Networked Media Tank -- Popcorn Hour (PCH) A110

More or less interesting and useful stuff I use on/with my Networked Media Tank Popcorn Hour A-110.

Questions or Feedback --> nmt (at) holyhead.de

Unmount USB drives

Inspired by Automatic Acoustic Management setting changer, I have created a html-file to manually unmount USB drives without telnet access.

Just put the files usb_unmount.html and usb_unmount.cgi (usb_unmount.zip) to your share directory.

To unmount an USB drive, just open usb_unmount.html and invoke usb_unmount.cgi using the link "USB unmount". The CGi shows a list of all mounted USB drives is shown (/dev/sda1 for USB-DRIVE A1, etc). Select the corresponding link to unmount.

My Busybox

I have compiled my own busybox. My latest build is busybox 1.13.3, the files can be found here.

To compile your own version

Install and compile the NMT (SMP8634) toolchain.
For further hints, please refer to the Cross-compilation Toolchain
Note: It's been quite a while that I compiled stuff for my PCH... the above toolchain might no longer work with newer linuxes.

Configure your cross-compile environment:
This is most easily be done by creating a file export_env which sets all environment paths and then importing the settings to your bash using

$ . /path_to/export_env

Sample export_env (adapt TOOLCHAIN path to your needs):

TOOLCHAIN=~/PCH/smp86xx_toolchain.20080505/build_mipsel_nofpu/staging_dir/

export PATH=${TOOLCHAIN}/bin:${PATH}
export CC=${TOOLCHAIN}/bin/mipsel-linux-uclibc-gcc
export LDFLAGS=-L${TOOLCHAIN}/lib
export CPPFLAGS=-I${TOOLCHAIN}/include
export CPP=${TOOLCHAIN}/bin/mipsel-linux-uclibc-cpp
export CROSS_COMPILE=mipsel-linux-uclibc- 
export ARCH=mipsel-linux

Change to your busybox-directory, and issue

make menuconfig

to configure your busybox (you may use my .config file linked above as a start). A simple

make

compiles your busybox. If everything went well, you ./busybox is your own busy-box.

Note: to avoid problems, make root the owner of your busybox binary and give everyone execution rights after installation on your PCH:

chown root: busybox
chmod a+x busybox

My autostart (and autostop) solution

My autostart solution contains the following enhancements

enable telnet login (using login shell)
set /bin/sh shell and password for user root
enhance shell usability: install enhanced busybox, set aliases, etc
add editor pico
save and restore mono settings and bookmarks
adjust power management settings of my internal hard disc

To achieve this, I have added the following code to the beginning of the start() function in /mnt/syb8634/etc/smb.sh (since I have samba always enabled, if you always run the ftpserver, user ftpserver.sh instead; however, it does not make sense to run startup.sh multiple times)

       if [ -x /opt/sybhttpd/localhost.drives/HARD_DISK/.bin/startup.sh ]; then
          /opt/sybhttpd/localhost.drives/HARD_DISK/.bin/startup.sh
       fi

Analogously, I have added the following code to the beginning of the stop() function in /mnt/syb8634/etc/smb.sh

       if [ -x /opt/sybhttpd/localhost.drives/HARD_DISK/.bin/stop.sh ]; then
          /opt/sybhttpd/localhost.drives/HARD_DISK/.bin/stop.sh
       fi

My .bin/startup.sh:

#!/bin/sh
cd /opt/sybhttpd/localhost.drives/HARD_DISK/.bin/

# chsh
sed -e 's#root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/true#root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/sh#' -i /etc/passwd 

mv /etc/profile /etc/profile_orig

cat > /etc/profile <<EOF
test -r \$HOME/.profile  && . \$HOME/.profile
EOF

cat > /root/.profile <<EOF
alias la="ls -la"
alias cdhd="cd /opt/sybhttpd/localhost.drives/HARD_DISK/"
alias pico="/opt/sybhttpd/localhost.drives/HARD_DISK/.bin/nano"
export TERM=linux
EOF

rm /root/.bash*

cp ./busybox-1.13.3 /bin/busybox
# install all applets to /usr/bin
/bin/busybox --install -s

# acoustic management: quiet
./hdparm -M 128
# Advanced Power Management setting (1: max, 254: min, 255: off)
./hdparm -B 254 /dev/hda
# Standby: 10 min
./hdparm -S 120 /dev/hda

busybox telnetd -l /bin/login &

#restore mono settings 
if [ -e mono_bookmark ]; then
  cp mono_bookmark /tmp
fi
if [ -e mono_settings ]; then
  cp mono_settings /tmp
fi

# now, enable telnet, (change dir -> //pch/share/)
#cd ..
#busybox telnetd &

The line

sed -e 's#root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/true#root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/sh#' -i /etc/passwd

can be enhanced to also set a root-password. Simply replace the second ':x:' by ':PasswordHash:'. The PasswordHash can be calcuated by the unix command mkpasswd. Exmaple: the following line sets the password '1234':

sed -e 's#root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/true#root:HX7YXGspliajE:0:0:root:/root:/bin/sh#' -i /etc/passwd

And my .bin/stop.sh:

#!/bin/sh
cd /opt/sybhttpd/localhost.drives/HARD_DISK/.bin/

cp -a /tmp/setting.txt /tmp/mono_bookmark /tmp/mono_settings .

Applications

Nano editor (a pico clone)

Since I am not very used to vi, I have compiled nano for the PCH. The binary can be found here.

You may need to set a valid terminal before starting nano, for example

export TERM=vt100

(TERM=linux should also work).

Lynx (text browser)

I have also successfully compiled lynx for the PCH. The files can be found here. Extract all files of one of the bin-* archives to /share/.bin/ Do not change the path, otherwise lynx will not find its files lynx.cfg and lynx.lss. (The location is hard-coded, and I did not want them to be on the tmpfs or /mnt path.)

Screen

If you need screen, here's my binary.

In case of problems, you might try setting the TERM variable to linux or xterm:

export TERM=linux

I set TERM=linux in my .profile, see my startup.sh above.

Further links

Forum

Wiki and tool-collections

Misc tips

Simple Save&Restore of PCH settings (German)
Persistent settings are stored in /dev/mtd1 and can be read/modified using pflash
How to access the popcorn hour from your webbrowser
Web browser access to the PCH from your PC
Gaya remote control

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