1.1. Background

The Compaq iPAQ is a highly versatile handheld PC that features a 240x320 colour LCD screen and a vast array of peripherals, thanks to Compact Flash and PCMCIA expansion jackets.

This guide attempts to simplify the process of installing Intimate onto an iPAQ, however, further work needs to be done to automate the process, probably through use of scripting.

Since the original Intimate installer was written, significant development has taken place on bootldr, the program used to boot Linux on the iPAQ. These developments include recognising some of the iPAQ expansion sleeves (e.g. the Compact Flash and PCMCIA sleeves), reading from IDE devices and the ability to read MS-DOS formatted partitions. It is also now capable of booting PocketPC, making it entirely possible to have a dual-boot system, with either PocketPC or Familiar Linux in flash memory, and an OS such as Intimate Linux on an external storage device. It is this dual-boot ability that we will be taking advantage of.

The boot process for Intimate loads a kernel image and an 'initial ram disk' (or 'initrd') from an MS-DOS formatted partition and then executes the kernel. The initrd (a gzipped cramfs image) is then mounted and provides a small selection of programs required to mount the main Intimate disk partition and start it booting.

While this is not necessarily the cleanest way to boot an operating system, it does mean that none of the precious flash is used, so you can install another OS there, be it Familiar Linux or PocketPC.

1.2. Assumptions

To limit the size of this document, several assumptions are made - you MUST meet these before beginning any of the tasks described here. Failure to do so is very unlikely to cause any damage, but it might lead to data loss as it involves formatting certain devices.

1. You have a Compaq iPAQ. Currently the 36xx models are best supported, and 38xx models should now be supported.

2. You have installed bootldr 2.18.54. If you have a previous version of bootldr installed, upgrade instructions can be found here (only the "Installing the Bootldr" section). If you have not yet installed any version of bootldr, installation instructions can be found here.

   We have found that newer versions of bootldr (e.g. 2.19.x and 2.20.x) have some issues booting our initrd's. Investigations are ongoing.

3. You have some kind of storage device on which to install Intimate.

   	Can't I use the built-in flash memory?
   	Intimate will not fit in the 16MB/32MB Flash ROM in a typical iPAQ, you will need an external storage device of some kind. This could either be a large Compact Flash device, such as an IBM Microdrive, or a PCMCIA IDE hard disk. These devices are typically available in anything up to 5GB sizes.

4. Your storage device is partitioned as follows:

   1. Primary Partition 1: 10MB FAT16

   2. Primary Partition 2: ext3

   (the ext3 partition should fill whatever space is left after addition of the FAT16 partition. A typical Intimate install will need this partition to be around 300MB)

   Both partitions should be pre-formatted. You can do this either with another machine (e.g. a laptop or other machine with pcmcia slots) or from the iPAQ itself if you have Familiar Linux installed. Whatever system you are using, once you have partitioned the device (using fdisk, parted, etc.), you can use the command mkdosfs /dev/discs/discX/part1 to make the FAT16 partition and mkfs.ext3 -j /dev/discs/discX/part2 for the ext3 partition (you should replace the block device '/dev/discs/discX/' with the correct path to the block device that represents your storage device). If you are performing these tasks from within Familiar, you will need to install the mkfs commands, which are in the e2fsprogs ipk (e.g. ipkg install e2fsprogs).

   	Does it have to be ext3?
   	For now, yes. ext3is more widely accessible than reiserfs, which in our view makes it more useful for a device like an iPAQ. It is also very important that you create ext3's journal inodes on the partition. Passing "-j" to mkfs.ext3 (as above) will do this automatically, or, if you want to do it seperately, tune2fs -j /dev/discs/discX/part2 will do the trick

1.3. Caveat

As of time of writing, some of the Intimate packages are out of date. Efforts are being made to update these. Contributions are very welcome!