Raspberry Pi Pre Initialization for Debian Stretch

Purpose

This program lets you set your Raspberry Pi up solely by writing to the /boot partition (i.e. the one you can write from most computers!).

It allows you to distribute a small .zip file to set up a Raspberry Pi to do anything. You tell the user to unzip it over the top of the Pi's boot partition - the system can set itself up perfectly on the first boot.

This package contains run-once.d and on-boot.d directories having bash-scripts. These scripts are being executed on start up.

Trying it out

• Download and write a standard Raspbian Image, e.g. the Raspbian Stretch Lite (tested on October 2018 version).
• Copy the content of this project's boot folder to the microSD card's /boot partition.
• Remove the SD card and put it into your Pi.

The Raspberry Pi should now boot several times. The first boot takes 2-5 minutes depending on your network, and which model of Raspberry Pi you use (I tested with model 3B+ and ZeroW).

Scripts from run-once.d folder are being executed once only, and then moved to run-once.d/completed folder.

Scripts from on-boot.d folder are being executed every time the devices boots up.

Building pi-init3

You will need golang installed (I'm currently using 1.10)

root@hostname:~# sudo apt install golang

There is a Makefile in the root of this project. Calling

root@hostname:~# make

will compile the main.go (source code) and create boot/pi-init3.

Alternatively, you can do the following

root@hostname:~# GOOS=linux GOARCH=arm GOARM=5 go build -o boot/pi-init3 .

How it works

This is really cool. The cmdline.txt specifies an init=/pi-init3 kernel argument to use a custom binary in this package in place of the usual systemd init. That binary holds everything except for the cmdline.txt file (that would be a chicken-egg problem) and the run-once.d which you will modify to script your desired setup.

How/Why you should incorporate this project into your Raspberry Pi project

If you have a project you expect someone to run on an RPi (especially if it would be the RPi's single purpose) you could provide your own run-once.d/ scripts that will clone your project, configure, and install it.

Credits

Credits go to the following projects:

• gesellix/pi-init2: This is the original fork, the fork-chain that led us here started with,
• RichardBronosky/pi-init2: This is a direct fork (^c^) on which this project is based on,

Any contributions appreciated!

Troubleshooting

1. Stuck on boot Solution: The microSD card's /boot partition contains cmdline.txt file right after burning a fresh image. Find root=PARTUUID=##PARTUUID##-02 text in it. Copy ##PARTUUID## and replace it in cmdline.txt.orig file before copying boot folder to the microSD card's /boot partition.

2. Scripts from run-once.d have not been moved to run-once.d/completed folder after boot Scripts in run-once.d and on-boot.d folders must have a unix end-line format (LF) and not windows-like (CR LF).

Enjoy! :)