Ubuntu Lucid on OLPC XO

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Introduction

This guide describes how to install Ubuntu Lucid (10.04) on the OLPC XO. At the time of writing, Lucid is still in the development phase, but will soon be released in a stable version. The method of installing Ubuntu described herein is aimed at power users who know what they're doing and know what they want - but plain old folks are welcome to give it a try, of course. This guide solves the problem that earlier methods had with Upstart, so we won't have to take a step backwards to sysvinit.

Requirements

You will need a USB flashdrive or an SD card big enough to fit the Ubuntu system, 4 GB should work. You will also need a computer other than the XO, to create the Ubuntu system on. We will be using a virtualisation software on this computer to create the Ubuntu image which will be written to the flashdrive/SD card. I will be using an Ubuntu system (surprise!) with VirtualBox. Qemu should work too.

Creating the Ubuntu Image

Create a disk image in VirtualBox or Qemu, slightly smaller than your destination flashdrive/SD card. Then continue with installing Ubuntu Lucid as you normally would. If you need guidance on how to operate your virtualisation software or install Ubuntu in it, please look elsewhere - the Internet has plenty of guides on that.

Attention: Make sure to use the manual partition editor during the installation, and format the root partition as Ext3. Do not use the default setting of Ext4, as it is not yet supported by the OpenFirmware bootloader in the XO.

After installing Ubuntu and running "sudo apt-get upgrade" to install the latest packages, you might want to install the "Netbook Remix" packages. They give Ubuntu a new desktop interface optimized for netbooks, which works nicely on the XO's small display. To do so, run "sudo apt-get install ubuntu-netbook".

Writing image to the drive

Shut down your virtual Ubuntu machine. Now convert your virtual disk image to a raw format that can be written to your flashdrive/SD card. If you are using VirtualBox, the commandthis is: " If you are

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