New 1.0.4.6 based custom firmware

[kfurge]

What the next binary will do better?
Jerome

The primary new feature will be the ability to hook into the system binaries. For starters, I'll be redirecting rc, rc.asus, busybox, and sh/ash and their assorted symlinks. For each binary or symlink, you'll have the ability to pre-exec and/or post-exec a user script. You'll also be able to choose whether or not you want the Asus binary to run at all.

This will allow us to add more flexibility to the stock firmware at runtime similar to what we have at startup with rc.local.

It will also help clear up some quirks with optware packages expecting certain versions of certain binaries to reside in bin.

I'll also be adding some more stub directories like /root.

- K.C.

[Stiefel]

While using the custom 1.0.4.6 firmware i got to a point where i got stuck with a device that does not mount the HDD anymore.

In the beginning everything worked fine by following the instructions of the tutorial. I flashed the custom firmware using the routers webpage. Then i was able to make ipkg work, installed dropbear, users, etc. Rebooting was not a problem, everything worked smooth.

Then in a final step I added two things to the rc.local:
1. Start TwonkyMusic
2. Added the 3 suggested lines for HDD spin down

Then I did a reboot. Now apparently something was wrong, the device would not boot in the beginning. I heard the HDD working for 6 seconds, and then a "spin down"-noise. This repeated several times (about 10 Minutes). During that time i could not ping, sometimes i saw a strange "default" WLAN SSID.

After the 10 minutes, I could log in again, but VOLUME1 was not mounted anymore :-(. If i go to "Disk Managment" on the routers page it says: Type: "raw" and Status: "unmounted" !?

Telnet, FTP and CFIS does not work because of this. So i am essentially locked out of the router. The initial telnet trick via CGI also does not work anymore because of this :-(

When i go to "Applications - Basic Config" it says: "Applications is disabled temporarily for building system mirror." !?!?

-----------

I think i may have created a corrupt rc.local. Either the start of the TwonkyServer does hold the script, or more likely the "spin-down" commands do unmount the HDD (since a remount is involved, btw. I have the 250GB version of the WL-700g)

Question 1: when is the rc.local executed? I am wondering how this could affect the boot behaviour?

Question 2: Can anyone suggest a recovery procedure? The most obvious for me was to install the original firmware, which should just ignore the rc.local and boot up fine. However, this did not work: i flashed using the webpage, got only a blank page as result, rebooted after 4 Minutes, but nothing changed.

Question 3: I dont even know how to check if i now have the custom or the original firmware installed :-( Any easy way to see this, e.g. on the routers webpage?

Flashing using the Asus Tools is not possible for me, since i am on MacosX. I will try playing with tftp now.

Any help is highly appreciated :-)

Stefan

[gratitude182]

@stefan

do you have rested the router already?

grat182

[Stiefel]

Thanks gratitude182.

The solution was indeed to hold the reset button until the ready light blinks.

After that all settings were reset and the hdd was mounted again. Then i could use the cgi trick to telnet in again, edit the rc.local, and install the custom firmware again.

I think I could even reproduce the error: it happened again, when i switched on the "User Management" and then rebooted...

So i will leave the user management switched off for now - which means the box will be wide open.

Anyway, TwonkyMusic is now running nicely and I am happy for now...

[gratitude182]

@Stefan

for the usba mode (user mangagment) try this... that should help.

grat182

i had got the same problem... my problems where solved with one of these solutions (with telnet onto the router):

http://www.wl500g.info/showthread.ph...highlight=ubsa

http://www.wl500g.info/showthread.ph...highlight=ubsa

maybe that helps!

grat182

[gratitude182]

@Stefan

i think this one helped for me:

http://www.wl500g.info/showthread.ph...highlight=ubsa

grat182

[medsource]

Does the custom firmware (which still rocks BTW) have the same QOS modules in the kernel as the original firmware??? I ask as I'm having a terrible time trying to layer some bandwidth management on the wl-700ge. I've been running the 1.0.4.6 2a firmware for a few months and want to cap the FTP outbound so my network doesn't become saturated when ftp transfers are going on.

I've tried the GUI interface for the bandwidth shaping (couldn't find any difference)

I've also tried suggestions from other posts (including wondershaper from the 500g section in reference to their own custom firmware). I made progress with wondershaper but even using the default syntax (eg an already functioning script on the 500g) there are errors that come up with invalid arguments in the qdisc syntax (these don't seem to be mentioned as issues for users in the 500g section). These errors made me think about the QOS modules and how they might be different or missing (in part) on the custom firmware kernel for the 700ge series. If they are different from the original firmware this might explain why the GUI bandwidth util doesn't (at least for me) seem to do anything.

Can anyone comment on this???
(I apologise in advance if this question is silly as my Linux knowledge is meager compared to the resident gurus here)

As always, thanx in advance.

[kfurge]

Does the custom firmware (which still rocks BTW) have the same QOS modules in the kernel as the original firmware???

The kernel, and all modules, should be the same though I've never actually confirmed this.

- K.C.

[medsource]

Another proposal for kfurge is to create firmware-kfurge.mk script looking at my firmware-oleg.mk to provide revisable build for wl700g firmware as a package. See http://trac.nslu2-linux.org/optware/...rmware-oleg.mk for example.

In my dealings with oleo (to get a working pure-ftpd in the oleg ipkg which he has almost finished!), he suggested this (the above message). Granted this is over my head (for now at least) but it might be something you'd be interested in?

[kfurge]

In my dealings with oleo (to get a working pure-ftpd in the oleg ipkg which he has almost finished!), he suggested this (the above message). Granted this is over my head (for now at least) but it might be something you'd be interested in?

Thanks for the info. I'll think about it...

- K.C.

[xtin]

Hi,

When I try to follow the steps of the HowTo, i can easily flash and get to telnet. But when i try to untar the packet's i downloaded i get something like this:

# tar xvzf data.tar.gz
#
.
./opt
./opt/bin/busybox
tar: ./opt/bin/busybox: Input/Output error

so i got no write access on that path, altough i'm quite sure i did everything as i should have (tried it several times without success...)

when i do "mount" there are the following entry's in the end:

/dev/se/2 on /shares/MYVOLUME1 type reiserfs (rw)
/dev/se/2 on /opt type reiserfs (rw)
/dev/se/2 on /opt type reiserfs (rw)

it looks quite wrong, but i don't know how to go on =( any ideas?

thanks

Rafael

[back2basic]

when i do "mount" there are the following entry's in the end:

/dev/se/2 on /shares/MYVOLUME1 type reiserfs (rw)
/dev/se/2 on /opt type reiserfs (rw)
/dev/se/2 on /opt type reiserfs (rw)

it looks quite wrong, but i don't know how to go on =( any ideas?

thanks

Rafael

this can be fixed by a simple reboot

[kfurge]

tar: ./opt/bin/busybox: Input/Output error

Input/Output errors usually indicate something very wrong at the device level. Is the HDD ok?

To help debug, please post the last few lines from the output of the 'dmesg' and 'logread' commands to see if the kernel logged any errors.

FWIW, I just configured a new router from scratch and, besides the uclibc package name changing to uclibc-opt, I had no problems.

- K.C.

[xtin]

Thanks for your help! I tried restarting it after flashing without success.

This is the output of logread

Mar  7 10:10:34 printd[379]: Startup
Mar  7 10:10:34 printd[379]: Opened server descriptor 4
Mar  7 10:10:34 printd[381]: Create print queue OfficeJet-G55 device /dev/usb/lp0
Mar  7 10:10:45 utelnetd[573]: utelnetd (port: 23, ifname: br0, login: /bin/login) startup succeeded 
Mar  7 10:10:53 utelnetd: connection from: 192.168.1.50 
Mar  7 10:10:55 login[578]: root login  on `pts/0' 
Mar  7 10:11:53 printd[594]: Startup
Mar  7 10:11:53 printd[594]: bind: Address already in use

The dmesg command does not exist. (?)

if found this in /tmp/var/log/samba.log (proably of no help, but i'm getting desperate)

[2007/03/07 09:10:07, 0] smbd/qos.c:qos_init(143)
QoS is disabled
[2007/03/07 09:10:07, 0] smbd/server.c:main(784)
standard input is not a socket, assuming -D option
[2007/03/07 09:10:08, 0] printing/nt_printing.c:nt_printing_init(298)
nt_printing_init: Failed to open nt drivers database /usr/local/samba/var/lock
s/ntdrivers.tdb (No such file or directory)

edit2:

there really seems to be something seriously wrong. i can't create users via the webinterface, i can't remove a share i addet (getting an input/output error), i can't access the share via smb or nfs (anymore, this worked in the beginning), printer doesn't work either (i could add it on my computer from the network place but it wouldn't print) ...

i guess i'll have to return it to the vendor ...

[Chris Thompson]

Maybee not the exact place to ask this but I have been following this thread, upgrading the software on my wl700ge. I have apart from one issue had compleat sucess.

It has been a steep learning curve for me but it was fun.

My one remaining problem is when, using putty to log on via dropbear to the root I do not know the default password. Or how to change it. I get the message telling me my key or my password is wrong.

How do I change the password and where do I put the authorized_keys file obtained from puttygen? And will it work, what are the files in opt/etc/dropbear/dropbear_dss_host_key and dropbear_rsa_host_key?

I have tried all the user guids, FAQ etc but still no luck

TIA Chris.