[Arm-netbook] Eoma68 update

[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

---
crowd-funded eco-conscious hardware: https://www.crowdsupply.com/eoma68


On Mon, Jul 24, 2017 at 2:07 AM,  <chadvellacott at sasktel.net> wrote:

>    Any estimate of how much cost it'd add, per unit, to buy big-enough
> microSD-cards for the bigger distributions pledged for, and prepare and test
> the cards?

 i'd need to do it.  times a thousand.  which is why i'm not hugely
keen on the idea.

>  Personally, I'm definitely fine with paying more for this.
>    How about total cost for that?  Depending on the amount, one or more
> persons might wish to make a donation to cover, or help cover, this cost for
> everyone.

 that would be great

> computer OTHER than the EOMA-68 lap-top, or (2) use a "live" version of some
> "Linux-GNU"-distribution, just so that I could (3) download the OS for the
> "EOMA68-A20"-card.

 one option is to get a very small card (512mb, 1gb) and put a
"loader" OS on that.  if they're $0.25 or $0.50 in qty 1000 then
that's worth considering.  instead of $4 for an 8GB card. say.

>  And my current lap-top, seems to not like the libre
> distributions which I have tried on it (at least, endless "sleep" with
> "Trisquel").  Maybe other backers or persons planning to back this, are
> likely to have the same problem if merely given download-scripts?

 exactly.

>      I guess that a different way to put this problem, is-
>    how "important" is it at this stage of EOMA68, to "include" persons who
> are not already running Linux-GNU?

 honestly as this is early-phase anyone should expect to have things
that they'll need to deal with... *but* for those people not able to
cope i expect *you guys* (those with technical knowledge) to help them
out.

>  (Maybe this question is going to only be
> true for the "A20"-cards, because maybe others like "RK3388" shall not have
> this problem.  And the "A20"-cards might not see many production-runs.  But
> I still plan to back at least one "A20"-card.)

 yay.  thank you.

>> and/or to offer much smaller 128 MB or 256 MB microSD cards which have an
>> absolute bare minimum OS on them, with scripts that will download an OS
>> onto
>
>    I have tried hard to practice safe "Internet"-use with the systems which
> I have and previously had (yes, moving from "Microsoft" to a libre "OS",
> should be a quantum leap on that "issue").

 :)

>    How secure would this "bare minimum OS" be, for both down-loading AND
> installing onto a microSD-card (supplied by me)?

 if it's designed properly, none.

>    Ideally, I hope that (1) it does not permit any connections other than
> downloading one of several particular "OS"-images, via "URLs" which are
> white-listed as part of the "bare minimum OS",

 not whitelisted: hard-coded.

> and (2) it afterwards checks
> the image to see whether the crypto-graphic hash (better than MD5) matches
> the hash which the "bare minimum OS" says is valid for that image.

 bittorrent would automatically do that. command-line version is
btdownloadheadless.

 very tired.  stopping here.  sorry. please do carry on the
conversation.  i'll pick it up later.

l
.