Customization stick

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HowTo [ID# 152508]  +/-

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  For Developers

The customization key allows you to install your own set of activities and library content on top of a signed OLPC build. You may want to include a named activity pack in such a key.

Preparing the key:

• Unpack customization-2.zip into the root directory of a USB flash drive.
  • This will create an empty subdirectory 'bundles' and a subdirectory 'boot' containing two files 'runos.zip' and 'actos.zip'.
  • NOTE: this does not currently work when booting from an SDIO card. You must use USB.
  • NOTE: the USB flash drive must be formatted with a VFAT partition, this is the default for larger USB flash drives.
• Optional: Add 'fs.zip' and 'osXYZ.img' from the base build you want to install.
  • This is optional. If no signed base build is present, the activities will still be installed.
  • For example, the files for build 656 are at http://download.laptop.org/xo-1/os/official/656/jffs2/
  • Click here for the list of G1G1_bundled_activities#G1G1_deployment; and click Activities directory to download the latest version of activities that you wish to add to your 'bundles' directory. Or, use the create-customization-key Python script to populate 'bundles'.
  • Only official releases are signed, and have an associated 'fs.zip' file.
• Drag the .xo files (activity bundles) and .xol files (library bundles) you want to install into the 'bundles' directory.
• If you create a zip file containing files named 'frame00.565' through 'frame26.565' and place it in 'bundles' with a name ending in '.pb', you can customize the boot animation. You might also replace the shutdown graphic (but our UL certification depends on displaying the standard graphic).

Using the key:

Once you've created your USB flash drive(s) in this way:

• Insert the USB flash drive into a powered-off XO
• Turn the machine on while holding down all four game pad keys to update to newer build and customize.

The machine will erase all contents of the flash including any existing activation lease or developer key on the XO, install the base build, and then install your custom activity and content set. It will then power-off, and you can remove the USB flash drive and move on to the next XO.

• If you only want to customize:
  • On secure/restricted machines you can turn the machine on; you don't have to hold down any game pad keys.
  • On developer/unrestricted machines on developer machines you will need to hold down the x game key to simulate security.

NOTE: If your machine is unactivated, this key does not perform the activation step for you. You will need to Activate your XO in order to get the machine to boot after this process. Note that you can not put your activation lease on the customization key and expect it to work; it will boot the customization routine instead of booting into the activation routine. Your activation lease file (lease.sig) must be on a different key (or else you must temporarily rename the 'boot' directory on the customization key).

Scaling up

For large-scale country deployments, we provide a tool to convert a customization key into a filesystem image suitable for Quanta to flash onto machines at the factory. See the Image builder page for more information.

See also

Firmware Security explains how the XO firmware handles files like runos.zip and actos.zip at boot time.

Previous Versions:

• customization-1.zip deprecated: this version hangs when unpacking bundles with many files because of a resource starvation bug