• F2FS On USB Sticks?

    From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to All on Fri Mar 21 03:04:08 2025
    I was under the impression that all devices using flash memory had some
    kind of wear-levelling logic built into their controllers. But now I hear
    that the level of sophistication of this varies. Namely, while SSDs, meant
    for running OS installations and active user filesystems, put the most
    effort into prolonging their lives, SD cards and USB sticks do not.

    So it makes sense to use some more flash-aware filesystem on the latter devices, to help reduce the wear on them as well. Looking at the Wikipedia
    list <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_file_system>, it seems like F2FS
    is the best bet.

    Anybody tried this sort of thing?

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Lawrence D'Oliveiro on Fri Mar 21 03:13:02 2025
    On 3/20/25 11:04 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
    I was under the impression that all devices using flash memory had some
    kind of wear-levelling logic built into their controllers. But now I hear that the level of sophistication of this varies. Namely, while SSDs, meant for running OS installations and active user filesystems, put the most
    effort into prolonging their lives, SD cards and USB sticks do not.

    So it makes sense to use some more flash-aware filesystem on the latter devices, to help reduce the wear on them as well. Looking at the Wikipedia list <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_file_system>, it seems like F2FS
    is the best bet.

    Anybody tried this sort of thing?

    Gparted has F2FS as a formatting option ...

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Anssi Saari@21:1/5 to Lawrence D'Oliveiro on Fri Mar 21 11:20:22 2025
    Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> writes:

    Anybody tried this sort of thing?

    I did a quick trial. My newish Sony Google/Android/whatsit TV ignored
    the f2fs stick, my Samsung phone "helpfully" offered to format the f2fs
    stick, probably to exFAT. Extra annoying as the phone uses f2fs on its
    internal storage so the support is there.

    So f2fs might be nice and all but it seems, with this experiment, that I
    can't think of a supported use case for an f2fs formatted USB stick or
    SD card.

    Did you have some use in mind?

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Anssi Saari on Fri Mar 21 07:31:32 2025
    On 3/21/25 5:20 AM, Anssi Saari wrote:
    Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> writes:

    Anybody tried this sort of thing?

    I did a quick trial. My newish Sony Google/Android/whatsit TV ignored
    the f2fs stick, my Samsung phone "helpfully" offered to format the f2fs stick, probably to exFAT. Extra annoying as the phone uses f2fs on its internal storage so the support is there.

    So f2fs might be nice and all but it seems, with this experiment, that I can't think of a supported use case for an f2fs formatted USB stick or
    SD card.

    Did you have some use in mind?

    If you want compatibility with 'devices' then you're
    kinda stuck with FAT32. USB sticks always come formatted
    that way, it's just "the standard". Yes, you CAN format
    a USB stick with most any system - I've got a few EXT4 -
    but they're not gonna work in my copy machine or anything.

    In any case, it's unclear why you would work a USB stick
    as long and hard as a disk drive. They're just not meant
    for that, you're kinda lucky if they work tomorrow. Get a
    USB adapter for an M.2 memory module and use that - but
    it still won't work in your TV if not FAT32.

    "Internet appliances" like some router/firewalls are a
    small Linux system under the cover and *sometimes* can
    cope with EXT3/EXT4 sticks, but never tried F2FS.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to Anssi Saari on Fri Mar 21 12:25:51 2025
    On 2025-03-21 10:20, Anssi Saari wrote:
    Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> writes:

    Anybody tried this sort of thing?

    I did a quick trial. My newish Sony Google/Android/whatsit TV ignored
    the f2fs stick, my Samsung phone "helpfully" offered to format the f2fs stick, probably to exFAT. Extra annoying as the phone uses f2fs on its internal storage so the support is there.

    So f2fs might be nice and all but it seems, with this experiment, that I can't think of a supported use case for an f2fs formatted USB stick or
    SD card.

    Did you have some use in mind?




    The support was removed in my distro (openSUSE) because the specs
    changed on every release of the distro, and a stick formatted one year
    would be unreadable the next year or something of the sort.

    I see the sources in the kernel, but not compiled.

    Telcontar:~ # grep -i f2fs /etc/filesystems
    Telcontar:~ #

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to All on Fri Mar 21 13:20:32 2025
    On 2025-03-21 12:31, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/21/25 5:20 AM, Anssi Saari wrote:
    Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> writes:


      If you want compatibility with 'devices' then you're
      kinda stuck with FAT32. USB sticks always come formatted
      that way, it's just "the standard".

    I think I bought one memory card that came in exFAT. Can't be 100% sure, maybe it was the camera that formatted it that way.

    I saved a compressed image of the original card, so I can find out.

    cer@Telcontar:/data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB> file image
    image: DOS/MBR boot sector MS-MBR XP english at offset 0x12c "Invalid partition table" at offset 0x144 "Error loading operating system" at offset 0x163 "Missing operating system", disk signature 0x59f161dc; partition 1 : ID=0xc, start-CHS (0x0,63,1), end-
    CHS (0xe2,16,1), startsector 8064, 121137280 sectors


    Ok, so it has a partition table. Long time I don't do this...

    Telcontar:/data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB # mount -o ro,loop=/dev/loop0 image mnt/
    mount: mnt/: failed to setup loop device for /data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB/image.


    Huh. This is new. :-?


    Telcontar:/data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB # fdisk -l image
    Disk image: 57,77 GiB, 62026416128 bytes, 121145344 sectors
    Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
    Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
    I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
    Disklabel type: dos
    Disk identifier: 0x59f161dc

    Device Boot Start End Sectors Size Id Type
    image1 8064 121145343 121137280 57,8G c W95 FAT32 (LBA) Telcontar:/data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB #


    Trying gparted... it says fat32. Ok, doubt solved :-)


    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Fri Mar 21 19:01:54 2025
    On 21/03/2025 07:13, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/20/25 11:04 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
    I was under the impression that all devices using flash memory had some
    kind of wear-levelling logic built into their controllers. But now I hear
    that the level of sophistication of this varies. Namely, while SSDs,
    meant
    for running OS installations and active user filesystems, put the most
    effort into prolonging their lives, SD cards and USB sticks do not.

    So it makes sense to use some more flash-aware filesystem on the latter
    devices, to help reduce the wear on them as well. Looking at the
    Wikipedia
    list <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_file_system>, it seems like
    F2FS
    is the best bet.

    Anybody tried this sort of thing?

      Gparted has F2FS as a formatting option ...


    I think you are chasing Unicorns here.

    SD cards and thumb drives are designed as limited usage cheap storage,
    and no amount of faffing around with filesystems is going to change
    that. At some stage no matter what file system is in operation data
    needs to be (over) written and blocks need to be erased to do it.

    Professional level SSDs are designed to adapt the writes to extract the
    best out of a limited block erase life, and that's that, and you pay for
    that by using a more conservative memory cell design and hanging a lot
    of smarts in front of it.

    Since there is no 1:1 correlation between the sector you think you are
    writing to, and the actual physical RAM on even a thumbdrive, there is
    nothing you can do at the operating system level other than caching your
    writes and doing them in single big chunks in the hope that some of them
    end up in the same erase page, and using the DISCARD function.

    If you want better life, buy a better SSD. And a much bigger one than
    you need. If you are reading and writing 100Mbytre of data regularly,
    using 100Gbyte drive will lessen the erase stress on each block by 1000.

    And if you must use an SDcard or thumb drive, do what I did. Take your
    linux and move everything that doesn't need to be persistent, like most logging, and any temporary files onto a ram drive. And turn off swap.

    You can monitor I/O. It should be zero IO onto the SD card

    If you have so much moving data that it overflows the ram or needs to
    persist between reboots, use a pukka SSD.


    --
    "And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch".

    Gospel of St. Mathew 15:14

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Fri Mar 21 19:06:01 2025
    On 21/03/2025 11:31, c186282 wrote:
    "Internet appliances" like some router/firewalls are a
      small Linux system under the cover and *sometimes* can
      cope with EXT3/EXT4 sticks, but never tried F2FS.

    My home Pi's run off SD cards but never in normal use write to them AT ALL. There is a series of configuration you can do that moves logging to
    RAMdisk and any temporary files to RAMdisk as well - and you turn swap off.

    For small applications that is a perfect way to have access to Linux,
    but not go to the expense of a proper SSD

    --
    In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
    In practice, there is.
    -- Yogi Berra

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Fri Mar 21 19:11:40 2025
    On 21/03/2025 12:20, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    On 2025-03-21 12:31, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/21/25 5:20 AM, Anssi Saari wrote:
    Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> writes:


       If you want compatibility with 'devices' then you're
       kinda stuck with FAT32. USB sticks always come formatted
       that way, it's just "the standard".

    I think I bought one memory card that came in exFAT. Can't be 100% sure, maybe it was the camera that formatted it that way.

    Since I am almost 100% linux here mine tend to be re-formatted to EXT4.
    The ones that go in other kit - like my car - of course are FAT32. Its horrible, but that is the way of the world.

    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in IIRC
    VFAT and EXT4

    Frankly I hate the bloody things. I use them as little as possible, My
    camera has something in it but it talks via USB to the computer so I
    have no idea what format it actually is
    Ditto my mobile phone


    --
    "If you don’t read the news paper, you are un-informed. If you read the
    news paper, you are mis-informed."

    Mark Twain

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Richard Kettlewell@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Fri Mar 21 19:40:06 2025
    The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> writes:
    On 21/03/2025 07:13, c186282 wrote:
      Gparted has F2FS as a formatting option ...

    https://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~jhe/eurosys17-he.pdf is worth a look.

    I think you are chasing Unicorns here.

    SD cards and thumb drives are designed as limited usage cheap storage,
    and no amount of faffing around with filesystems is going to change
    that. At some stage no matter what file system is in operation data
    needs to be (over) written and blocks need to be erased to do it.

    You can buy high-endurance devices, aimed at industrial use cases,
    dashcams, etc, if you’re prepared to pay for them.

    Professional level SSDs are designed to adapt the writes to extract
    the best out of a limited block erase life, and that's that, and you
    pay for that by using a more conservative memory cell design and
    hanging a lot of smarts in front of it.

    Since there is no 1:1 correlation between the sector you think you are writing to, and the actual physical RAM on even a thumbdrive, there is nothing you can do at the operating system level other than caching
    your writes and doing them in single big chunks in the hope that some
    of them end up in the same erase page, and using the DISCARD function.

    For cheap devices agreed. Keep spare in stock, you’ll probably need it.

    --
    https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From D@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Fri Mar 21 22:08:25 2025
    This message is in MIME format. The first part should be readable text,
    while the remaining parts are likely unreadable without MIME-aware tools.

    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 21/03/2025 11:31, c186282 wrote:
    "Internet appliances" like some router/firewalls are a
      small Linux system under the cover and *sometimes* can
      cope with EXT3/EXT4 sticks, but never tried F2FS.

    My home Pi's run off SD cards but never in normal use write to them AT ALL. There is a series of configuration you can do that moves logging to RAMdisk and any temporary files to RAMdisk as well - and you turn swap off.

    For small applications that is a perfect way to have access to Linux, but not go to the expense of a proper SSD

    This is the truth! I do the same thing, and they happily chug along for
    years.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Fri Mar 21 20:28:14 2025
    On 3/21/25 8:20 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    On 2025-03-21 12:31, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/21/25 5:20 AM, Anssi Saari wrote:
    Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> writes:


       If you want compatibility with 'devices' then you're
       kinda stuck with FAT32. USB sticks always come formatted
       that way, it's just "the standard".

    I think I bought one memory card that came in exFAT. Can't be 100% sure, maybe it was the camera that formatted it that way.

    I saved a compressed image of the original card, so I can find out.

    These days, esp for video/image stuff, FAT32 just can't
    handle the file sizes. ExFAT is kinda of the in-between
    system, more than F32, less complex than NTFS. I'm still
    kinda surprised your camera could use it. However your
    camz aren't gonna do EXT4 or ZFS, or F2FS. M$ just
    kinda rules. Haven't even seen Apple systems used on
    things like USB sticks.

    cer@Telcontar:/data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 -
    64GB> file image
    image: DOS/MBR boot sector MS-MBR XP english at offset 0x12c "Invalid partition table" at offset 0x144 "Error loading operating system" at
    offset 0x163 "Missing operating system", disk signature 0x59f161dc;
    partition 1 : ID=0xc, start-CHS (0x0,63,1), end-CHS (0xe2,16,1),
    startsector 8064, 121137280 sectors


    Ok, so it has a partition table. Long time I don't do this...

    Telcontar:/data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB # mount  -o ro,loop=/dev/loop0 image mnt/
    mount: mnt/: failed to setup loop device for /data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB/image.


    Huh. This is new. :-?


    Telcontar:/data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB #
    fdisk -l image
    Disk image: 57,77 GiB, 62026416128 bytes, 121145344 sectors
    Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
    Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
    I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
    Disklabel type: dos
    Disk identifier: 0x59f161dc

    Device     Boot Start       End   Sectors  Size Id Type image1           8064 121145343 121137280 57,8G  c W95 FAT32 (LBA) Telcontar:/data/storage_b/copias_usb_sticks/vacios/EMTEC C410 - 64GB #


    Trying gparted... it says fat32. Ok, doubt solved :-)

    Gparted is good. The CL utilities throw in too
    much garbage, hard to tell what you have.

    In any case, looks like something doesn't love
    your mem stick.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to All on Fri Mar 21 20:54:02 2025
    On 3/21/25 5:08 PM, D wrote:


    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 21/03/2025 11:31, c186282 wrote:
    "Internet appliances" like some router/firewalls are a
       small Linux system under the cover and *sometimes* can
       cope with EXT3/EXT4 sticks, but never tried F2FS.

    My home Pi's run off SD cards but never in normal use write to them AT
    ALL.
    There is a series of configuration you can do that moves logging to
    RAMdisk and any temporary files to RAMdisk as well - and you turn swap
    off.

    For small applications that is a perfect way to have access to Linux,
    but not go to the expense of a proper SSD

    This is the truth! I do the same thing, and they happily chug along for years.

    Had one running a decade that way - old Pi, the one with
    fewer GPIO pins - did it's one little job so quietly I
    forgot it was there. Anyway, for most Pi uses what you
    describe is probably the ideal setup.

    And with modern RAM capacities, swap should never be
    needed.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sat Mar 22 00:41:01 2025
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in IIRC
    VFAT and EXT4

    That may be inherited from Debian. vfat is used for /boot/firmware or / boot/efi for UEFI compatibility.

    fwiw when it's mounted the Pico 2 shows as vfat. I assume the Pico does
    also but the two I have hooked up are running so don't show as a mount.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Computer Nerd Kev@21:1/5 to c186282@nnada.net on Sat Mar 22 11:47:33 2025
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    Had one running a decade that way - old Pi, the one with
    fewer GPIO pins - did it's one little job so quietly I
    forgot it was there. Anyway, for most Pi uses what you
    describe is probably the ideal setup.

    And with modern RAM capacities, swap should never be
    needed.

    That depends, the Pi Zeros still have only 512MB and anyway it
    depends what you're trying to do. Compressed swap in RAM is a good
    alternative to a swap file/partition on such hardware, albeit
    mainly as a safety net to avoid crashes rather than something to
    rely on often.

    --
    __ __
    #_ < |\| |< _#

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Computer Nerd Kev@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sat Mar 22 11:42:20 2025
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in IIRC
    VFAT and EXT4

    That may be inherited from Debian. vfat is used for /boot/firmware or / boot/efi for UEFI compatibility.

    Not from Debian, but for the same reason that like UEFI, the RPi
    firmware only has drivers for FAT (FAT32, or FAT16 works too,
    I'm not sure if any new ones support exFAT).

    To run in a tmpfs, I set up Linux on a FAT partition on an SD
    card. No need for a separate EXT* partition if you're not mounting
    any as / anyway.

    --
    __ __
    #_ < |\| |< _#

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to Computer Nerd Kev on Sat Mar 22 07:07:49 2025
    On 22 Mar 2025 11:42:20 +1000, Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

    Not from Debian, but for the same reason that like UEFI, the RPi
    firmware only has drivers for FAT (FAT32, or FAT16 works too, I'm not
    sure if any new ones support exFAT).

    Raspberry Pi OS on the RPi5 uses ext4 except for /boot/firmware. (and the various tmpfs)

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sat Mar 22 04:38:40 2025
    On 3/21/25 8:41 PM, rbowman wrote:
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in IIRC
    VFAT and EXT4

    That may be inherited from Debian. vfat is used for /boot/firmware or / boot/efi for UEFI compatibility.

    fwiw when it's mounted the Pico 2 shows as vfat. I assume the Pico does also but the two I have hooked up are running so don't show as a mount.

    At present, every Linux I've used, the UEFI stuff is
    ALWAYS in a FAT partition. However it's SMALL, not
    a prob.

    Don't love UEFI at all ... but these days it's harder
    and harder to NOT have that partition.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Computer Nerd Kev on Sat Mar 22 04:47:56 2025
    On 3/21/25 9:47 PM, Computer Nerd Kev wrote:
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    Had one running a decade that way - old Pi, the one with
    fewer GPIO pins - did it's one little job so quietly I
    forgot it was there. Anyway, for most Pi uses what you
    describe is probably the ideal setup.

    And with modern RAM capacities, swap should never be
    needed.

    That depends, the Pi Zeros still have only 512MB and anyway it
    depends what you're trying to do. Compressed swap in RAM is a good alternative to a swap file/partition on such hardware, albeit
    mainly as a safety net to avoid crashes rather than something to
    rely on often.

    512mb is *huge* compared to The Old Days.

    My first IBM-PC had, with added memory card, 512 KILObytes.
    You had to put all the little chippies into the board by
    yourself ... NOT bending the contact legs ......

    However 2-4gb is most common now.

    Zero's ARE kinda 'special purpose' however ... kinda
    aimed at being the middle point between microcontrollers
    and 'real computers'. It's a valid niche.

    But, stick to the niche - if you NEED swap space then
    you're going above and beyond. Compu-Ozempic is required.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to c186282@nnada.net on Sat Mar 22 11:21:23 2025
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    At present, every Linux I've used, the UEFI stuff is
    ALWAYS in a FAT partition. However it's SMALL, not
    a prob.

    Since you can put live and rescue images in the UEFI partition, I
    usually make it 2 Gig or so. That's not SMALL.

    Don't love UEFI at all

    You should! It's neat.

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sat Mar 22 14:07:58 2025
    On 2025-03-22 11:21, Marc Haber wrote:
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    At present, every Linux I've used, the UEFI stuff is
    ALWAYS in a FAT partition. However it's SMALL, not
    a prob.

    It uses FAT because that is in the UEFI specs. The firmware reads that
    FAT, you do not want to support all the filesystems in the universe, and
    make the firmware huge and add more bugs.

    Since you can put live and rescue images in the UEFI partition, I
    usually make it 2 Gig or so. That's not SMALL.

    That's interesting.

    Do you have a link on info on that?



    Don't love UEFI at all

    You should! It's neat.

    Yep.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

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    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sat Mar 22 14:04:14 2025
    On 2025-03-21 20:11, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
     Frankly I hate the bloody things. I use them as little as possible, My camera has something in it but it talks via USB to the computer so I
    have no idea what format it actually is
    Ditto my mobile phone

    Yes, my camera talks via USB to the computer, but it is slower than
    directly connecting the card, and uses battery. Linux is very good at
    handling different filesystems.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sat Mar 22 14:17:25 2025
    On 2025-03-21 20:01, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    Since there is no 1:1 correlation between the sector you think you are writing to, and the actual physical RAM on even a thumbdrive, there is nothing you can do at the operating system level other than caching your writes and doing them in single big chunks in the hope that some of them
    end up in the same erase page, and using the DISCARD function.

    I read somewhere, long ago, that sticks and memory cards were actually optimized for FAT, by having the pages under the start of the disk significantly smaller. Ie, optimized for having more writes in the FAT area.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sat Mar 22 13:35:54 2025
    On 22/03/2025 00:41, rbowman wrote:
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in IIRC
    VFAT and EXT4

    That may be inherited from Debian. vfat is used for /boot/firmware or / boot/efi for UEFI compatibility.

    fwiw when it's mounted the Pico 2 shows as vfat. I assume the Pico does also but the two I have hooked up are running so don't show as a mount.

    The PICO has no filesystem. IN use you hold a button down while powering
    up and it's Flash presents itself as a USB drive. You copy a special
    binary file of compiled code onto that 'drive', and it reboots and runs it..

    Free flash ram is available for program use as well, but its fairly
    tricky to use it - its read a sector. erase a block write a block level primitives

    In practice, you don't normally do that - most code is simple and uses DRAM.


    --
    "Corbyn talks about equality, justice, opportunity, health care, peace, community, compassion, investment, security, housing...."
    "What kind of person is not interested in those things?"

    "Jeremy Corbyn?"

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to Computer Nerd Kev on Sat Mar 22 13:37:52 2025
    On 22/03/2025 01:42, Computer Nerd Kev wrote:
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in IIRC >>> VFAT and EXT4

    That may be inherited from Debian. vfat is used for /boot/firmware or /
    boot/efi for UEFI compatibility.

    Not from Debian, but for the same reason that like UEFI, the RPi
    firmware only has drivers for FAT (FAT32, or FAT16 works too,
    I'm not sure if any new ones support exFAT).

    To run in a tmpfs, I set up Linux on a FAT partition on an SD
    card. No need for a separate EXT* partition if you're not mounting
    any as / anyway.

    Then what are you mounting as / ?
    I don't understand Linux needs a root filesystem that accepts linux permissions, VFAT does not

    --
    Climate is what you expect but weather is what you get.
    Mark Twain

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Sat Mar 22 13:39:38 2025
    On 22/03/2025 08:38, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/21/25 8:41 PM, rbowman wrote:
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in IIRC >>> VFAT and EXT4

    That may be inherited from Debian.  vfat is used for /boot/firmware or /
    boot/efi for UEFI compatibility.

    fwiw when it's mounted the Pico 2 shows as  vfat.  I assume the Pico does >> also but the two I have hooked up are running so don't show as a mount.

      At present, every Linux I've used, the UEFI stuff is
      ALWAYS in a FAT partition. However it's SMALL, not
      a prob.

      Don't love UEFI at all ... but these days it's harder
      and harder to NOT have that partition.
    Sad but true. I am sure its all frightfully necessary, but for home use
    you just want to boot the bloody computer, not have to go through all
    that rigmarole.
    IN a way getting a PI to boot is actually simpler...


    --
    Climate is what you expect but weather is what you get.
    Mark Twain

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Sat Mar 22 13:45:28 2025
    On 22/03/2025 00:54, c186282 wrote:
    .

      And with modern RAM capacities, swap should never be
      needed.

    Well that is entirely a function of what you are trying to run and how
    much RAM you bought.

    3GB of Windows VM plus a python application (god python seems to waste
    memory) plus a browser with 5 tabs open started swapping on a n 8Gbyte machine., Its now 24 and all is well.

    A Pi Zero only has 512MByte

    X-windows isn't even going to get out of bed with that.



    --
    “A leader is best When people barely know he exists. Of a good leader,
    who talks little,When his work is done, his aim fulfilled,They will say,
    “We did this ourselves.”

    ― Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Sat Mar 22 13:49:07 2025
    On 22/03/2025 08:47, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/21/25 9:47 PM, Computer Nerd Kev wrote:
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
       Had one running a decade that way - old Pi, the one with
       fewer GPIO pins - did it's one little job so quietly I
       forgot it was there. Anyway, for most Pi uses what you
       describe is probably the ideal setup.

       And with modern RAM capacities, swap should never be
       needed.

    That depends, the Pi Zeros still have only 512MB and anyway it
    depends what you're trying to do. Compressed swap in RAM is a good
    alternative to a swap file/partition on such hardware, albeit
    mainly as a safety net to avoid crashes rather than something to
    rely on often.

      512mb is *huge* compared to The Old Days.

      My first IBM-PC had, with added memory card, 512 KILObytes.
      You had to put all the little chippies into the board by
      yourself ... NOT bending the contact legs ......

      However 2-4gb is most common now.

      Zero's ARE kinda 'special purpose' however ... kinda
      aimed at being the middle point between microcontrollers
      and 'real computers'. It's a valid niche.

      But, stick to the niche - if you NEED swap space then
      you're going above and beyond. Compu-Ozempic is required.

    +1. I wanted a headless server that would run linux, multitask, drive
    some hardware, run a small web server and connect to my network

    Pi Zero W was perfect

    If you don't need the multitask a pico will do the job. Yeah you CAN
    multitask it, but is a lot of hassle compared with just booting linux on
    a zero


    --
    For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and
    wrong.

    H.L.Mencken

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Sat Mar 22 13:50:19 2025
    On 22/03/2025 13:04, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    On 2025-03-21 20:11, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
      Frankly I hate the bloody things. I use them as little as possible,
    My camera has something in it but it talks via USB to the computer so
    I have no idea what format it actually is
    Ditto my mobile phone

    Yes, my camera talks via USB to the computer, but it is slower than
    directly connecting the card, and uses battery. Linux is very good at handling different filesystems.

    Agreed on all points, but pulling the SD card out of the camera is not something I care to do and I don't have a reader for that format card

    --
    For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and
    wrong.

    H.L.Mencken

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sat Mar 22 15:26:55 2025
    On 2025-03-22 14:39, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 22/03/2025 08:38, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/21/25 8:41 PM, rbowman wrote:
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in
    IIRC
    VFAT and EXT4

    That may be inherited from Debian.  vfat is used for /boot/firmware or / >>> boot/efi for UEFI compatibility.

    fwiw when it's mounted the Pico 2 shows as  vfat.  I assume the Pico
    does
    also but the two I have hooked up are running so don't show as a mount.

       At present, every Linux I've used, the UEFI stuff is
       ALWAYS in a FAT partition. However it's SMALL, not
       a prob.

       Don't love UEFI at all ... but these days it's harder
       and harder to NOT have that partition.
    Sad but true. I am sure its all frightfully necessary, but for home use
    you just want to boot the bloody computer, not have to go through all
    that rigmarole.

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk;
    UEFI has made this easier.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Sat Mar 22 17:29:12 2025
    "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
    On 2025-03-22 11:21, Marc Haber wrote:
    Since you can put live and rescue images in the UEFI partition, I
    usually make it 2 Gig or so. That's not SMALL.

    That's interesting.

    Do you have a link on info on that?

    You can boot live images via grub, so boot grub via UEFI and point it
    towards the iso that also resides on the UEFI partition. The
    grml-rescueboot package on Debian-based systems might give some hints.

    Don't love UEFI at all

    You should! It's neat.

    Yep.

    I am positively impressed every time my fwupdmgr puts a Firmware
    update on the UEFI partition and the next system boot will
    transparently install it. From a Linux OS!

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Sat Mar 22 17:47:56 2025
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 04:38:40 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    At present, every Linux I've used, the UEFI stuff is ALWAYS in a FAT
    partition. However it's SMALL, not a prob.

    Yes, it's /boot and usually under 1 GB.

    Don't love UEFI at all ... but these days it's harder and harder to
    NOT have that partition.

    The Fedora box was pre-UEFI. /boot is ext4 and the rest of the SSD is
    btrfs. It had OpenSUSE 13.2 previously which used btrfs for /boot by
    default. The machine would not start until I selected ext4. At the time
    there grub2 couldn't handle btrfs. I don't know if Fedora is playing it
    safe.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sat Mar 22 19:02:23 2025
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk;
    UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot
    in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros >caught up.

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA. Thankfully we have Virtualization now which has Dual Boot mostly obsolete.

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Sat Mar 22 17:52:41 2025
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk;
    UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot
    in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros caught up.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sat Mar 22 19:09:50 2025
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 13:35:54 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    The PICO has no filesystem. IN use you hold a button down while powering
    up and it's Flash presents itself as a USB drive. You copy a special
    binary file of compiled code onto that 'drive', and it reboots and runs
    it..

    Okay, you hold down BOOTSEL when plugging it into the USB. Then it shows
    up on Files as RP2350. If you click on that you see INDEX.HTM and INFO_UF2.TXT. If you look at Properties it reports 2 items totaling 305
    bytes and 134.1 MB free.

    df -Th /dev/sda1
    Filesystem Type Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1 vfat 128M 8.0K 128M 1% /media/xxxxx/RP2350

    Then you can

    cp blink.uf2 /media/xxxxx/RP2350/

    and, lo and behold, it starts blinking and vanishes from the file system!
    I'm lazy so after it blinks 20 times it calls

    reset_usb_boot(0, 0);

    and miraculously reappears mounted. How does it do all this without a
    file system known to Ubuntu? I won't even ask why after copying the CircuitPython uf2 it reboots mounted as CIRCUITPYTHON and you can copy .py files directly.

    My comment had nothing to do with the programmatic use of the flash
    memory, only how the Pico presents as a mass storage device.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sat Mar 22 20:39:58 2025
    On 2025-03-22 18:52, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk;
    UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot
    in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros caught up.

    Define "fine".

    Like buying a machine and all 4 primaries are in use?

    Secure boot is a different beast.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sat Mar 22 20:41:26 2025
    On 2025-03-22 18:47, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 04:38:40 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    At present, every Linux I've used, the UEFI stuff is ALWAYS in a FAT
    partition. However it's SMALL, not a prob.

    Yes, it's /boot and usually under 1 GB.

    Don't love UEFI at all ... but these days it's harder and harder to
    NOT have that partition.

    The Fedora box was pre-UEFI. /boot is ext4 and the rest of the SSD is
    btrfs. It had OpenSUSE 13.2 previously which used btrfs for /boot by default. The machine would not start until I selected ext4. At the time
    there grub2 couldn't handle btrfs. I don't know if Fedora is playing it
    safe.

    With a separate /boot the trick to boot a previous snapshot after a
    failed update does not work.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sat Mar 22 20:37:44 2025
    On 2025-03-22 17:29, Marc Haber wrote:
    "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
    On 2025-03-22 11:21, Marc Haber wrote:
    Since you can put live and rescue images in the UEFI partition, I
    usually make it 2 Gig or so. That's not SMALL.

    That's interesting.

    Do you have a link on info on that?

    You can boot live images via grub, so boot grub via UEFI and point it
    towards the iso that also resides on the UEFI partition. The
    grml-rescueboot package on Debian-based systems might give some hints.

    Ah. So not directly from uefi. Not much use when it is grub which is
    failing.


    Don't love UEFI at all

    You should! It's neat.

    Yep.

    I am positively impressed every time my fwupdmgr puts a Firmware
    update on the UEFI partition and the next system boot will
    transparently install it. From a Linux OS!

    I have not done that.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Anssi Saari@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sat Mar 22 23:28:35 2025
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> writes:

    You can boot live images via grub, so boot grub via UEFI and point it
    towards the iso that also resides on the UEFI partition. The
    grml-rescueboot package on Debian-based systems might give some hints.

    But why the EFI partition? Grub can boot images from any partition. I
    keep my collection of GRML images on a largish stuff partition on an HD
    and the grml-rescueboot adds those to the grub menu.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Anssi Saari@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sat Mar 22 23:35:14 2025
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> writes:

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA.

    I've usually had two or more OSes on my main PC, since from around 1995
    or so. Hasn't been unstable, fragile or PITA. Virtualization isn't a
    solution for my current use case of having Windows for games, Arch Linux
    for seeing how new Linux stuff runs and looks like on my HW and Debian
    for everything else.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Computer Nerd Kev@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sun Mar 23 07:49:11 2025
    The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> wrote:
    On 22/03/2025 01:42, Computer Nerd Kev wrote:
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    My other usage is Raspberry Pi SD cards which are two partitions in IIRC >>>> VFAT and EXT4

    That may be inherited from Debian. vfat is used for /boot/firmware or / >>> boot/efi for UEFI compatibility.

    Not from Debian, but for the same reason that like UEFI, the RPi
    firmware only has drivers for FAT (FAT32, or FAT16 works too,
    I'm not sure if any new ones support exFAT).

    To run in a tmpfs, I set up Linux on a FAT partition on an SD
    card. No need for a separate EXT* partition if you're not mounting
    any as / anyway.

    Then what are you mounting as / ?

    The tmpfs.

    I don't understand Linux needs a root filesystem that accepts linux permissions, VFAT does not

    Yes, but it can hold a file containing the filesystem data which is
    unpacked into RAM during start-up. In fact this is common behaviour
    with initrd unpacked to RAM during kernel initialisation and
    mounted as /, after which the kernel can set up the partition it
    wants to use as / and chroot to that. That second partition can be
    an ext4 filesystem such as RPi OS uses, or it can be a tmpfs or
    ramdisk with contents unpacked from an archive on the FAT FS into
    RAM by the init script in the initrd. Or / can even just stay in
    the initrd forever (which is what happens in most distros if the
    latter steps fail).

    So a Linux file system is really optional. The only FS you _need_
    for booting on RPi or UEFI is FAT, because that's what the firmware
    can load the Linux kernel from.

    --
    __ __
    #_ < |\| |< _#

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Computer Nerd Kev@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sun Mar 23 07:55:06 2025
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> wrote:
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk; >>> UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot
    in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros >>caught up.

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA.

    The only thing that made it unstable for me was when distros
    switched to Grub 2. So I started throwing that away in favour of SysLinux/ExtLinux and things have been easy again.

    --
    __ __
    #_ < |\| |< _#

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Computer Nerd Kev@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sun Mar 23 07:59:47 2025
    The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> wrote:
    A Pi Zero only has 512MByte

    X-windows isn't even going to get out of bed with that.

    X runs very well on a Pi Zero if you use the old, less bloated,
    versions. The newer versions will still at least get out of bed.
    I'm running X on PC with 80MB RAM right now.

    --
    __ __
    #_ < |\| |< _#

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to Anssi Saari on Sat Mar 22 23:25:16 2025
    On 2025-03-22 22:28, Anssi Saari wrote:
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> writes:

    You can boot live images via grub, so boot grub via UEFI and point it
    towards the iso that also resides on the UEFI partition. The
    grml-rescueboot package on Debian-based systems might give some hints.

    But why the EFI partition? Grub can boot images from any partition. I
    keep my collection of GRML images on a largish stuff partition on an HD
    and the grml-rescueboot adds those to the grub menu.

    Grub can, but the firmware can not.


    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sat Mar 22 22:59:11 2025
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 19:02:23 +0100, Marc Haber wrote:

    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same
    disk;
    UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot
    in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux
    distros caught up.

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA. Thankfully we have Virtualization now which has Dual Boot mostly obsolete.

    With the caveat that Windows seldom sees the light of day after installing Linux I haven't had problems with dual boot beyond the initial setup.
    Defraging Windows was the biggest problem.

    It's been a while though. I have access to Windows boxes so there is no
    reason to bother. "Use the whole disk?" "You betcha!"

    The Windows boxes all have a WSL instance anyway.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sun Mar 23 00:46:31 2025
    On 22/03/2025 18:02, Marc Haber wrote:
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk; >>> UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot
    in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros
    caught up.

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA. Thankfully we have Virtualization now which has Dual Boot mostly obsolete.

    Greetings
    Marc
    +1.

    --
    In a Time of Universal Deceit, Telling the Truth Is a Revolutionary Act.

    - George Orwell

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sun Mar 23 00:52:00 2025
    On 22/03/2025 19:09, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 13:35:54 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    The PICO has no filesystem. IN use you hold a button down while powering
    up and it's Flash presents itself as a USB drive. You copy a special
    binary file of compiled code onto that 'drive', and it reboots and runs
    it..

    Okay, you hold down BOOTSEL when plugging it into the USB. Then it shows
    up on Files as RP2350. If you click on that you see INDEX.HTM and INFO_UF2.TXT. If you look at Properties it reports 2 items totaling 305
    bytes and 134.1 MB free.

    df -Th /dev/sda1
    Filesystem Type Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1 vfat 128M 8.0K 128M 1% /media/xxxxx/RP2350

    Then you can

    cp blink.uf2 /media/xxxxx/RP2350/

    and, lo and behold, it starts blinking and vanishes from the file system!
    I'm lazy so after it blinks 20 times it calls

    reset_usb_boot(0, 0);

    and miraculously reappears mounted. How does it do all this without a
    file system known to Ubuntu? I won't even ask why after copying the CircuitPython uf2 it reboots mounted as CIRCUITPYTHON and you can copy .py files directly.

    My comment had nothing to do with the programmatic use of the flash
    memory, only how the Pico presents as a mass storage device.

    Well it spoofs the disk obviously
    --
    “It is not the truth of Marxism that explains the willingness of intellectuals to believe it, but the power that it confers on
    intellectuals, in their attempts to control the world. And since...it is
    futile to reason someone out of a thing that he was not reasoned into,
    we can conclude that Marxism owes its remarkable power to survive every criticism to the fact that it is not a truth-directed but a
    power-directed system of thought.”
    Sir Roger Scruton

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to Anssi Saari on Sun Mar 23 08:28:00 2025
    Anssi Saari <anssi.saari@usenet.mail.kapsi.fi> wrote:
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> writes:
    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA.

    I've usually had two or more OSes on my main PC, since from around 1995
    or so. Hasn't been unstable, fragile or PITA.

    Then you're lucky. To be able to fix a broken dualboot you need
    intimate knowlegde of all platforms. Most people don't have that.

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Sun Mar 23 08:25:04 2025
    "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
    On 2025-03-22 17:29, Marc Haber wrote:
    You can boot live images via grub, so boot grub via UEFI and point it
    towards the iso that also resides on the UEFI partition. The
    grml-rescueboot package on Debian-based systems might give some hints.

    Ah. So not directly from uefi. Not much use when it is grub which is
    failing.

    UEFI grub usually doesn't fail. It a least gets you to a shell. And
    you can have a second grub for the rescue image.

    Don't love UEFI at all

    You should! It's neat.

    Yep.

    I am positively impressed every time my fwupdmgr puts a Firmware
    update on the UEFI partition and the next system boot will
    transparently install it. From a Linux OS!

    I have not done that.

    Just install fwupd and see it working automagically.

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to Anssi Saari on Sun Mar 23 08:26:40 2025
    Anssi Saari <anssi.saari@usenet.mail.kapsi.fi> wrote:
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> writes:
    You can boot live images via grub, so boot grub via UEFI and point it
    towards the iso that also resides on the UEFI partition. The
    grml-rescueboot package on Debian-based systems might give some hints.

    But why the EFI partition?

    Doesnt need anything else. If the EFI partition is broken you're hosed
    anyway, you couldn't boot a rescue image then anyway. Having rescue
    system on a different filesystem means another filesystem that needs
    to be okay to be able to boot to rescue, and another filesystem that
    can fill up and cause trouble.

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to Computer Nerd Kev on Sun Mar 23 08:28:45 2025
    not@telling.you.invalid (Computer Nerd Kev) wrote:
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> wrote:
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk; >>>> UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot >>>in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros >>>caught up.

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA.

    The only thing that made it unstable for me was when distros
    switched to Grub 2. So I started throwing that away in favour of >SysLinux/ExtLinux and things have been easy again.

    I consider that an exceptionally bad idea and I am not going to engage
    in this discussion today.

    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Sun Mar 23 05:57:02 2025
    On 3/22/25 3:39 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    On 2025-03-22 18:52, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk; >>> UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot
    in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros
    caught up.

    Define "fine".

    Like buying a machine and all 4 primaries are in use?

    Secure boot is a different beast.

    One of my major gripes with UEFI is that M$
    loved it SO much. As such I suspect evil in
    there somewhere. It also just COMPLICATES
    boots yet another level.

    UEFI parts CAN be used for essentially image
    backups ... but I've never done that, maybe
    never will.

    The super-simple straight-up CP/M & DOS booting
    is something to aim for. Do whatever tricks
    AFTERWARDS.

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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Anssi Saari on Sun Mar 23 05:58:16 2025
    On 3/22/25 5:35 PM, Anssi Saari wrote:
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> writes:

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA.

    I've usually had two or more OSes on my main PC, since from around 1995
    or so. Hasn't been unstable, fragile or PITA. Virtualization isn't a
    solution for my current use case of having Windows for games, Arch Linux
    for seeing how new Linux stuff runs and looks like on my HW and Debian
    for everything else.

    Agree. I've had as many as six bootable images
    at various times. NO probs with Grub.

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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to c186282@nnada.net on Sun Mar 23 11:04:11 2025
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    On 3/22/25 3:39 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    On 2025-03-22 18:52, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk; >>>> UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot >>> in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros >>> caught up.

    Define "fine".

    Like buying a machine and all 4 primaries are in use?

    Secure boot is a different beast.

    One of my major gripes with UEFI is that M$
    loved it SO much. As such I suspect evil in
    there somewhere. It also just COMPLICATES
    boots yet another level.

    Let me bet: You are a fan of IPv4 and you hate IPv6 because it's so complicated.

    People going down this road of argument usually are what we in German
    call "Betriebsblind", being accustomed to the quirks of the old way
    that they don't see the compelling simplicity of the new way.

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Sun Mar 23 05:49:19 2025
    On 3/22/25 9:04 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    On 2025-03-21 20:11, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
      Frankly I hate the bloody things. I use them as little as possible,
    My camera has something in it but it talks via USB to the computer so
    I have no idea what format it actually is
    Ditto my mobile phone

    Yes, my camera talks via USB to the computer, but it is slower than
    directly connecting the card, and uses battery. Linux is very good at handling different filesystems.

    Agreed. If I only need a few pix I'll USB connect. If I
    need a lot, I'll pop the cam card and plug it into my
    Linux laptop.

    Ok, I *only* have Linux laptops/desktops/etc.
    DO look into BeeLink/BMax mini-boxes ... N95
    now thru N150 and beyond. Prices HAVE gone up a
    tad since the new Trump/China sanctions but
    still good. The N150s are kinda 'low-end
    laptop' power, which means Really Good for
    Linux uses ... all for under US $250.

    My poor poor desktop PC ... built it, top end
    i5 and 32gb and SSD ... and it's just SAT IDLE
    for a couple of YEARS now. Asus MB, love 'em.
    Haven't turned the thing on since forever.
    Again though, it's Deb/MX, not a drop of Winders.

    Cams generally use SD cards now (Sony has it's own
    version) - either the old 'wide' cards or the tiny
    newer ones. The 'wide' ones do have certain perks.
    Recently bought a few, and not only for older cams.

    Frankly I'm kinda tired of cards too small to
    physically handle, SO easy to loose in chair
    cushions ........

    Hmmmm ... remember the old Trek series ? Their
    "data tapes" were about 3"x2"x1/8" ... just
    big enough to put in yer pocket without getting
    lost and assumed to hold terabytes. An AMAZING
    concept in 1967 :-)

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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sun Mar 23 06:05:34 2025
    On 3/22/25 8:52 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 22/03/2025 19:09, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 13:35:54 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    The PICO has no filesystem. IN use you hold a button down while powering >>> up and it's Flash presents itself as a USB drive. You copy a special
    binary file of compiled code onto that 'drive', and it reboots and runs
    it..

    Okay, you hold down BOOTSEL when plugging it into the USB. Then it shows
    up on Files as RP2350.  If you click on that you see INDEX.HTM and
    INFO_UF2.TXT. If you look at Properties it reports 2 items totaling 305
    bytes and 134.1 MB free.

    df -Th /dev/sda1
    Filesystem     Type  Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1      vfat  128M  8.0K  128M   1% /media/xxxxx/RP2350

    Then you can

    cp blink.uf2 /media/xxxxx/RP2350/

    and, lo and behold, it starts blinking and vanishes from the file system!
    I'm lazy so after it blinks 20 times it calls

    reset_usb_boot(0, 0);

    and miraculously reappears mounted.  How does it do all this without a
    file system known to Ubuntu? I won't even ask why after copying the
    CircuitPython uf2 it reboots mounted as CIRCUITPYTHON and you can copy
    .py
    files directly.

    My comment had nothing to do with the programmatic use of the flash
    memory, only how the Pico presents as a mass storage device.

    Well it spoofs the disk obviously

    Ya know ..... think I'm gonna stay away from Pico's :-)

    If I want microcontrollers, there are more traditional
    straight-up boards out there. If I want microprocessors
    there are the straight-up PIs and beyond.

    Did use PICs for a long time ... kinda remember their
    quirks and tricks. There are Pico/Nano style boards to
    be had cheap that use PICs. Atmel versions also exist.

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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sun Mar 23 07:15:48 2025
    On 3/23/25 6:04 AM, Marc Haber wrote:
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    On 3/22/25 3:39 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    On 2025-03-22 18:52, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk; >>>>> UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot >>>> in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros >>>> caught up.

    Define "fine".

    Like buying a machine and all 4 primaries are in use?

    Secure boot is a different beast.

    One of my major gripes with UEFI is that M$
    loved it SO much. As such I suspect evil in
    there somewhere. It also just COMPLICATES
    boots yet another level.

    Let me bet: You are a fan of IPv4 and you hate IPv6 because it's so complicated.

    Yep ! DISABLE it !!! :-)

    Though, eventually ......

    Actually, just making IPv5, one more set of three,
    would have solved The Problem for a LONG time. There
    were other fixes as well.

    People going down this road of argument usually are what we in German
    call "Betriebsblind", being accustomed to the quirks of the old way
    that they don't see the compelling simplicity of the new way.

    "Old ways" aren't always BAD ways - sometimes they
    are just common sense. Young bucks oft try to "do
    better", but it's mostly ego and less practical.

    In any case, hate, and see little use for, UEFI.

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  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sun Mar 23 14:57:33 2025
    On 2025-03-23 08:28, Marc Haber wrote:
    Anssi Saari <anssi.saari@usenet.mail.kapsi.fi> wrote:
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> writes:
    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA.

    I've usually had two or more OSes on my main PC, since from around 1995
    or so. Hasn't been unstable, fragile or PITA.

    Then you're lucky. To be able to fix a broken dualboot you need
    intimate knowlegde of all platforms. Most people don't have that.

    I remember my first laptop. Windows was installed, and used three
    primary partitions. I could create an extended partition, add some
    logical partitions, and install grub on the extended itself.

    Then, Windows would refuse some updates because its boot partition was
    no longer marked bootable. I had to mark partition 1, boot Windows thus,
    run the upgrade (7 to 10, probably), and then mark again partition 4 as bootable.

    Then I learned that I could replace the code in the MBR by a hacked one
    that boots partition 4, even though partition 1 was marked bootable.
    Windwos was happy, but grub booted first.

    It worked, but it was a hack, and could fail anytime Windows would do something.

    And then there were other machines that came with all four primary
    partitions used. What to do then? It is not trivial.

    UEFI, on the other hand, is designed to boot multiple systems. Having
    the boot signed is a different thing.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

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  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sun Mar 23 14:49:36 2025
    On 2025-03-23 08:25, Marc Haber wrote:
    "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
    On 2025-03-22 17:29, Marc Haber wrote:
    You can boot live images via grub, so boot grub via UEFI and point it
    towards the iso that also resides on the UEFI partition. The
    grml-rescueboot package on Debian-based systems might give some hints.

    Ah. So not directly from uefi. Not much use when it is grub which is
    failing.

    UEFI grub usually doesn't fail. It a least gets you to a shell. And
    you can have a second grub for the rescue image.

    Don't love UEFI at all

    You should! It's neat.

    Yep.

    I am positively impressed every time my fwupdmgr puts a Firmware
    update on the UEFI partition and the next system boot will
    transparently install it. From a Linux OS!

    I have not done that.

    Just install fwupd and see it working automagically.

    I probably have it installed, it does nothing.

    fwupdagent fwupdate fwupdmgr fwupdtool


    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to c186282@nnada.net on Sun Mar 23 15:37:59 2025
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    On 3/23/25 6:04 AM, Marc Haber wrote:
    Let me bet: You are a fan of IPv4 and you hate IPv6 because it's so
    complicated.

    Yep ! DISABLE it !!! :-)

    Though, eventually ......

    Actually, just making IPv5, one more set of three,
    would have solved The Problem for a LONG time. There
    were other fixes as well.

    People going down this road of argument usually are what we in German
    call "Betriebsblind", being accustomed to the quirks of the old way
    that they don't see the compelling simplicity of the new way.

    "Old ways" aren't always BAD ways - sometimes they
    are just common sense. Young bucks oft try to "do
    better", but it's mostly ego and less practical.

    In any case, hate, and see little use for, UEFI.

    Thanks for proving all of my points.

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

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  • From David W. Hodgins@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Sun Mar 23 11:58:32 2025
    On Sun, 23 Mar 2025 09:57:33 -0400, Carlos E.R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
    <snip>
    UEFI, on the other hand, is designed to boot multiple systems. Having
    the boot signed is a different thing.

    I used to use the gag boot loader on the mbr, grub (legacy) on each linux partition boot record,
    so that a problem with one install had no impact on another install. Each install was isolated
    except for a data partition shared between them.

    With grub2, I changed to one disk per install in order to keep one install from impacting another.
    While grub2 can be installed on the pbr, most installers will only install it on an mbr.

    With uefi, while it's still possible to have multiple installs, it is not possible to keep them isolated
    from each other. Any install can break all installs. The only way to keep each install isolated is
    to have one install per machine.

    uefi is a mini operating system developed primarily for the purpose of making it harder for other
    operating systems to be used, and to boost pc sales. The attack surface it exposes allows
    undetectable root kits to be installed, or machines to be easily bricked just by deleting the
    efivars from the nvram.

    uefi is marketed as improving security. While it may block amateur attackers, it is a security
    nightmare. The only possible way to ensure a uefi computer does not have a stealth rootkit
    already installed is to remove it's nvram and use a reader attached to another system. In most
    cases the nvram is soldered onto the motherboard.

    Regards, Dave Hodgins

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  • From =?UTF-8?Q?St=C3=A9phane?= CARPENTIE@21:1/5 to All on Sun Mar 23 16:33:18 2025
    Le 22-03-2025, Computer Nerd Kev <not@telling.you.invalid> a écrit :
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> wrote:
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk; >>>> UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot >>>in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros >>>caught up.

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA.

    The only thing that made it unstable for me was when distros
    switched to Grub 2. So I started throwing that away in favour of SysLinux/ExtLinux and things have been easy again.

    No, the only thing that made it unstable was Windows. I don't know how
    it is now, but for years, every Windows update removed anything that
    wasn't its own boot system.

    --
    Si vous avez du temps à perdre :
    https://scarpet42.gitlab.io

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  • From =?UTF-8?Q?St=C3=A9phane?= CARPENTIE@21:1/5 to All on Sun Mar 23 16:41:14 2025
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:

    One of my major gripes with UEFI is that M$
    loved it SO much. As such I suspect evil in
    there somewhere. It also just COMPLICATES
    boots yet another level.

    For me it's way more simple now, thanks to UEFI. I have no more LILO,
    GRUB, rEFInd or anything else. Instead of launching a boot manager which launches Linux, the UEFI directly launches Linux. So, removing a level in
    the boot process isn't complicating things but simplifying them.

    --
    Si vous avez du temps à perdre :
    https://scarpet42.gitlab.io

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to sc@fiat-linux.fr on Sun Mar 23 17:50:10 2025
    Stéphane CARPENTIER <sc@fiat-linux.fr> wrote:
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:

    One of my major gripes with UEFI is that M$
    loved it SO much. As such I suspect evil in
    there somewhere. It also just COMPLICATES
    boots yet another level.

    For me it's way more simple now, thanks to UEFI. I have no more LILO,
    GRUB, rEFInd or anything else. Instead of launching a boot manager which >launches Linux, the UEFI directly launches Linux. So, removing a level in
    the boot process isn't complicating things but simplifying them.

    Do you have that automated to the level the current grob tooling
    offers? Would you share your scripts?

    Greetings
    Marc
    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

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  • From Richard Kettlewell@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Sun Mar 23 18:02:10 2025
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> writes:
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    On 3/22/25 3:39 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    On 2025-03-22 18:52, rbowman wrote:
    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure
    boot in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the
    Linux distros caught up.

    AFAIK it’s always been possible to disable secure boot. Certainly true
    on everything I’ve needed to (which rare but not unheard of).

    One of my major gripes with UEFI is that M$
    loved it SO much. As such I suspect evil in
    there somewhere. It also just COMPLICATES
    boots yet another level.

    Microsoft liking something is not a coherent reason for disliking it.

    Let me bet: You are a fan of IPv4 and you hate IPv6 because it's so complicated.

    People going down this road of argument usually are what we in German
    call "Betriebsblind", being accustomed to the quirks of the old way
    that they don't see the compelling simplicity of the new way.

    Quite.

    --
    https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

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  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Sun Mar 23 19:06:13 2025
    On Sun, 23 Mar 2025 06:05:34 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    Ya know ..... think I'm gonna stay away from Pico's

    If I want microcontrollers, there are more traditional straight-up
    boards out there. If I want microprocessors there are the straight-up
    PIs and beyond.

    Did use PICs for a long time ... kinda remember their quirks and
    tricks. There are Pico/Nano style boards to be had cheap that use
    PICs. Atmel versions also exist.

    You pays your money and you makes your choice. You are right, there is a confusing selection of low cost boards compared to 15 or 20 years ago when boards like the Arduino or BeagleBone started to appear.

    I still have an old AVR development board. I should get a USB to serial converter to see if it still works. I preferred the AVR instruction set to
    the PIC's.

    Today you have to add a lot of qualifiers. The PIC32MX was based on the
    MIPS architecture and was sort of a dead end. The PIC32C is ARM based.
    Since Microchip bought Atmel, there are also the ATSAM ARM series. They're
    also coming out with the PIC64 based on the ARM Cortex A, rather than the Cortex M.

    Even the Arduino Uno R4 Minima is a ARM processor. It looks and acts like
    a UNO R3, which was the last of the ATMega line. Other Arduinos like the
    Nano have moved on to ARM processors too.

    Adafruit has the Feather boards some of which use the RP2040 like the
    Pico. One of them comes loaded with CircuitPython so you don't even need a
    IDE. Plug it in, edit main.py, and you're good to go.

    Then there are the ESP32 boards with RISC processors or the Pico 2 with 2
    ARM cores and 2 RISC-V cores, take your pick.

    If you're really a glutton for punishment, there is STM32. They're used
    quite a bit in commercial embedded applications. The problem with them is
    there are a million (okay, not quite) variations with arcane part numbers.
    Is it a F403 or a F411? How many pin does it have?

    The newer uCs have more memory which means they can support CircuitPython
    or MicroPython. Of course you can use a C/C++ SDK for more control and
    faster execution but that will differ between processors unlike the more uniform Python abstraction.

    Decisions, decisions... Most options are inexpensive, or really cheap if
    you don't mind rolling the dice with AliExpress.

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    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sun Mar 23 23:36:04 2025
    On 3/23/25 3:06 PM, rbowman wrote:
    On Sun, 23 Mar 2025 06:05:34 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    Ya know ..... think I'm gonna stay away from Pico's

    If I want microcontrollers, there are more traditional straight-up
    boards out there. If I want microprocessors there are the straight-up
    PIs and beyond.

    Did use PICs for a long time ... kinda remember their quirks and
    tricks. There are Pico/Nano style boards to be had cheap that use
    PICs. Atmel versions also exist.

    You pays your money and you makes your choice. You are right, there is a confusing selection of low cost boards compared to 15 or 20 years ago when boards like the Arduino or BeagleBone started to appear.


    Just recently bought two Ards ... the old Uno and a 2560.
    Have weather apps in mind and the libs easily do all the
    funky little devices and one-wires and such and there's
    megatons of docs.

    Oh, you CAN do ethernet, even a web page, on the Uno ...
    but it's *slow* :-)

    Also have a BBB but have never gotten around to it yet.

    SOMEBODY does or did make something that looked a whole
    lot like a PI, but used some PIC instead. A Pi is faster,
    but the PIC likely uses lots less power and can go
    almost static between interrupts. Job, best tool. Note
    the Ard low-power lib is pretty damned good too, have
    used that with solar-powered units before.

    I still have an old AVR development board. I should get a USB to serial converter to see if it still works. I preferred the AVR instruction set to the PIC's.

    Today you have to add a lot of qualifiers. The PIC32MX was based on the
    MIPS architecture and was sort of a dead end. The PIC32C is ARM based.
    Since Microchip bought Atmel, there are also the ATSAM ARM series. They're also coming out with the PIC64 based on the ARM Cortex A, rather than the Cortex M.

    But is Cortex-based REALLY a "PIC" ??? :-)

    16F84 was a PIC.

    My fave PICs are the 12Fxxx 8-pin little lovelies.
    So small, so cheap, so versatile. I've even used
    them to emulate ordinary logic gates if speed was
    not super-critical ... that cheap, and can be most
    anything you want, even drive a serial display.

    Even the Arduino Uno R4 Minima is a ARM processor. It looks and acts like
    a UNO R3, which was the last of the ATMega line. Other Arduinos like the
    Nano have moved on to ARM processors too.

    Adafruit has the Feather boards some of which use the RP2040 like the
    Pico. One of them comes loaded with CircuitPython so you don't even need a IDE. Plug it in, edit main.py, and you're good to go.

    Then there are the ESP32 boards with RISC processors or the Pico 2 with 2
    ARM cores and 2 RISC-V cores, take your pick.

    If you're really a glutton for punishment, there is STM32. They're used
    quite a bit in commercial embedded applications. The problem with them is there are a million (okay, not quite) variations with arcane part numbers.
    Is it a F403 or a F411? How many pin does it have?

    The newer uCs have more memory which means they can support CircuitPython
    or MicroPython. Of course you can use a C/C++ SDK for more control and
    faster execution but that will differ between processors unlike the more uniform Python abstraction.

    Decisions, decisions... Most options are inexpensive, or really cheap if
    you don't mind rolling the dice with AliExpress.

    Seems like microcontroller overload these days :-)

    You can still buy the Epson FOUR-bitters from DigiKey ...
    read the sheet once, can be tweaked to interface with
    almost anything, AMAZING versatility with nanowatt
    standby power.

    However the bigger pain/expense lies in the 'development
    systems/boards'. You don't just buy the chip - you have
    to be able to program it too. Discourages experimenters.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Mon Mar 24 06:48:21 2025
    On Sun, 23 Mar 2025 23:36:04 -0400, c186282 wrote:


    Just recently bought two Ards ... the old Uno and a 2560.
    Have weather apps in mind and the libs easily do all the funky little
    devices and one-wires and such and there's megatons of docs.

    Well, you shouldn't run out of pins with the 2560. I've got a few Uno R3s laying around and a couple of Nano 33 BLE Senses. The Nano is used in a
    MIT ML course and they picked it because of all the onboard sensors rather
    than a bunch of loose components. It's based on the Nordic Cortex M4 uc.

    SOMEBODY does or did make something that looked a whole lot like a
    PI, but used some PIC instead. A Pi is faster,
    but the PIC likely uses lots less power and can go almost static
    between interrupts. Job, best tool. Note the Ard low-power lib is
    pretty damned good too, have used that with solar-powered units
    before.

    There were quite a few. I used to subscribe to Steve Ciarcia's 'Circuit
    Cellar' and PIC projects were very popular.

    But is Cortex-based REALLY a "PIC" ???

    16F84 was a PIC.

    My fave PICs are the 12Fxxx 8-pin little lovelies.
    So small, so cheap, so versatile. I've even used them to emulate
    ordinary logic gates if speed was not super-critical ... that cheap,
    and can be most anything you want, even drive a serial display.

    I've got some chips with a bunch of little legs that I assume are legacy
    AVRs. You could do a lot with them,

    However the bigger pain/expense lies in the 'development
    systems/boards'. You don't just buy the chip - you have to be able to
    program it too. Discourages experimenters.


    https://www.mikroe.com/easyavr

    Yeah, the $215 is a barrier and then you wind up with a dead bug you have
    to do something with. Of course you can go a lot cheaper:

    https://www.walmart.com/ip/AVR-Development-Board-NO-Chip-Included-DIY- Set-for-8-48-with-USB-Input/2830964591

    Walmart? Yeah I'm sure the local superstore has a bunch of them. Must be something similar for PICs or you can roll your own.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to rbowman on Mon Mar 24 03:49:11 2025
    On 3/24/25 2:48 AM, rbowman wrote:
    On Sun, 23 Mar 2025 23:36:04 -0400, c186282 wrote:


    Just recently bought two Ards ... the old Uno and a 2560.
    Have weather apps in mind and the libs easily do all the funky little
    devices and one-wires and such and there's megatons of docs.

    Well, you shouldn't run out of pins with the 2560. I've got a few Uno R3s laying around and a couple of Nano 33 BLE Senses. The Nano is used in a
    MIT ML course and they picked it because of all the onboard sensors rather than a bunch of loose components. It's based on the Nordic Cortex M4 uc.

    The only prob with the much-better 2560 is that the pins
    aren't THE SAME AS ON THE Uno. There ARE lib tweaks, but
    you always have to make sure to port 'em forward.

    Used a couple dozen 2560s with add-on boards (commercial
    and hand-wired) for various purposes. Damned good units.
    The Uno is 'newbie', the 2560 is 'real world'.

    SOMEBODY does or did make something that looked a whole lot like a
    PI, but used some PIC instead. A Pi is faster,
    but the PIC likely uses lots less power and can go almost static
    between interrupts. Job, best tool. Note the Ard low-power lib is
    pretty damned good too, have used that with solar-powered units
    before.

    There were quite a few. I used to subscribe to Steve Ciarcia's 'Circuit Cellar' and PIC projects were very popular.

    Ah ... guru Steve. Followed him almost forever ! :-)

    MOST fav - when asked his favorite programming lang
    he answered 'solder' :-)

    But is Cortex-based REALLY a "PIC" ???

    16F84 was a PIC.

    My fave PICs are the 12Fxxx 8-pin little lovelies.
    So small, so cheap, so versatile. I've even used them to emulate
    ordinary logic gates if speed was not super-critical ... that cheap,
    and can be most anything you want, even drive a serial display.

    I've got some chips with a bunch of little legs that I assume are legacy AVRs. You could do a lot with them,

    The AVRs kinda came to parallel PICS - very similar
    apps/environments.

    And yea, you can do a *LOT* with them.

    However the bigger pain/expense lies in the 'development
    systems/boards'. You don't just buy the chip - you have to be able to
    program it too. Discourages experimenters.


    https://www.mikroe.com/easyavr

    Seen the current PIC/AVR dev stuff ?
    They went from *a* handy serial
    programmer to one/more where you
    have to buy special adapters for
    most every kind of chip. This is
    EXPENSIVE.

    DID have the older programmer ... ZIF,
    could insert a huge variety of chips
    all in one small compact serial unit.
    Worked great. No 'emulation', just DID
    ITS JOB. Program and pop straight into
    your project boards.

    NOW ........


    Yeah, the $215 is a barrier and then you wind up with a dead bug you have
    to do something with. Of course you can go a lot cheaper:

    https://www.walmart.com/ip/AVR-Development-Board-NO-Chip-Included-DIY- Set-for-8-48-with-USB-Input/2830964591

    Walmart? Yeah I'm sure the local superstore has a bunch of them. Must be something similar for PICs or you can roll your own.


    I'm seeing less and less of the simple/practical
    "development/programming" environments for the
    basic micro-controllers. It's all *too* these
    days. Sounds like "marketers" got involved
    rather than bona-fide "developers".

    PICs and near relatives still have a significant
    role in today's projects/products. They provide
    what's NEEDED - can simplify/sort-it-out for
    the fancier processors for dirt cheap.

    There's a Serbian? Firm - MikroElectronika -
    that sells a very versatile development
    board/env for PICs or AVRs. The name may
    have changed, but the units still sell.
    They offer a 'C' or 'MikroPascal' env to
    build yer stuff. The board accomodates
    most everything - including up to serial
    GUIs. Price, last check, was fair.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to Richard Kettlewell on Mon Mar 24 11:33:18 2025
    On 23/03/2025 18:02, Richard Kettlewell wrote:
    Microsoft liking something is not a coherent reason for disliking it.

    Well no but....

    --
    Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as
    foolish, and by the rulers as useful.

    (Seneca the Younger, 65 AD)

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Mon Mar 24 11:31:02 2025
    On 23/03/2025 10:05, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/22/25 8:52 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 22/03/2025 19:09, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 13:35:54 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    The PICO has no filesystem. IN use you hold a button down while
    powering
    up and it's Flash presents itself as a USB drive. You copy a special
    binary file of compiled code onto that 'drive', and it reboots and runs >>>> it..

    Okay, you hold down BOOTSEL when plugging it into the USB. Then it shows >>> up on Files as RP2350.  If you click on that you see INDEX.HTM and
    INFO_UF2.TXT. If you look at Properties it reports 2 items totaling 305
    bytes and 134.1 MB free.

    df -Th /dev/sda1
    Filesystem     Type  Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1      vfat  128M  8.0K  128M   1% /media/xxxxx/RP2350 >>>
    Then you can

    cp blink.uf2 /media/xxxxx/RP2350/

    and, lo and behold, it starts blinking and vanishes from the file
    system!
    I'm lazy so after it blinks 20 times it calls

    reset_usb_boot(0, 0);

    and miraculously reappears mounted.  How does it do all this without a
    file system known to Ubuntu? I won't even ask why after copying the
    CircuitPython uf2 it reboots mounted as CIRCUITPYTHON and you can
    copy .py
    files directly.

    My comment had nothing to do with the programmatic use of the flash
    memory, only how the Pico presents as a mass storage device.

    Well it spoofs the disk obviously

      Ya know ..... think I'm gonna stay away from Pico's  :-)

    It is a big learning curve. But they are fearfully cheap...small...and light

      If I want microcontrollers, there are more traditional
      straight-up boards out there. If I want microprocessors
      there are the straight-up PIs and beyond.

      Did use PICs for a long time ... kinda remember their
      quirks and tricks. There are Pico/Nano style boards to
      be had cheap that use PICs. Atmel versions also exist.

    I looked at those. Many times the price of a pico.

    I am slowly making up libraries of Code That Works (as opposed to what
    you find plastered around the Web.

    --
    “Some people like to travel by train because it combines the slowness of
    a car with the cramped public exposure of 
an airplane.”

    Dennis Miller

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Richard Kettlewell@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Mon Mar 24 13:30:42 2025
    The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> writes:
    On 23/03/2025 18:02, Richard Kettlewell wrote:
    Microsoft liking something is not a coherent reason for disliking it.

    Well no but....

    They also like virtualization, Linux[1], cryptography and security in
    general and many other technologies. If the previous poster is going to
    take a dislike to a technology because Microsoft like it then they’re
    not going to have much left to work with.

    [1] Something like 60% of Azure is running Linux; it’s making them
    billions of dollars a year. The desktop integration of WSL is also
    pretty good.

    --
    https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Tue Mar 25 01:18:57 2025
    On 3/24/25 7:31 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 23/03/2025 10:05, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/22/25 8:52 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 22/03/2025 19:09, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 13:35:54 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    The PICO has no filesystem. IN use you hold a button down while
    powering
    up and it's Flash presents itself as a USB drive. You copy a special >>>>> binary file of compiled code onto that 'drive', and it reboots and
    runs
    it..

    Okay, you hold down BOOTSEL when plugging it into the USB. Then it
    shows
    up on Files as RP2350.  If you click on that you see INDEX.HTM and
    INFO_UF2.TXT. If you look at Properties it reports 2 items totaling 305 >>>> bytes and 134.1 MB free.

    df -Th /dev/sda1
    Filesystem     Type  Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1      vfat  128M  8.0K  128M   1% /media/xxxxx/RP2350 >>>>
    Then you can

    cp blink.uf2 /media/xxxxx/RP2350/

    and, lo and behold, it starts blinking and vanishes from the file
    system!
    I'm lazy so after it blinks 20 times it calls

    reset_usb_boot(0, 0);

    and miraculously reappears mounted.  How does it do all this without a >>>> file system known to Ubuntu? I won't even ask why after copying the
    CircuitPython uf2 it reboots mounted as CIRCUITPYTHON and you can
    copy .py
    files directly.

    My comment had nothing to do with the programmatic use of the flash
    memory, only how the Pico presents as a mass storage device.

    Well it spoofs the disk obviously

       Ya know ..... think I'm gonna stay away from Pico's  :-)

    It is a big learning curve. But they are fearfully cheap...small...and
    light

       If I want microcontrollers, there are more traditional
       straight-up boards out there. If I want microprocessors
       there are the straight-up PIs and beyond.

       Did use PICs for a long time ... kinda remember their
       quirks and tricks. There are Pico/Nano style boards to
       be had cheap that use PICs. Atmel versions also exist.

    I looked at those. Many times the price of a pico.

    I am slowly making up libraries of Code That Works (as opposed to what
    you find plastered around the Web.

    As I was talking about elsewhere, there's the price
    of the target CHIPS, and then the price of the
    development system/board. The price of the latter
    has become rather high in some cases ... can't even
    get a good all-purpose PIC programmer anymore that
    doesn't require special sockets/libs and such for $$$

    MicroChip USED to sell a very useful serial appliance
    with a 40-pin ZIF socket. Upgraded it once. You could
    stick a large variety of their chips into the thing.
    Just specify in their dev app and it'd all work well.

    But now .........

    If you are an 'experimenter' or small-run person then
    the price of the dev/programming crap kinda now makes
    it just TOO.

    Found people long back who sold an upgraded 8051 (it
    was 'fat', had an actual battery in the case to keep
    the RAM alive) AND a BASIC-like compiler. The programmer
    was a small, kinda bare, PC board - again serial interface.
    Not fancy at all - but GOT IT DONE. Made dozens of devices
    using that all for almost nothing.

    Oh, if a MHz or so is enough, the 8051 is STILL a great chip.

    In any case, I *understand* the Pico/Nano approach. It's
    "all in one" and no vast other investment required. As
    for whether they're good/easy for EVERYTHING, well ....
    actually ARDs are still competitive, esp for low-power
    applications. Sleep the thing and wait for the next
    interrupt ........

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Tue Mar 25 11:13:30 2025
    On 25/03/2025 05:18, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/24/25 7:31 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 23/03/2025 10:05, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/22/25 8:52 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 22/03/2025 19:09, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 13:35:54 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    The PICO has no filesystem. IN use you hold a button down while
    powering
    up and it's Flash presents itself as a USB drive. You copy a special >>>>>> binary file of compiled code onto that 'drive', and it reboots and >>>>>> runs
    it..

    Okay, you hold down BOOTSEL when plugging it into the USB. Then it
    shows
    up on Files as RP2350.  If you click on that you see INDEX.HTM and
    INFO_UF2.TXT. If you look at Properties it reports 2 items totaling
    305
    bytes and 134.1 MB free.

    df -Th /dev/sda1
    Filesystem     Type  Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1      vfat  128M  8.0K  128M   1% /media/xxxxx/RP2350 >>>>>
    Then you can

    cp blink.uf2 /media/xxxxx/RP2350/

    and, lo and behold, it starts blinking and vanishes from the file
    system!
    I'm lazy so after it blinks 20 times it calls

    reset_usb_boot(0, 0);

    and miraculously reappears mounted.  How does it do all this without a >>>>> file system known to Ubuntu? I won't even ask why after copying the
    CircuitPython uf2 it reboots mounted as CIRCUITPYTHON and you can
    copy .py
    files directly.

    My comment had nothing to do with the programmatic use of the flash
    memory, only how the Pico presents as a mass storage device.

    Well it spoofs the disk obviously

       Ya know ..... think I'm gonna stay away from Pico's  :-)

    It is a big learning curve. But they are fearfully cheap...small...and
    light

       If I want microcontrollers, there are more traditional
       straight-up boards out there. If I want microprocessors
       there are the straight-up PIs and beyond.

       Did use PICs for a long time ... kinda remember their
       quirks and tricks. There are Pico/Nano style boards to
       be had cheap that use PICs. Atmel versions also exist.

    I looked at those. Many times the price of a pico.

    I am slowly making up libraries of Code That Works (as opposed to what
    you find plastered around the Web.

      As I was talking about elsewhere, there's the price
      of the target CHIPS, and then the price of the
      development system/board. The price of the latter
      has become rather high in some cases ... can't even
      get a good all-purpose PIC programmer anymore that
      doesn't require special sockets/libs and such for $$$

    ?. Picos don't need development boards, I mean what are you going to
    hang round them that is so complex? I just go straight to the final PCB.

    Works out at maybe $20 for 10 chinese made PCBs...


      MicroChip USED to sell a very useful serial appliance
      with a 40-pin ZIF socket. Upgraded it once. You could
      stick a large variety of their chips into the thing.
      Just specify in their dev app and it'd all work well.

      But now .........

      If you are an 'experimenter' or small-run person then
      the price of the dev/programming crap kinda now makes
      it just TOO.


    ?/ What??? The point about a PICO is that it *is* a development board,
    if you like, It's all in for $5.
    All youi need is s computer running a GCC cross compiler and the free development envir9nmenmt


      Found people long back who sold an upgraded 8051 (it
      was 'fat', had an actual battery in the case to keep
      the RAM alive) AND a BASIC-like compiler. The programmer
      was a small, kinda bare, PC board - again serial interface.
      Not fancy at all - but GOT IT DONE. Made dozens of devices
      using that all for almost nothing.

      Oh, if a MHz or so is enough, the 8051 is STILL a great chip.

    That must have been 50 years ago., Things have moved on

      In any case, I *understand* the Pico/Nano approach. It's
      "all in one" and no vast other investment required. As
      for whether they're good/easy for EVERYTHING, well ....
      actually ARDs are still competitive, esp for low-power
      applications. Sleep the thing and wait for the next
      interrupt ........

    PICOS essentially the same. Or what I am looking to do is to use an
    external ultra low power timer to switch the board on after a long
    delay, and the board switches itself off when its done its business.
    Rinse and repeat



    --
    The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to
    rule.
    – H. L. Mencken, American journalist, 1880-1956

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Tue Mar 25 08:31:21 2025
    On 3/25/25 7:13 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 25/03/2025 05:18, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/24/25 7:31 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 23/03/2025 10:05, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/22/25 8:52 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 22/03/2025 19:09, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 13:35:54 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote: >>>>>>
    The PICO has no filesystem. IN use you hold a button down while
    powering
    up and it's Flash presents itself as a USB drive. You copy a special >>>>>>> binary file of compiled code onto that 'drive', and it reboots
    and runs
    it..

    Okay, you hold down BOOTSEL when plugging it into the USB. Then it >>>>>> shows
    up on Files as RP2350.  If you click on that you see INDEX.HTM and >>>>>> INFO_UF2.TXT. If you look at Properties it reports 2 items
    totaling 305
    bytes and 134.1 MB free.

    df -Th /dev/sda1
    Filesystem     Type  Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1      vfat  128M  8.0K  128M   1% /media/xxxxx/RP2350 >>>>>>
    Then you can

    cp blink.uf2 /media/xxxxx/RP2350/

    and, lo and behold, it starts blinking and vanishes from the file
    system!
    I'm lazy so after it blinks 20 times it calls

    reset_usb_boot(0, 0);

    and miraculously reappears mounted.  How does it do all this
    without a
    file system known to Ubuntu? I won't even ask why after copying the >>>>>> CircuitPython uf2 it reboots mounted as CIRCUITPYTHON and you can
    copy .py
    files directly.

    My comment had nothing to do with the programmatic use of the flash >>>>>> memory, only how the Pico presents as a mass storage device.

    Well it spoofs the disk obviously

       Ya know ..... think I'm gonna stay away from Pico's  :-)

    It is a big learning curve. But they are fearfully
    cheap...small...and light

       If I want microcontrollers, there are more traditional
       straight-up boards out there. If I want microprocessors
       there are the straight-up PIs and beyond.

       Did use PICs for a long time ... kinda remember their
       quirks and tricks. There are Pico/Nano style boards to
       be had cheap that use PICs. Atmel versions also exist.

    I looked at those. Many times the price of a pico.

    I am slowly making up libraries of Code That Works (as opposed to
    what you find plastered around the Web.

       As I was talking about elsewhere, there's the price
       of the target CHIPS, and then the price of the
       development system/board. The price of the latter
       has become rather high in some cases ... can't even
       get a good all-purpose PIC programmer anymore that
       doesn't require special sockets/libs and such for $$$

    ?. Picos don't need development boards, I mean what are you going to
    hang round them that is so complex? I just go straight to the final PCB.

    Works out at maybe $20 for 10 chinese made PCBs...


       MicroChip USED to sell a very useful serial appliance
       with a 40-pin ZIF socket. Upgraded it once. You could
       stick a large variety of their chips into the thing.
       Just specify in their dev app and it'd all work well.

       But now .........

       If you are an 'experimenter' or small-run person then
       the price of the dev/programming crap kinda now makes
       it just TOO.


    ?/ What???  The point about a PICO is that it *is* a development board,
    if you like, It's all in for $5.
    All youi need is s computer running a GCC cross compiler and the free development envir9nmenmt

    I'm not gonna really knock the Pico ... a very good,
    wide-purpose, solution for many microcontroller needs.

    But ... some people have other prefs, special needs.

       Found people long back who sold an upgraded 8051 (it
       was 'fat', had an actual battery in the case to keep
       the RAM alive) AND a BASIC-like compiler. The programmer
       was a small, kinda bare, PC board - again serial interface.
       Not fancy at all - but GOT IT DONE. Made dozens of devices
       using that all for almost nothing.

       Oh, if a MHz or so is enough, the 8051 is STILL a great chip.

    That must have been 50 years ago., Things have moved on


    Nah ... a MHz is still good for LOTS of uses !

    Or should your Mr. Coffee machine have an Nvidia
    chip in there ... ok, it WOULD serve as the heating
    element ....... :-)


       In any case, I *understand* the Pico/Nano approach. It's
       "all in one" and no vast other investment required. As
       for whether they're good/easy for EVERYTHING, well ....
       actually ARDs are still competitive, esp for low-power
       applications. Sleep the thing and wait for the next
       interrupt ........

    PICOS essentially the same. Or what I am looking to do is to use an external  ultra low power timer to switch the board on after a long
    delay, and the board switches  itself off when its done its business.
    Rinse and repeat

    I know Ards better. More years of libs/examples too.

    Anyway, it all depends on what you need to do. An old 16F84
    with RC clock may be "good enough" for a number of things,
    like decoding a keypad for an alarm system or whatever, or
    yer Mr. Coffee.

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  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Tue Mar 25 14:20:06 2025
    On 25/03/2025 12:31, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/25/25 7:13 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 25/03/2025 05:18, c186282 wrote:


       Oh, if a MHz or so is enough, the 8051 is STILL a great chip.

    That must have been 50 years ago., Things have moved on


      Nah ... a MHz is still good for LOTS of uses !

    Cant program 8051 in C IIRC

    And its bigger than a pi PICO!




    --
    The theory of Communism may be summed up in one sentence: Abolish all
    private property.

    Karl Marx

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  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Wed Mar 26 04:16:25 2025
    On Tue, 25 Mar 2025 08:31:21 -0400, c186282 wrote:


    I know Ards better. More years of libs/examples too.

    https://randomnerdtutorials.com/programming-raspberry-pi-pico-w-arduino-
    ide/

    No problem.

    https://docs.sunfounder.com/projects/kepler-kit/en/latest/cproject/ for_arduino_user.html

    Sunfounder has a variety of offerings and this page is for the Kepler kit
    that has a variety of sensors, discrete components, and so forth for the
    Pico although they can be used with any board. The projects are paralleled between MicroPython and the Arduino.

    The setup shows using the Arduino IDE or Thonny for MicroPython but I
    prefer VS Code with the PlatformIO plugin for Arduino or the MicroPython
    pluin for Python. There is also a Raspberry Pi Pico extension that uses
    the native Pico C/C++ SDK.

    Arm is deprecating the mbed RTOS but there are a couple of candidates for replacement.

    https://os.mbed.com/blog/entry/Important-Update-on-Mbed/

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  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Wed Mar 26 04:39:15 2025
    On Tue, 25 Mar 2025 14:20:06 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 25/03/2025 12:31, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/25/25 7:13 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 25/03/2025 05:18, c186282 wrote:


       Oh, if a MHz or so is enough, the 8051 is STILL a great chip.

    That must have been 50 years ago., Things have moved on


      Nah ... a MHz is still good for LOTS of uses !

    Cant program 8051 in C IIRC

    https://sdcc.sourceforge.net/

    afaik there never was a C compiler for the MCS-48 family but the MCS-51
    family had a luxurious amount of space (relatively)

    And its bigger than a pi PICO!

    https://www.keil.com/dd/chips/all/8051.htm

    Those aren't your grandfather's 8051s. Your ABS or TPS doesn't need a Cortex-M4.

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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to rbowman on Wed Mar 26 04:22:58 2025
    On 3/26/25 12:39 AM, rbowman wrote:
    On Tue, 25 Mar 2025 14:20:06 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 25/03/2025 12:31, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/25/25 7:13 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 25/03/2025 05:18, c186282 wrote:


       Oh, if a MHz or so is enough, the 8051 is STILL a great chip.

    That must have been 50 years ago., Things have moved on


      Nah ... a MHz is still good for LOTS of uses !

    Cant program 8051 in C IIRC

    https://sdcc.sourceforge.net/

    afaik there never was a C compiler for the MCS-48 family but the MCS-51 family had a luxurious amount of space (relatively)

    And its bigger than a pi PICO!

    https://www.keil.com/dd/chips/all/8051.htm


    Easier to solder ! :-)


    Those aren't your grandfather's 8051s. Your ABS or TPS doesn't need a Cortex-M4.

    My point here is that not every app requires
    an Nvidia or i9 sucking up mass amounts of
    power to, what, run a coffee-pot or home
    alarm or microwave ???

    Frankly an ancient 16F84 with an RC clock can
    do all that's required with such things and
    more. One MHz, HALF a MHz ... good enough
    and for just a trickle of power.

    Actually, the 12Fxxx chips may be enough.

    Look up the Epson nano-power FOUR-bit chips.
    Everything you'd ever need for a huge spectrum
    of devices/applications.

    A lot of people love PICOs, and I can see why,
    but they're not the best solution to EVERYTHING.

    ANYway, don't diss the '51 ... damned good chip
    and, for some uses, STILL. If you can't do ASM
    and can't find a 'C' compiler there were some
    BASIC compilers that'd get the job done nicely.

    Oh, if nobody's ever noticed, the Ard UNO has a
    SOCKETED chip. You can use the Uno as the programming
    fixture, put in a new chip, program it ... stick the
    chips into your OWN custom boards. Just enough zap
    for lots of things (and a good low-power library
    for like solar-powered projects).

    8051s and functional relatives can be had at
    Mouser and DigiKey.

    Try :
    http://systronix.com/BCI51/BCI51DAT.PDF
    for good dev products.
    There may still even be an ancient rec from me in there :-)

    Oh, the DS-5000s were the ones with the backup batt
    built in ....

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  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Wed Mar 26 17:09:30 2025
    On Wed, 26 Mar 2025 04:22:58 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    ANYway, don't diss the '51 ... damned good chip and, for some uses,
    STILL. If you can't do ASM and can't find a 'C' compiler there were
    some BASIC compilers that'd get the job done nicely.

    I would have loved to have had a 51 for one project but in the early '80s
    lead times for many parts were over a year and the MCS-48, specifically
    the 8749 parts, were available.

    Oh, if nobody's ever noticed, the Ard UNO has a SOCKETED chip. You
    can use the Uno as the programming fixture, put in a new chip,
    program it ... stick the chips into your OWN custom boards. Just
    enough zap for lots of things (and a good low-power library for like
    solar-powered projects).

    Usually. Speaking of parts shortages...

    https://store.arduino.cc/products/arduino-uno-rev3-smd

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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Wed Mar 26 21:00:48 2025
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 14:17:25 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    I read somewhere, long ago, that sticks and memory cards were actually optimized for FAT, by having the pages under the start of the disk significantly smaller. Ie, optimized for having more writes in the FAT
    area.

    Not sure how that’s supposed to benefit the wear-levelling algorithm. The whole point of wear-levelling is that successive writes to the same
    logical sector do not necessarily end up in the same physical location.

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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Thu Mar 27 02:33:08 2025
    On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 19:11:40 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    My camera has something in it but it talks via USB to the computer so I
    have no idea what format it actually is Ditto my mobile phone

    Could be MTP or PTP. PTP was the original protocol developed for cameras,
    then expanded into MTP.

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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Thu Mar 27 04:42:55 2025
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 11:21:23 +0100, Marc Haber wrote:

    Don't love UEFI at all

    You should! It's neat.

    The idea may seem good, the execution seems to leave something to be
    desired. It’s supposed to be OS-independent, but in practice the vendors
    only test that it boots Windows OK before shipping. So it’s left to the developers of the other OSes (mainly Linux, of course) to add hacks to
    work around all the bugs and gaps in their implementations of the spec.

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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to All on Thu Mar 27 06:11:38 2025
    On 23 Mar 2025 16:33:18 GMT, Stéphane CARPENTIER wrote:

    No, the only thing that made it unstable was Windows. I don't know how
    it is now, but for years, every Windows update removed anything that
    wasn't its own boot system.

    That is basically it. Boot problems are usually an easy thing to fix, if
    you know how (and keep a stick with SystemRescue on it handy). If you
    don’t, then it can look like your machine is a goner.

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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to David W. Hodgins on Thu Mar 27 06:17:08 2025
    On Sun, 23 Mar 2025 11:58:32 -0400, David W. Hodgins wrote:

    uefi is a mini operating system developed primarily for the purpose of
    making it harder for other operating systems to be used, and to boost pc sales. The attack surface it exposes allows undetectable root kits to
    be installed, or machines to be easily bricked just by deleting the
    efivars from the nvram.

    Harsh ... but fair ...

    uefi is marketed as improving security. While it may block amateur
    attackers, it is a security nightmare.

    To me, the big security nightmare seems to be “Secure Boot”, which so
    far has been anything but. It was supposed to be possible to revoke
    security keys for compromised bootloaders/OSes, but this turned out to
    be impossible in practice <https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-pulls-security-update-after-reports-of-issues-affecting-some-pcs/>.

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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to Marc Haber on Thu Mar 27 06:19:00 2025
    On Sun, 23 Mar 2025 11:04:11 +0100, Marc Haber wrote:

    People going down this road of argument usually are what we in German
    call "Betriebsblind", being accustomed to the quirks of the old way
    that they don't see the compelling simplicity of the new way.

    One might say that they are lacking in, to use a French phrase,
    “Système D”.

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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to Computer Nerd Kev on Thu Mar 27 06:21:06 2025
    On 23 Mar 2025 07:49:11 +1000, Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

    ... after which the kernel can set up the partition it
    wants to use as / and chroot to that.

    pivot_root(2), not chroot(2). All chroot does is impose some simplistic restrictions on the current process, it doesn’t change the systemwide root volume.

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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Thu Mar 27 07:31:28 2025
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 13:50:19 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    ... pulling the SD card out of the camera is not
    something I care to do ...

    Turn off the camera first, it’ll be fine.

    ...and I don't have a reader for that format card

    Get one. Multi-format readers are, or were (at the time I got my last
    one), not expensive.

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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to rbowman on Thu Mar 27 03:51:30 2025
    On 3/26/25 1:09 PM, rbowman wrote:
    On Wed, 26 Mar 2025 04:22:58 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    ANYway, don't diss the '51 ... damned good chip and, for some uses,
    STILL. If you can't do ASM and can't find a 'C' compiler there were
    some BASIC compilers that'd get the job done nicely.

    I would have loved to have had a 51 for one project but in the early '80s lead times for many parts were over a year and the MCS-48, specifically
    the 8749 parts, were available.

    Somewhere noted 'Systronics' ... 1980s/90s context ... used
    DS-5000t '51 variants, came with a minimal but usable serial
    programming board and a BASIC compiler. Affordable. Used 'em
    for many projects. The 't' is for 'time' ... RTC included.

    Oh, if nobody's ever noticed, the Ard UNO has a SOCKETED chip. You
    can use the Uno as the programming fixture, put in a new chip,
    program it ... stick the chips into your OWN custom boards. Just
    enough zap for lots of things (and a good low-power library for like
    solar-powered projects).

    Usually. Speaking of parts shortages...

    https://store.arduino.cc/products/arduino-uno-rev3-smd

    Never saw a shortage of UNO chips ......

    Anyway, they were just fast/capable enough and CHEAP
    enough for a variety of projects. Good dev environment.

    TODAY ... maybe PICOs are the better path ... but they
    may not be BEST for every app. I admit I do like the
    idea of "JUST Enough" ... the PIC 12F-xxx chips still
    have a special place in my heart :-)

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Lawrence D'Oliveiro on Thu Mar 27 04:13:41 2025
    On 3/27/25 12:42 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 11:21:23 +0100, Marc Haber wrote:

    Don't love UEFI at all

    You should! It's neat.

    The idea may seem good, the execution seems to leave something to be
    desired. It’s supposed to be OS-independent, but in practice the vendors only test that it boots Windows OK before shipping. So it’s left to the developers of the other OSes (mainly Linux, of course) to add hacks to
    work around all the bugs and gaps in their implementations of the spec.

    Yep ... wound up seriously dedicated to Winders.

    Tricks/tweaks/pain associated with making it work OK
    with Linux and other stuff.

    STILL worry about it being 'vulnerable' - spying,
    hacking.

    IF it's practical to get non-UEFI boot then I still
    go that way.

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  • From Anssi Saari@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Thu Mar 27 11:41:28 2025
    The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> writes:

    Cant program 8051 in C IIRC

    Both Keil and IAR have sold C compilers for it. I don't know if those
    are still available.

    I do sometimes wonder what people use to develop for their 8051s
    today. For example, I bought a little solder-it-yourself desktop clock
    kit available for peanuts and it has some Chinese 8051 variant on it. No software source unfortunately.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Lawrence D'Oliveiro on Thu Mar 27 05:41:38 2025
    On 3/27/25 2:17 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
    On Sun, 23 Mar 2025 11:58:32 -0400, David W. Hodgins wrote:

    uefi is a mini operating system developed primarily for the purpose of
    making it harder for other operating systems to be used, and to boost pc
    sales. The attack surface it exposes allows undetectable root kits to
    be installed, or machines to be easily bricked just by deleting the
    efivars from the nvram.

    Harsh ... but fair ...

    Very fair - and perhaps increasingly relevant

    UEFI, imho, was originally promoted by M$ to SCREW
    the Linux/Unix world. We worked AROUND it quickly
    of course, but it WAS intended as a knife to the heart.

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  • From Marc Haber@21:1/5 to c186282@nnada.net on Thu Mar 27 16:49:12 2025
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    UEFI, imho, was originally promoted by M$ to SCREW
    the Linux/Unix world.

    You're entitled to your opinion, of course, but is tehre actual
    evidence about this?

    --
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Rhein-Neckar, DE | Beginning of Wisdom " |
    Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 6224 1600402

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  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Thu Mar 27 18:09:44 2025
    On Thu, 27 Mar 2025 03:51:30 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    Never saw a shortage of UNO chips ......

    https://www.seeedstudio.com/blog/2022/05/24/three-alternatives-to- atmega-328p-au-microcontroller-to-bypass-the-chip-crisis/

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DA6pHT-2fXs

    Those talk about the AU but I believe the PU was also tight. Remember
    covid? Climate problems in Texas? The CF in Ukraine disrupting the neon supply?

    Reading between the lines there is also validation of the wisdom of not
    using a chip in your design that is used in the automotive industry.
    They'll suck the well dry.

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  • From Richard Kettlewell@21:1/5 to rbowman on Thu Mar 27 18:55:59 2025
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> writes:
    On Thu, 27 Mar 2025 03:51:30 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    Never saw a shortage of UNO chips ......

    https://www.seeedstudio.com/blog/2022/05/24/three-alternatives-to- atmega-328p-au-microcontroller-to-bypass-the-chip-crisis/

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DA6pHT-2fXs

    Those talk about the AU but I believe the PU was also tight. Remember
    covid? Climate problems in Texas? The CF in Ukraine disrupting the neon supply?

    Reading between the lines there is also validation of the wisdom of not
    using a chip in your design that is used in the automotive industry.
    They'll suck the well dry.

    Doesn’t help, vendors will pull production capacity from the chips you
    want if they can make more money elsewhere (e.g. automotive).

    We switched to FPGA instead, a decision that is likely to keep rewarding
    us for years.

    --
    https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

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  • From Computer Nerd Kev@21:1/5 to Anssi Saari on Fri Mar 28 07:44:33 2025
    Anssi Saari <anssi.saari@usenet.mail.kapsi.fi> wrote:
    The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> writes:

    Cant program 8051 in C IIRC

    Both Keil and IAR have sold C compilers for it. I don't know if those
    are still available.

    I do sometimes wonder what people use to develop for their 8051s
    today. For example, I bought a little solder-it-yourself desktop clock
    kit available for peanuts and it has some Chinese 8051 variant on it.

    The Chinese are still releasing new 8051 variants with all the
    latest peripherals built-in. I expect SDCC is popular as a C
    compiler for those.

    --
    __ __
    #_ < |\| |< _#

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  • From Computer Nerd Kev@21:1/5 to Lawrence D'Oliveiro on Fri Mar 28 07:28:26 2025
    Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
    On 23 Mar 2025 07:49:11 +1000, Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

    ... after which the kernel can set up the partition it
    wants to use as / and chroot to that.

    pivot_root(2), not chroot(2).

    Hmm, looks like switch_root is another option and what I've
    actually been using.

    --
    __ __
    #_ < |\| |< _#

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  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to Richard Kettlewell on Thu Mar 27 23:53:48 2025
    On Thu, 27 Mar 2025 18:55:59 +0000, Richard Kettlewell wrote:

    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> writes:
    On Thu, 27 Mar 2025 03:51:30 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    Never saw a shortage of UNO chips ......

    https://www.seeedstudio.com/blog/2022/05/24/three-alternatives-to-
    atmega-328p-au-microcontroller-to-bypass-the-chip-crisis/

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DA6pHT-2fXs

    Those talk about the AU but I believe the PU was also tight. Remember
    covid? Climate problems in Texas? The CF in Ukraine disrupting the
    neon supply?

    Reading between the lines there is also validation of the wisdom of not
    using a chip in your design that is used in the automotive industry.
    They'll suck the well dry.

    Doesn’t help, vendors will pull production capacity from the chips you
    want if they can make more money elsewhere (e.g. automotive).

    In the '80s Motorola was known for reverting to their motor roots. Today
    it's even more of a minefield. How much of a choke point is TSMC? IBM sold their fabs to Global and that had a rocky beginning. Intel, who knows what they're going to do?

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to rbowman on Fri Mar 28 05:16:15 2025
    On 3/27/25 2:09 PM, rbowman wrote:
    On Thu, 27 Mar 2025 03:51:30 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    Never saw a shortage of UNO chips ......

    https://www.seeedstudio.com/blog/2022/05/24/three-alternatives-to- atmega-328p-au-microcontroller-to-bypass-the-chip-crisis/

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DA6pHT-2fXs

    Those talk about the AU but I believe the PU was also tight. Remember
    covid? Climate problems in Texas? The CF in Ukraine disrupting the neon supply?

    Reading between the lines there is also validation of the wisdom of not
    using a chip in your design that is used in the automotive industry.
    They'll suck the well dry.


    Well, I recently bought a 5-pack of those chips
    from Amazon for about $1.25 each ... so I don't
    see any 'shortage'.

    The global situation can, and will, cause various
    kinds of chip issues over the next 5 years. If
    China blockades Taiwan soon, before much in the
    way of Euro/US chip factories can get on line
    then it'll be BAD. The factories that do exist
    will be mostly directed to produce 'defense'
    items, not consumer goods.

    Oh, one another note, have had issues with that N150
    BeeLink and MX. Tried to clone the old box, seemed
    to go OK, but after installing the thing would hang
    up at a terminal login-in prompt for no good reason.
    Tried to install from a native MX Live and same effect.

    Fedora live WOULD boot and autologin to GUI like I
    wanted ... so the issue is MX. Got an ISO of the
    MX-AHS ... supposedly better support for 'new'
    hardware, a slightly newer kernel too. I'll try
    that soon. Alt would be to try Mint instead.
    I'd rather stick to the DebiVerse since I know
    its tricks better.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From c186282@21:1/5 to All on Fri Mar 28 07:21:53 2025
    Note : MX-AHS fixed it.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to Lawrence D'Oliveiro on Fri Mar 28 14:49:02 2025
    On 2025-03-26 22:00, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 14:17:25 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    I read somewhere, long ago, that sticks and memory cards were actually
    optimized for FAT, by having the pages under the start of the disk
    significantly smaller. Ie, optimized for having more writes in the FAT
    area.

    Not sure how that’s supposed to benefit the wear-levelling algorithm. The whole point of wear-levelling is that successive writes to the same
    logical sector do not necessarily end up in the same physical location.

    Doesn't matter.

    sticks and cards do not have wear levelling.

    And if they did, smaller write chunks in the FAT area reduces the number
    of writes per chunk. They would have to consider two areas, though,
    because of the different write chunk size.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Fri Mar 28 18:51:33 2025
    On Fri, 28 Mar 2025 05:16:15 -0400, c186282 wrote:


    Well, I recently bought a 5-pack of those chips from Amazon for about
    $1.25 each ... so I don't see any 'shortage'.

    Shortages come and go like the price of gas. Remember the toilet paper
    shortage in 2020? Remember when video cards were unobtanium because the
    bit miners snapped them up? The articles I referenced were post covid not
    what Amazon had last week.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to Carlos E.R. on Fri Mar 28 21:18:51 2025
    On Fri, 28 Mar 2025 14:49:02 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    sticks and cards do not have wear levelling.

    Then they would benefit from using a filesystem format that integrates wear-levelling in its storage-allocation algorithms, like the
    aforementioned F2FS or NilFS2.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Carlos E.R.@21:1/5 to Lawrence D'Oliveiro on Fri Mar 28 23:17:49 2025
    On 2025-03-28 22:18, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
    On Fri, 28 Mar 2025 14:49:02 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    sticks and cards do not have wear levelling.

    Then they would benefit from using a filesystem format that integrates wear-levelling in its storage-allocation algorithms, like the
    aforementioned F2FS or NilFS2.

    Certainly.

    exFAT is one.

    «exFAT (Extensible File Allocation Table) is a file system optimized for
    flash memory such as USB flash drives and SD cards,»

    «exFAT has been adopted by the SD Association as the default file system
    for SDXC and SDUC cards larger than 32 GB.»

    «Linux has support for exFAT via FUSE since 2009.[4] In 2013, Samsung Electronics published a Linux driver for exFAT under GPL.[32] On 28
    August 2019, Microsoft published the exFAT specification[8] and released
    the patent to the Open Invention Network members.[33] The Linux kernel introduced native exFAT support with the 5.4 release in November 2019.[34]»

    (<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExFAT>)


    *Flash optimizations*

    exFAT contains a few features that, according to Microsoft, makes it flash-friendly:

    * Boundary alignment for filesystem structures. The offsets for the
    FAT and the cluster heap is adjustable at format time, so that writes to
    these areas will happen in as few flash blocks as possible.
    * An "OEM parameters" field can be used to record features such as
    block size of the underlying storage. One single type for flash storage
    is pre-defined.[41]
    * The lack of a journal, so that less data is written. (Although
    FAT32 also lacks a journal.)

    The first feature requires support from the formatting software.
    Compliant implementations will follow existing offsets. The OEM
    parameter may be ignored. Implementations may also use TRIM to reduce wear.

    --
    Cheers, Carlos.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Sat Mar 29 13:44:58 2025
    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
      one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial.
    Getting Cmake to do what's wanted is non trivial...

    Ok if micropython gives you a hardon, there is that...

    --
    "When one man dies it's a tragedy. When thousands die it's statistics."

    Josef Stalin

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Sat Mar 29 13:47:44 2025
    On 29/03/2025 00:00, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/28/25 7:18 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 28/03/2025 13:49, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    sticks and cards do not have wear levelling.
    R U sure about that?

    . . .

      According to the (de-facto ad) from here :

      https://www.delkin.com/blog/wear-leveling-usb-flash-drive-basics/

      Most thumb drives do not use leveling, instead it's mostly in
      SSDs and such. However 'industrial' thumb drives - at least
      this corps - DO employ on-chip-controlled leveling algos.

    blah blah 'not all usb sticks use wear levelling BUT OURS DOES' is
    hardly authoritative..:-)

    --
    “Some people like to travel by train because it combines the slowness of
    a car with the cramped public exposure of 
an airplane.”

    Dennis Miller

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sat Mar 29 17:20:25 2025
    On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 13:44:58 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
      one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial. Getting Cmake to
    do what's wanted is non trivial...

    "Getting started with Raspberry Pi Pico-series"

    https://datasheets.raspberrypi.com/pico/getting-started-with-pico.pdf

    If you can't follow that you probably shouldn't be messing with a Pico
    without adult supervision.

    1. Install VS Code
    2. Install the Raspberry Pi Pico VS Code Extension
    3. Compile and run 'blink'

    "The extension will now download the SDK and the toolchain, install them locally, and generate the new project. The first project may take 5-10
    minutes to install the toolchain. VS Code will ask you whether you trust
    the authors because we’ve automatically generated the .vscode directory
    for you. Select yes."

    On some Linux distros you may have to install python, git, tar, and build- essentials.


    Ok if micropython gives you a hardon, there is that...

    https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/microcontrollers/ micropython.html#what-is-micropython


    Or CircuitPython.

    CircuitPython is aimed at newbies.

    https://learn.adafruit.com/getting-started-with-raspberry-pi-pico- circuitpython/overview

    The projects in the documentation follow the RPi MicroPython document so
    it's easy to see the differences. I think they're working on it but CP
    doesn't support interrupts or threading. Interrupts rather than polling
    may or may not be more efficient.

    Or the Arduino framework.

    https://arduino-pico.readthedocs.io/en/latest/

    Either the Arduino IDE v1, v2, or VS Code with the PlatformIO plugin makes
    that pretty painless.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sat Mar 29 19:59:34 2025
    On 29/03/2025 17:20, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 13:44:58 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
      one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial. Getting Cmake to
    do what's wanted is non trivial...

    "Getting started with Raspberry Pi Pico-series"

    https://datasheets.raspberrypi.com/pico/getting-started-with-pico.pdf

    If you can't follow that you probably shouldn't be messing with a Pico without adult supervision.

    You may follow it., bit it doesn't always work...

    1. Install VS Code
    2. Install the Raspberry Pi Pico VS Code Extension
    3. Compile and run 'blink'

    "The extension will now download the SDK and the toolchain, install them locally, and generate the new project. The first project may take 5-10 minutes to install the toolchain. VS Code will ask you whether you trust
    the authors because we’ve automatically generated the .vscode directory
    for you. Select yes."

    On some Linux distros you may have to install python, git, tar, and build- essentials.

    And cmake ...
    Have you actually done this yourself?


    --
    “Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.”

    H.L. Mencken, A Mencken Chrestomathy

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sun Mar 30 00:31:45 2025
    On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 19:59:34 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 29/03/2025 17:20, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 13:44:58 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
      one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial. Getting Cmake to
    do what's wanted is non trivial...

    "Getting started with Raspberry Pi Pico-series"

    https://datasheets.raspberrypi.com/pico/getting-started-with-pico.pdf

    If you can't follow that you probably shouldn't be messing with a Pico
    without adult supervision.

    You may follow it., bit it doesn't always work...

    I'm certain people can figure out how to fuck it up.


    1. Install VS Code 2. Install the Raspberry Pi Pico VS Code Extension
    3. Compile and run 'blink'

    "The extension will now download the SDK and the toolchain, install
    them locally, and generate the new project. The first project may take
    5-10 minutes to install the toolchain. VS Code will ask you whether you
    trust the authors because we’ve automatically generated the .vscode
    directory for you. Select yes."

    On some Linux distros you may have to install python, git, tar, and
    build-
    essentials.

    And cmake ...

    To repeat:

    "The first project may take >> 5-10 minutes to install the toolchain."

    The toolchain includes cmake.

    Have you actually done this yourself?

    Yes, most recently with the Pico2 W I got last week. The Raspberry Pi
    Pico extension allows you to specify the board and correctly handles the
    Pico W and Pico 2 W boards.

    // Pico W devices use a GPIO on the WIFI chip for the LED,
    // so when building for Pico W, CYW43_WL_GPIO_LED_PIN will be defined
    #ifdef CYW43_WL_GPIO_LED_PIN
    #include "pico/cyw43_arch.h"
    #endif

    Because the onboard LED is integrated with the WiFi chip the procedure is
    more complicated than the the non-W blink.

    And before you ask, I have also used CircuitPython, MicroPython, and the Arduino framework with the Pico to compare them. For a Python solution I
    prefer MicroPython since it handles interrupts and _utilizing the second
    core. I have not yet tried the RISC-V core in the Pico 2. MicroPython also
    has a decorator that allows for inline PIO programming that I do not
    believe CircuitPython has.

    The Arduino core approach allows using the C/C++ structure familiar to
    many people but I'm sure at some point if you need to get down into the
    weeds to do bit-twiddling in the registers you would need to use the RPi
    C/C++ SDK.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sun Mar 30 02:59:17 2025
    On 3/29/25 9:44 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
       one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial.

    So what's new in ComputerLand ? :-)

    Getting Cmake to do what's wanted is non trivial...

    Same.

    Ok if micropython gives you a hardon, there is that...

    Not what I like ... full python is OK though.
    In any case, there's a 'C' dev kit for Pico. If
    I get into Pico's that'll be the choice.

    Examples :

    https://www.electronicshub.org/program-raspberry-pi-pico-using-c/

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sun Mar 30 03:14:42 2025
    On 3/29/25 9:47 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 29/03/2025 00:00, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/28/25 7:18 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 28/03/2025 13:49, Carlos E.R. wrote:
    sticks and cards do not have wear levelling.
    R U sure about that?

    . . .

       According to the (de-facto ad) from here :

       https://www.delkin.com/blog/wear-leveling-usb-flash-drive-basics/

       Most thumb drives do not use leveling, instead it's mostly in
       SSDs and such. However 'industrial' thumb drives - at least
       this corps - DO employ on-chip-controlled leveling algos.

    blah blah 'not all usb sticks use wear levelling BUT OURS DOES' is
    hardly authoritative..:-)

    I said it was an ad ........

    Did search Amazon - "industrial flash drive". The
    results were unclear, it mostly just brought up
    the usual spectrum of thumb drives with no mention
    of wear-leveling/toughening. Mostly see "industrial"
    related to the old 'wide' flash cards.

    Those are still used, mostly in pro cameras. Have
    one or two and a USB adapter.

    I know 'industrial' versions of various flash DO exist,
    had to buy some once for a vendors devices. They tend
    to cost twice as much, but have better specs (except,
    often, speed).

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to rbowman on Sun Mar 30 18:10:38 2025
    On 30/03/2025 00:31, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 19:59:34 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 29/03/2025 17:20, rbowman wrote:
    On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 13:44:58 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
      one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial. Getting Cmake to >>>> do what's wanted is non trivial...

    "Getting started with Raspberry Pi Pico-series"

    https://datasheets.raspberrypi.com/pico/getting-started-with-pico.pdf

    If you can't follow that you probably shouldn't be messing with a Pico
    without adult supervision.

    You may follow it., bit it doesn't always work...

    I'm certain people can figure out how to fuck it up.


    1. Install VS Code 2. Install the Raspberry Pi Pico VS Code Extension
    3. Compile and run 'blink'

    "The extension will now download the SDK and the toolchain, install
    them locally, and generate the new project. The first project may take
    5-10 minutes to install the toolchain. VS Code will ask you whether you
    trust the authors because we’ve automatically generated the .vscode
    directory for you. Select yes."

    On some Linux distros you may have to install python, git, tar, and
    build-
    essentials.

    And cmake ...

    To repeat:

    "The first project may take >> 5-10 minutes to install the toolchain."

    The toolchain includes cmake.

    It doesnt. I insalled ity yesreday again.
    It didnt include cmake.




    --
    The biggest threat to humanity comes from socialism, which has utterly
    diverted our attention away from what really matters to our existential survival, to indulging in navel gazing and faux moral investigations
    into what the world ought to be, whilst we fail utterly to deal with
    what it actually is.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Sun Mar 30 18:11:16 2025
    On 30/03/2025 07:59, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/29/25 9:44 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
       one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial.

      So what's new in ComputerLand ?  :-)

    Getting Cmake to do what's wanted is non trivial...

      Same.

    Ok if micropython gives you a hardon, there is that...

      Not what I like ... full python is OK though.
      In any case, there's a 'C' dev kit for Pico. If
      I get into Pico's that'll be the choice.

    It works, but its a fairly steep learning curve

      Examples :

      https://www.electronicshub.org/program-raspberry-pi-pico-using-c/

    --
    The biggest threat to humanity comes from socialism, which has utterly
    diverted our attention away from what really matters to our existential survival, to indulging in navel gazing and faux moral investigations
    into what the world ought to be, whilst we fail utterly to deal with
    what it actually is.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Sun Mar 30 18:19:29 2025
    On Sun, 30 Mar 2025 02:59:17 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    Not what I like ... full python is OK though.
    In any case, there's a 'C' dev kit for Pico. If I get into Pico's
    that'll be the choice.

    Examples :

    https://www.electronicshub.org/program-raspberry-pi-pico-using-c/

    I have a couple of versions of the Raspberry Pi Pico SDK documentation.
    The older one follows the website steps. The newer one starts with
    installing VS Code and the Raspberry Pi Pico extension. The extension
    handles most of the heavy lifting, both in downloading the latest version
    of the tool chain and in building the project.

    The revision history shows "Added documentation on the official Raspberry
    Pi Pico VS Code extension." for the 03 May 2024 revision. Pico 2 support
    was added 8 August 2024. Subsequent releases are mostly fixing typos like 'VSCode' for 'VS Code'.

    MicroPython, Circuitpython, and the Arduino core are not static either.
    Staying current is helpful.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Sun Mar 30 18:26:03 2025
    On Sun, 30 Mar 2025 18:11:16 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 30/03/2025 07:59, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/29/25 9:44 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
       one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial.

      So what's new in ComputerLand ?  :-)

    Getting Cmake to do what's wanted is non trivial...

      Same.

    Ok if micropython gives you a hardon, there is that...

      Not what I like ... full python is OK though.
      In any case, there's a 'C' dev kit for Pico. If I get into Pico's
      that'll be the choice.

    It works, but its a fairly steep learning curve

    Almost everything I've dealt with in the last 50 years has involved a
    steep learning curve. Those that can't keep up either become middle
    managers or baristas.

    When I was a IEEE member most of the people in local chapter were
    classical electrical engineers working for Public Service of New
    Hampshire. Nice guys and they kept the lights on but they weren't on the cutting edge of anything. I would have been bored shitless.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Ant@21:1/5 to c186282@nnada.net on Sun Mar 30 23:48:43 2025
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    ...
    Did search Amazon - "industrial flash drive". The
    results were unclear, it mostly just brought up
    the usual spectrum of thumb drives with no mention
    of wear-leveling/toughening. Mostly see "industrial"
    related to the old 'wide' flash cards.

    Those are still used, mostly in pro cameras. Have
    one or two and a USB adapter.

    I know 'industrial' versions of various flash DO exist,
    had to buy some once for a vendors devices. They tend
    to cost twice as much, but have better specs (except,
    often, speed).

    Do you know which brand and models those were so we can buy them too?
    --
    "And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge ? that you may be filled to the
    measure of all the fullness of God." ?Ephesians 3:17-19. Let's just assume every day is slammy.
    Note: A fixed width font (Courier, Monospace, etc.) is required to see this signature correctly.
    /\___/\ Ant(Dude) @ http://aqfl.net & http://antfarm.home.dhs.org.
    / /\ /\ \ Please nuke ANT if replying by e-mail.
    | |o o| |
    \ _ /
    ( )

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to Richard Kettlewell on Mon Mar 31 01:28:23 2025
    On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 09:13:06 +0000, Richard Kettlewell wrote:

    If you’re thinking of things like F2FS then I doubt it: it is explicitly designed for block devices with a working FTL.

    The article did say that SD cards have that. And presumably USB sticks,
    too.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Lawrence D'Oliveiro on Mon Mar 31 03:57:21 2025
    On 3/30/25 9:28 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
    On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 09:13:06 +0000, Richard Kettlewell wrote:

    If you’re thinking of things like F2FS then I doubt it: it is explicitly >> designed for block devices with a working FTL.

    The article did say that SD cards have that. And presumably USB sticks,
    too.

    Apparently not ALL sticks.

    Sticks REALLY aren't meant for long-term use/storage.
    They're kinda the modern floppies at best. NEVER bet
    on anything being there even 24 hours later - 24 months
    even less. Sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you don't.

    "Industrial Spec" sticks - I listed one ADVERT - may get
    around this. DID look on Amazon for "industrial spec"
    devices ... but its results were very iffy. MOST were
    the old 'wide' SD cards, meant for industry and 'pro'
    cameras and such. I did have to buy a some of those a
    few years ago for a 3rd-party 'device' - they were
    expensive. "Well rated", yes, but expensive.

    SO ... when to use F2SB and such ? NOT so clear.
    If the device has hardware wear-leveling then you
    are slowing it down, maybe working contrary.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to The Natural Philosopher on Mon Mar 31 03:58:43 2025
    On 3/30/25 1:11 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 30/03/2025 07:59, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/29/25 9:44 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
       one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial.

       So what's new in ComputerLand ?  :-)

    Getting Cmake to do what's wanted is non trivial...

       Same.

    Ok if micropython gives you a hardon, there is that...

       Not what I like ... full python is OK though.
       In any case, there's a 'C' dev kit for Pico. If
       I get into Pico's that'll be the choice.

    It works, but its a fairly steep learning curve

    What's new ?

       Examples :

       https://www.electronicshub.org/program-raspberry-pi-pico-using-c/


    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to rbowman on Mon Mar 31 04:16:42 2025
    On 3/30/25 2:19 PM, rbowman wrote:
    On Sun, 30 Mar 2025 02:59:17 -0400, c186282 wrote:

    Not what I like ... full python is OK though.
    In any case, there's a 'C' dev kit for Pico. If I get into Pico's
    that'll be the choice.

    Examples :

    https://www.electronicshub.org/program-raspberry-pi-pico-using-c/

    I have a couple of versions of the Raspberry Pi Pico SDK documentation.
    The older one follows the website steps. The newer one starts with
    installing VS Code and the Raspberry Pi Pico extension. The extension
    handles most of the heavy lifting, both in downloading the latest version
    of the tool chain and in building the project.

    They NEVER make it easy, do they ? :-)

    But - Final Results are what we're interested in.

    LightWeight newbies ... sorry ...... this is
    the Real Stuff ............. used to dealing
    with BYTES of RAM, BYTES of storage, funky
    register tweaks ? That's how yer microwave
    and Mr. Coffee and a LOT of things work under
    the proverbial hood ('bonnet' for Brits).

    The revision history shows "Added documentation on the official Raspberry
    Pi Pico VS Code extension." for the 03 May 2024 revision. Pico 2 support
    was added 8 August 2024. Subsequent releases are mostly fixing typos like 'VSCode' for 'VS Code'.

    MicroPython, Circuitpython, and the Arduino core are not static either. Staying current is helpful.

    I've looked into MicroPython. It's not BAD ... but also
    not everything I'd want. For micro-controllers I'd still
    pref 'C' - no limits.

    "GetFridayPlans.com : They're still trying to shut down
    this legal loophole ..." - real US TV ad on NOW. Worry,
    the product is rejected Chinese stuff. I'm now, so sorry,
    old enough where I might be interested - but then I'm kinda
    a 'Sheldon' tech nerd with zero social life/integration so
    who gives a damn ? Kinda LIKE "low-T" :-)

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to rbowman on Mon Mar 31 04:19:55 2025
    On 3/30/25 2:26 PM, rbowman wrote:
    On Sun, 30 Mar 2025 18:11:16 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

    On 30/03/2025 07:59, c186282 wrote:
    On 3/29/25 9:44 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
    On 29/03/2025 04:18, c186282 wrote:
    For today's uses, esp for newbies, the Pico is likely
       one of your best choices.
    Getting the SDK installed and working is non trivial.

      So what's new in ComputerLand ?  :-)

    Getting Cmake to do what's wanted is non trivial...

      Same.

    Ok if micropython gives you a hardon, there is that...

      Not what I like ... full python is OK though.
      In any case, there's a 'C' dev kit for Pico. If I get into Pico's
      that'll be the choice.

    It works, but its a fairly steep learning curve

    Almost everything I've dealt with in the last 50 years has involved a
    steep learning curve. Those that can't keep up either become middle
    managers or baristas.

    When I was a IEEE member most of the people in local chapter were
    classical electrical engineers working for Public Service of New
    Hampshire. Nice guys and they kept the lights on but they weren't on the cutting edge of anything. I would have been bored shitless.

    Well ..... 'classical' here means "Don't Go Nuts For
    the 'New Stuff'. What works, works.

    So don't EXPECT them to be "exciting" - the JOB is to
    do What Works Fer Sure. They WILL stay five+ years
    behind the proverbial curve for good reasons.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From c186282@21:1/5 to Ant on Mon Mar 31 04:37:43 2025
    On 3/30/25 7:48 PM, Ant wrote:
    c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
    ...
    Did search Amazon - "industrial flash drive". The
    results were unclear, it mostly just brought up
    the usual spectrum of thumb drives with no mention
    of wear-leveling/toughening. Mostly see "industrial"
    related to the old 'wide' flash cards.

    Those are still used, mostly in pro cameras. Have
    one or two and a USB adapter.

    I know 'industrial' versions of various flash DO exist,
    had to buy some once for a vendors devices. They tend
    to cost twice as much, but have better specs (except,
    often, speed).

    Do you know which brand and models those were so we can buy them too?

    Forgotten alas ... try a creative Amazon search.
    You'll get lots of bogus results, so you have to
    look at the detailed descriptions. The "industrial"
    keyword IS important.

    Note those were the "wide", original, SD cards -
    the inch+ large ones with lots of pins. They
    ARE still used for 'pro' equipment. Have a few
    in reserve, somewhere in some box ........

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From The Natural Philosopher@21:1/5 to All on Mon Mar 31 11:48:31 2025
    On 31/03/2025 08:57, c186282 wrote:
    SO ... when to use F2SB and such ? NOT so clear.
      If the device has hardware wear-leveling then you
      are slowing it down, maybe working contrary.

    Not necessarily. depends how much RAM cache it has.
    I remember the day I first booted CP/M *with disk write caching*
    WOW!

    But yes. The only thumb drive I have is used to play music in the car,
    Read only mostly

    Ive got the odd USB drive and portable SSD.

    --
    It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled. Mark Twain

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Charlie Gibbs@21:1/5 to c186282@nnada.net on Mon Mar 31 17:38:25 2025
    On 2025-03-31, c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:

    On 3/30/25 2:26 PM, rbowman wrote:

    When I was a IEEE member most of the people in local chapter were
    classical electrical engineers working for Public Service of New
    Hampshire. Nice guys and they kept the lights on but they weren't on the
    cutting edge of anything. I would have been bored shitless.

    Well ..... 'classical' here means "Don't Go Nuts For
    the 'New Stuff'. What works, works.

    So don't EXPECT them to be "exciting" - the JOB is to
    do What Works Fer Sure. They WILL stay five+ years
    behind the proverbial curve for good reasons.

    My philosophy is that systems should be ugly and boring.
    Ugly as in lacking the eye candy that just gets in the way,
    and boring as in it Just Works without any nasty surprises.

    --
    /~\ Charlie Gibbs | Growth for the sake of
    \ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | growth is the ideology
    X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | of the cancer cell.
    / \ if you read it the right way. | -- Edward Abbey

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From candycanearter07@21:1/5 to sc@fiat-linux.fr on Sun Apr 6 05:10:03 2025
    Stéphane CARPENTIER <sc@fiat-linux.fr> wrote at 16:33 this Sunday (GMT):
    Le 22-03-2025, Computer Nerd Kev <not@telling.you.invalid> a écrit :
    Marc Haber <mh+usenetspam1118@zugschl.us> wrote:
    rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 22 Mar 2025 15:26:55 +0100, Carlos E.R. wrote:

    At home, many people boot multiple operating systems from the same disk; >>>>> UEFI has made this easier.

    Dual boot worked find for years before UEFI. When MS went to secure boot >>>>in Windows 8 it became a major PITA to dual boot before the Linux distros >>>>caught up.

    Dual Boot has always an unstable, fragile PITA.

    The only thing that made it unstable for me was when distros
    switched to Grub 2. So I started throwing that away in favour of
    SysLinux/ExtLinux and things have been easy again.

    No, the only thing that made it unstable was Windows. I don't know how
    it is now, but for years, every Windows update removed anything that
    wasn't its own boot system.


    Windows doing that always seemed like a "plausibly deniable" way to
    discourage it, along with WSL. "Why risk your computer becoming unusable
    when we force you to update, when you can use our built in Linux?"
    --
    user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Lawrence D'Oliveiro@21:1/5 to All on Sun Apr 6 07:07:44 2025
    On Sun, 6 Apr 2025 05:10:03 -0000 (UTC), candycanearter07 wrote:

    "Why risk your computer becoming unusable when we force you to
    update ...

    Which Windows is quite capable of achieving on its own.

    How about a Windows update which breaks your ability to obtain further
    Windows updates?

    <https://www.zdnet.com/article/new-windows-11-24h2-bug-could-block-future-security-updates-see-whos-affected/>

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From rbowman@21:1/5 to All on Sun Apr 6 06:42:22 2025
    On Sun, 6 Apr 2025 05:10:03 -0000 (UTC), candycanearter07 wrote:

    Windows doing that always seemed like a "plausibly deniable" way to discourage it, along with WSL. "Why risk your computer becoming unusable
    when we force you to update, when you can use our built in Linux?"

    They've loosened that up. I installed Fedora 42 directly, not through the Windows store.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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