HowTo extend flash in BH Images

Shiro

BH-C
Many users already know this but sometimes i read posts about ppl that have flash full expecially in Vu+ Solo, Duo and Uno boxes.

This is funny because in BH images there are two ways to extend flash using usb stick.
As for example if you have a 4 Giga usb and want to use for flash you can

Case 1: Multiboot
1) Flash the box with the latest bh
2) Activate OpenMultiboot (OMB) on your usb
3) Install the same image in multiboot too
4) boot and use the image in multiboot.
In this case you will have all the 4 giga of the usb available for flash under your root folder.

Case 2: Parallel universe
1) Format the stick and mount via device manager in /universe
2) Enter in red panel and jump to "Avalon" universe.
3) Stay in Avalon and live in it.
In this case you will have the root directory with the normal flash but the /etc and /usr tree mounted on your usb stick.
This means that you have the same result to have all the 4 giga available for flash because all the additional software like plugins cams ecc will be installed under the /usr and /etc subfolders so your root directory use will never increase.

Here is an example of a box running on Avalon with 4 Gb usb stick
Code:
root@vuultimo:~# df -h
Filesystem                Size      Used Available Use% Mounted on
ubi0:rootfs            439.1M    82.9M    356.2M  19% /
udev                      2.0M    124.0K      1.9M  6% /dev
/dev/mtdblock2            4.0M    388.0K      3.6M  9% /boot
tmpfs                  134.5M    268.0K    134.2M  0% /var
tmpfs                  134.5M    12.0K    134.5M  0% /tmp
tmpfs                  134.5M        0    134.5M  0% /dev/shm
                          3.8G    71.0M      3.7G  2% /etc
none                      3.8G    71.0M      3.7G  2% /usr

You can see that the root folder is 439.1 MB
But the /etc and the /usr folders are 3.8 G !!
This means that you have 3.8 giga available to to install all your software and addons.

Hope that this is clear.
You will never have problem of available flash in Black Hole image using one of these simply tricks.

Rgds
 
Last edited:

znik

Vu+ Newbie
thanks for the very useful tutorial!
I had continuous green screens until I understood that the internal memory was full! I installed the BH image on a 32GB usb stick and now I have plenty of room to play :dance:
 

sunespeg

Vu+ Newbie
Notice that the BH System Info (blue -> yellow button) will still show the available space on the actual flash,and not the new location.
Instead use "df- h" as shown above to confirm available space on /user & /etc ,although this might be slightly geeky to some.
Even when you press the green button labeled "space", it will still show onboard flash.
Maybe it would be an idea to let one of the gauges indicate actual available space instead,when you are in a universe? (cf is rarely used i think, could be replaced).
 

janisoon

Vu+ Newbie
Many users already know this but sometimes i read posts about ppl that have flash full expecially in Vu+ Solo and Duo boxes.

This is funny because in BH images there are two ways to extend flash using usb stick.
As for example if you have a 4 Giga usb and want to use for flash you can

Case 1: Meoboot
1) Flash the box with the latest bh
2) Activate Meoboot on your usb
3) Install the same image in multiboot too
4) boot and use the image in multiboot.
In this case you will have all the 4 giga of the usb available for flash under your root folder.

Case 2: Parallel universe
1) Format the stick and mount via device manager in /universe
2) Enter in red panel and jump to "Avalon" universe.
3) Stay in Avalon and live in it.
In this case you will have the root directory with the normal flash but the /etc and /usr tree mounted on your usb stick.
This means that you have the same result to have all the 4 giga available for flash because all the additional software like plugins cams ecc will be installed under the /usr and /etc subfolders so your root directory use will never increase.

Here is an example of a box running on Avalon with 4 Gb usb stick
Code:
root@vuultimo:~# df -h
Filesystem                Size      Used Available Use% Mounted on
ubi0:rootfs            439.1M    82.9M    356.2M  19% /
udev                      2.0M    124.0K      1.9M  6% /dev
/dev/mtdblock2            4.0M    388.0K      3.6M  9% /boot
tmpfs                  134.5M    268.0K    134.2M  0% /var
tmpfs                  134.5M    12.0K    134.5M  0% /tmp
tmpfs                  134.5M        0    134.5M  0% /dev/shm
                          3.8G    71.0M      3.7G  2% /etc
none                      3.8G    71.0M      3.7G  2% /usr

You can see that the root folder is 439.1 MB
But the /etc and the /usr folders are 3.8 G !!
This means that you have 3.8 giga available to to install all your software and addons.

Hope that this is clear.
You will never have problem of available flash in Black Hole image using one of these simply tricks.

Rgds

VERY GOOD POST ! :yahoo::lol::kiss:
 

Jarooos

Vu+ Newbie
Why you don`t use very simple way to "extend" flash without addons ,extensions ?

run putty and:

mv /usr/lib/enigma2/python/Plugins/Extensions /XXX
ln -s /XXX/Extensions /usr/lib/enigma2/python/Plugins/Extensions
XXX = usb or hdd
 

AlexWilMac

Moderator
Said that this article is old and there wasn't OpenMultiboot at the time, even if this method worked, you'd just use the USB to put there the plugins.
With OMB, instead, you have in the external (or internal, if it's an internal HDD) device almost the whole image, apart from kernel and maybe something else (as far as I know).
So, skins, addons, settings, everything would reside in the OMB device.
 
Is it not as easy as mounting a usb memory stick and use Teleportation?

I really miss teleportation in OBH Image
 

AlexWilMac

Moderator
I used Teleportation only once, some years ago and I wasn't so enthusiast about it, not to mention some crashes.
I find OMB terribly comfortable. Imagine that, after the first boot, I'm able to work on one of the images installed in omb from another one, because ecah one is located in a different folder. The very same image I use as the main one, everyday, I decided now to run from omb, even if my Solo4K has no RAM issue at all (of course: I use now only OBH and it is not heavy). But I decided so not for extend the ram.
For instance, I can easily overwrite my timers or my autotimers from the current image to another one without problems (instead, when I needed to copy my timers from my computer to my image in flash, it was a funny race against the time because you can't do "live": you have to reboot your image and transfer these file very quickly to the box, before the system starts... terrible.
By OMB, instead, you are completely in control, as I explained in this article:
http://www.vuplus-community.net/boa...fully-take-advantage-of-open-multiboot.34604/
 
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