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[SOLVED] rpi4 installation

Anybody have some simple instructions on how to install  armtix on raspberry pi 4? I found some generic images and suspect that  https://armtix.artixlinux.org/images/armtix-runit-20210201.tar.xz is the filesystem I need to install on an SD card. The tar contains dtbs including one labelled rpi4...

I don't see either config.txt or cmdline.txt which I see in say manjaro for arm or alarm. So I guess I need to do something to get a bootable system. It's not even obvious what file system type I should use for the card.

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #1 –
RPi4 is a complex thing. I have one, tried to work with with mainline kernel v5.8, but since USB didn't work then, i decided to keep it for future. ALARM claim USB should work with v5.10
The way i propose is approximately following: create fat partition on SD, flash u-boot and firmware on it (ALARM provide these packages in [alarm] repo), then u-boot will be kernel8 and firmware will provide config files also. After that you are able to use it as any other board with u-boot.
Once i confirm it is usable, i'll add to supported devices
ARMtix
If you need to contact me, use email

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #2 –
I "THINK" I heard kernel 5.9 fixed usb but I could be wrong. I would give 5.9 or 5.10 if available a try. I would go with 5.10 if it was available. I don't have a SBC so I can't confirm

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #3 –
Thanks; I looked at the manjaro pkgbuild for rpi https://gitlab.manjaro.org/manjaro-arm/packages/core/linux-rpi4/-/blob/master/PKGBUILD and it seems they build in a standard way (I think without uboot an explicit conflict with 'uboot-raspberrypi'). their /boot ends up with kernel8, config/cmdlibe.txt and all the dtbs in /boot/overlays like alarm. I might try overwriting the armtix /boot and see if I can get a boot. I guess I would need to keep the armtix initramfs-linux.img, but  a quick test shouldn't take more than a few tries. My experience with uboot has been painful so I prefer not to go that route.

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #4 –
So I tried the manjaro approach.

1) create 2 partitions p1 220Mb w95 (lba) vfat32 p2 29Gb linux ext4 mount as root & boot label root as ROOT_ARMTX

2) bsdtar -xpf  armtix-runit-20210201.tar.xz -C root

3) rsync -a manjaro:/boot/ boot; edit boot/cmdline.txt and change the root label from ROOT_MNJRO to ROOT_ARMTX
this copies all the manjaro boot things/dtbs and structure to our /boot etc etc

4) cp root/boot/*.img boot/  this transfers the armtix  initramfs .img files; there also an kernel8.img from manjaro in our boot,
but since manjaro also has the same initramfs file names I hope their kernel8 will use the armtix initramfs.

5) sync and umount root boot

transfer the sd card  to the rpi4; turn on its power
see a boot process with quite a few errors about unsafe mounting points eg /proc etc /var

end up with a login (no hostname); I can log in as root / armtix and there's a system with runit / runsv elogind sshd etc etc.

Any way it seems possible to adopt the standard rpi4 approach. I'm probably not clever enough to get rid of all the errors though.

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #5 –
If you boot with manjaro kernel, you should also install their modules to /lib/modules/
ARMtix
If you need to contact me, use email

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #6 –
yes you are perfectly correct. I am no expert :(

after copying those I can still boot, but I am still seeing the errors

Detected unsafe path transition / -> /xxx during canonicalization of /xxx

I tried using the armtix kernel Image by copying to kernel8 and see the penguin rather than the raspberry in the console, but still see those errors and the boot fails in a hard loop somewhere.

The root filesystem seems a bit odd eg hostname is stuck in /lib/gettext, but most things seem to work. The clock is off as I only have these running

armtix@armtix-kat gettext]$ pstree
runit---runsvdir-+-runsv---sshd---sshd---sshd---bash---pstree
                 |-runsv---dhcpcd-+-dhcpcd---dhcpcd
                 |                `-2*[dhcpcd]
                 |-6*[runsv---agetty]
                 |-runsv---udevd
                 |-runsv---elogind
                 `-runsv---dbus-daemon
[armtix@armtix-kat gettext]$ date
Thu Jan  1 00:04:17 UTC 1970
[armtix@armtix-kat gettext]$

but I guess I can wait till there's a proper setup made by real experts. Until then I grin and bear things with manjaro

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #7 –
Quote from: replabrobin – on
Detected unsafe path transition / -> /xxx during canonicalization of /xxx
These messages are related to tmpfiles/sysusers IIRC, i had them during updates too but they don't seem to affect running system
Quote from: replabrobin – on
I tried using the armtix kernel Image by copying to kernel8 and see the penguin rather than the raspberry in the console, but still see those errors and the boot fails in a hard loop somewhere.
Due to the output you've shown below it's probably some problem with peripherials rather than boot. Can't say more since i didn't run rpi4 yet.
Quote from: replabrobin – on
The root filesystem seems a bit odd eg hostname is stuck in /lib/gettext, but most things seem to work. The clock is off as I only have these running
Wdym? According to the ouput below, you have hostname set to armtix-kat, gettext is your wd. If you didn't plug RTC battery clock will always be off, you need ntpd to sync it
Quote from: replabrobin – on
armtix@armtix-kat gettext]$ pstree
runit---runsvdir-+-runsv---sshd---sshd---sshd---bash---pstree
                 |-runsv---dhcpcd-+-dhcpcd---dhcpcd
                 |                `-2*[dhcpcd]
                 |-6*[runsv---agetty]
                 |-runsv---udevd
                 |-runsv---elogind
                 `-runsv---dbus-daemon
This is proper output
ARMtix
If you need to contact me, use email

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #8 –
Quote from: phoenix_king_rus – on
Wdym? According to the ouput below, you have hostname set to armtix-kat, gettext is your wd.
Thanks for the replies; I just meant that there is no hostname executable in /usr/bin. I edited /etc/hostname to make it explicit. Not really a big deal though.

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #9 –
I googled for these errors

Detected unsafe path transition / -> /xxx during canonicalization of /xxx

and found they were due to an error in creation of the rootfs seemingly / was owned by me at creation so that caused these errors.

After faking todays date withdate -s'....' I was able to update via pacman -Syyu; I didn't know the signing keys for the armtix repos so I put SigLevel = Never in pacman.conf.

Was able to updateall except  the kernel; but I see that ther are now specific aarch64/linux-raspberrypi4-5.10.14-1-aarch64.pkg.tar.xz and linux-raspberrypi4-headers-5.10.14-1-aarch64.pkg.tar.xz rpi4 packages. They seem to follow the standard installation layout. So I will try them out.

I was able to install and start openntpd,  syslog-ng & vim etc etc. So I think I will proceed further.

Thanks to phoenix_king_rus and all the others who are assisting with armtix.

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #10 –
Quote from: replabrobin – on
and found they were due to an error in creation of the rootfs seemingly / was owned by me at creation so that caused these errors.
IIRC i got these errors with / owned by root. Anyway, it doesn't seem to break anything to me

Quote from: replabrobin – on
Was able to updateall except  the kernel; but I see that ther are now specific aarch64/linux-raspberrypi4-5.10.14-1-aarch64.pkg.tar.xz and linux-raspberrypi4-headers-5.10.14-1-aarch64.pkg.tar.xz rpi4 packages. They seem to follow the standard installation layout. So I will try them out.
In case of rpi4 kernel there is a small difference: kernel itself is installed as rpi4Image instead of kernel8.img
ARMtix
If you need to contact me, use email

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #11 –
I installed into a clean boot and find it wont boot without all the .dat, .bin & .elf files. also the rpi4Image  needs to be kernel8.img and the initramfs-linux-rpi4.img has to be initramfs-linux.img. I'm not sure where the other startup files are suposed to come from; mine came from manjaro and I suppose the kernel8 and other filenames could be baked in by them.

Anyhow I have a booting system without obvious boot errors uname -a now reports

Linux armtix-kat 5.10.14-1-ARTIX #1 SMP PREEMPT Tue Feb 9 12:10:28 MSK 2021 aarch64 GNU/Linux

great work armtix/artix people.

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #12 –
Quote from: replabrobin – on
I installed into a clean boot and find it wont boot without all the .dat, .bin & .elf files.
This is what i dislike rpi4 for. This firmware is required by their boards
Quote from: replabrobin – on
also the rpi4Image  needs to be kernel8.img and the initramfs-linux-rpi4.img has to be initramfs-linux.img. I'm not sure where the other startup files are suposed to come from
Unlike ALARM (idk about manjaro) i mark each kernel and initramfs such that they don't conflict with each other (und u-boot in case of rpi). It is up to user to create desirable config. In your case you can either rename files with each update or create config.txt pointing out the correct ones instead of default
ARMtix
If you need to contact me, use email

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #13 –
Quote from: replabrobin – on
I installed into a clean boot and find it wont boot without all the .dat, .bin & .elf files. also the rpi4Image  needs to be kernel8.img and the initramfs-linux-rpi4.img has to be initramfs-linux.img. I'm not sure where the other startup files are suposed to come from; mine came from manjaro and I suppose the kernel8 and other filenames could be baked in by them.

Anyhow I have a booting system without obvious boot errors uname -a now reports

Linux armtix-kat 5.10.14-1-ARTIX #1 SMP PREEMPT Tue Feb 9 12:10:28 MSK 2021 aarch64 GNU/Linux

great work armtix/artix people.

Hi, it would be possible to provide the final steps to get a working ARMtix? Tried to follow the original ones, but looks like something's missing, and tried to replicate your steps from the whole post, but honestly i got lost over them, so i would love to have a free-SystemD working RPi

Re: rpi4 installation

Reply #14 –
Quote from: Alionicle – on
Hi, it would be possible to provide the final steps to get a working ARMtix? Tried to follow the original ones, but looks like something's missing, and tried to replicate your steps from the whole post, but honestly i got lost over them, so i would love to have a free-SystemD working RPi
Do you have any info to debug issue? I.e., you can determine the failure step by looking at LEDs reporting board status and use serial cable to get debug messages
ARMtix
If you need to contact me, use email