crazy for a while. The design flaw is using the /antix/antix (or /mepis/mepis) location for the squashfs file system.

The problem is that the linuxrc script inside of initrd.gz searches just about every possible partition and stops as soon as it finds /antix/antix. It mounts just about every partition searching for that file. As you’ve seen, this is fine for the LiveCD because in that case it looks at the cdroms first but it fails when using a LiveUSB if that file already exist on a hard drive partition (which is not unlikely because frugal installs can put the file there). This problem also makes it impossible to boot more than one version of Mepis or antiX from the same LiveUSB.

The solution I came up with was to use a directory structure for the LiveUSB that is different from the directory structure for the LiveCD. If the LiveUSB directories contain the OS and version number then even if it finds the wrong squashfs file system it will still work because the OS and version number should match.

Therefore I put everything under: /boot/$OS-$VERSION

For example: /boot/antiX-M8.5

The three files I put there are vmlinuz,initrd.gz, and squashfs (the squashfs file is a copy of /antix/antix from the LiveCD). The corresponding Grub entry would be:

title antiX-M8.5
kernel /boot/antiX-M8.5/vmlinuz bootdir=antiX-M8.5
initrd /boot/antiX-M8.5/initrd.gz

The bootdir parameter is saying to look for a file called: /boot/antiX-M8.5/squashfs and use that as the squashfs file system.

My antix2persist-usb.sh does all of this for you automatically. I’ve advocated that all LiveUSB scripts should use this superior directory structure but I don’t think that was done. People don’t work for me so I can’t force them to do things in a way that I think is better.

[Author]

Posts