Tiny Core Linux is minimalistic operating system booting from small partition into RAM. Wireless, bluetooth, GPIO and camera are extras and need to be loaded from user partition.
We will create a Raspberry Pi Zero W based micro controller that boots fast, can connect to bluetooth control pad, interface with GPIO, motor controller (USB serial) and be maintained through wireless ssh or serial terminal.
Tiny Core image for Raspberry is installed the same way as Raspian and provides rudimentary headless terminal. It includes wired ethernet but no wireless. Unlike with Raspian you can not just install piCore on the Raspberry Pi 4 and then swap the SD Card to a Raspberry Pi Zero.
Because Tiny Core runs in RAM, additional steps are needed for persistent extensions. They are installed on user partition which first needs to be manually extended. Then extensions need to be loaded through startup list or manually. Services on programs can be automatically started by extending the boot script. Configuration files are stored in compressed user data file and are loaded into RAM at boot time.
The more extensions are present and needed the slower the boot. The bare bone system with eth0 has a command prompt in 10 seconds after power on and 5 seconds after splash screen.
TinyCore has useful forum but you should not bother to register. The registration process has multiple steps for human versus bot detection and the registration software is flawed so that even with 100s of retries you can not pass. It takes about 5-10 retries and waiting to pass lockout period to get passed the first step. The second step you can not pass even if you take the odds (1 out of 8x8x8) of trying over and over again hoping that just by chance you will be presented with the correct orientation of tiles. There are suggestions on how to attempt modifying the html code in your browser, but you will be frustrated by the server letting you know that you were trying to hack the process. Neither Chrome, Edge and Firefox will solve the issue.
https://iotbytes.wordpress.com/?s=Tiny+Core
- Download Stable Release for Raspberry Pi
- Extract the img file
- Use Raspberry Pi Imager and custom image option to burn the image file onto SD Card.
Installing WiFi support without a wired internet connection is tricky. Its worth obtaining an USB to Ethernet dongle as well as an USB hub for Raspberry Pi Zero and let the extension server decide on the particular file versions you need:
tce-load -wi wifi.tcx
tce-load -wi firmware-rpi-wifi.tcz
This should automatically obtain the dependencies.
When you inspect the config.txt on the boot partition you can recognize which kernel the hardware is used:
| Raspberry | Kernel | Wifi Driver | Bluetooth Driver |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pi0W | 5.10.77.PiCore | wireless-5.10.77-piCore.tcz | bluetooth-5.10.77-piCore.tcz |
| Pi02W | 5.10.77.PiCore-v7 | wireless-5.10.77-piCore-v7.tcz | bluetooth-5.10.77-piCore-v7.tcz |
| Pi3 | 5.10.77.PiCore-v7 | wireless-5.10.77-piCore-v7.tcz | bluetooth-5.10.77-piCore-v7.tcz |
| Pi4 | 5.10.77.PiCore-v7l | wireless-5.10.77-piCore-v7l.tcz | bluetooth-5.10.77-piCore-v7l.tcz |
Note its version 7 letter l and not number one.
Based on the Kernel you select your download site:
| Version | Archive Site |
|---|---|
| old | http://www.tinycorelinux.net/13.x/armv6/tcz/ |
| v7 | http://www.tinycorelinux.net/13.x/armv7/tcz/ |
| v7l | http://www.tinycorelinux.net/13.x/armv7l/tcz/ |
- From appropriate site above you can download
firmware-rpi-wifi as well as wifi with the extensions *.tcz, *.tcz.dep, *.md5.txt
and the items listed in http://tinycorelinux.net/13.x/armXXX/tcz/wifi.tcz.tree using same extensions (XXX being v7 or v7l or empty).
This is:
- firmware-rpi-wifi.tcz
- wifi.tcz
- wireless_tools.tcz
- wireless-5.10.77-piCoreXXX.tcz
- wpa_supplicant-dbus.tcz
- wpa_supplicant.tcz
- libnl.tcz
- openssl.tcz
- ca-certificates.tcz
- readline.tcz
- ncurses.tcz
- regdb.tcz
- dbus.tcz
- Connect keyboard and display to Raspberry
- Boot Tiny Core.
- After keypairs have been created, execute
backup
After 10secs of powering on there is minimalistic terminal interface.
- to expand the user partition:
sudo fdisk -u /dev/mmcblk0
Then use p and 2 to select partition 2. Take note of start block of partition 2 (e.g. 139264). d then 2 to delete partition 2 and n, p and 2 to create new partition. Use start block of old partition 2. Press enter to select default size which is the max available. w to write results to disk.
sudo reboot and sudo resize2fs /dev/mmcblk0p2 to make the new partition available.
If you don't have a wired internet connection and you copied all necessary files into folder tcz on the boot partition you can obtain the files as listed above and:
sudo mount /dev/mmcblk0p1 /mnt/mmcblk0p1
cp /mnt/mmcblk0p1/tcz /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/optional
chown 1001:staff *.tcz*
chmod 664 *.tcz*
If you already have the extensions you only need:
echo "firmware-rpi3-wireless.tcz" >> /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/onboot.lst
echo "wifi.tcz" >> /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/onboot.lst
tce-load -i firmware-rpi-wifi
tce-load -i wifi-wifi
sudo wifi.sh
If you obtained the wrong files, executing wifi.sh lets you know that it did not find wifi hardware or that it does not have library to read the passphrase.
Once you have successfully connected to an access point you can run
sudo wifi.sh -a
Which will try to connect with stored credentials. The credentials are stored in ~/wifi.db and can be edited with plain text editor.
Defaults are:
username: tc
password: piCore
You can view all extension available at the websites listed above.
You can download a graphical user interface with:
tce-load -wi TC
startx
Next time you can just load the components without downloading:
tce-load -i TC
startx
In the GUI environment and using Apps you can select and download several useful extensions.
Apps -> Cloud -> Browse
| Extension | Notes |
|---|---|
| hostapd | Access point daemon |
| dnsmasq | DNS manipulation |
| samba4 | File Sharing |
| bluez | Bluetooth functionality |
| firmware-rpi-bt | Bluetooth driver |
| libasound | needed to run bluetoothctl |
| nano | Raspi Editor |
To install the extension, select it and for persistent installation choose OnBoot then Go. You can also just download them.
With Apps -> OnBoot Maintenance you can add remove extension that will be loaded at startup.
You can also check if dependencies are met and if any extensions are orphaned.
/mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/onboot.lst is the file that lists all extensions loaded at boot.
You can edit with sudo nano /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/onboot.lst
This is example list for Wifi hotspot and bluetooth functionality:
openssh.tcz
firmware-rpi-bt.tcz
libasound.tcz
bluez.tcz
firmware-rpi-wifi.tcz
wifi.tcz
You need to backup folders from RAM into compressed archive with:
backup
/opt/.filetool.lst lists additional folders to back up and /opt/.xfiletool.lst the ones to exclude. The exclude list supersedes the include list.
/opt/bootlocal.sh is used to start custom program and daemons. More below.
ifconfig -a
sudo wifi.sh
Lets you select wireless access point and connect to it.
You should be able to connect to tinycore from an other computer with
ssh tc@box
Check this if there are issues: https://iotbytes.wordpress.com/configure-ssh-server-on-microcore-tiny-linux/
It also explains how to make password less SSH connection.
When you copy paste from windows into ssh terminal, you might insert CR-LF as line terminator. You only want LF.
sed 's/\r$//' in.txt > out.txt
If you want to use tinycore on Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W, you will want it to automatically connect to Wifi or configure it to behave as access point. You could also use USB OTG cable to ssh into P02W but I have not figured that out yet. For hotspot look into https://blog.waynejohnson.net/doku.php/airflash
For WiFi client and AP: https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/computers/configuration.html#setting-up-a-routed-wireless-access-point
sudo nano /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/starnet.sh
with content
ifconfig wlan0 down
ifconfig wlan0 10.0.0.1 netmask 255.255.255.0 up
then
chmod 755 /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/startnet.sh
touch /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/dnsmask.leases
The end of bootlocal.sh should look like:
# Start openssh daemon
/usr/local/etc/init.d/openssh start &
# Start wlan0
while ! cat /proc/net/dev | grep wlan0
do
echo Waiting for wlan0
sleep 1
done
sudo /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/startnet.sh
# hostapd
hostapd -B /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/hostapd.conf 2>&1 | tee /tmp/hostapd.log
# DNS masquerade
# dnsmasq -C /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/dnsmasq.conf -l /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/dnsmasq.leases
We need to create a hostapd.conf file with sudo nano /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/hostapd.conf
# network interface name
interface=wlan0
# firmware driver name: hostapd, wired, madwifi, test, none, nl80211, bsd
driver=nl80211
# Operation mode: a,b,g,ad,
hw_mode=g
# Channel number if 0 need to set with ifconfig
channel=6
# ieee80211n is enabled
ieee80211n=1
# form802.11a and11a networks parameters will be send to wmm clients
wmm_enabled=1
# 0 accept MAC unless in deny list. 1 deny unless in accept list 2 use external radius server
macaddr_acl=0
# 0 desiabled, 1 send empty SSID, 2 clear SSID
ignore_broadcast_ssid=0
# Where are we operating
country_code=US
# 0 open system authentication, 1 shared key authentication,
auth_algs=1
# 1 WPA, 2 WPA2, 3 both
wpa=2
wpa_key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
wpa_pairwise=TKIP
rsn_pairwise=CCMP
# This is the name of the network
ssid=Urs Tiny Box
# The network passphrase
wpa_passphrase=fluorolog
We also need dnsmasq configuration file: sudo nano /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/hostapd.dnsmasq.conf
interface=wlan0
bind-interfaces
domain-needed
bogus-priv
dhcp-range=10.0.0.2,10.0.0.50,12h
We can test Access Point with
tce-load -i hostapd
sudo hostapd hostapd.conf
We need to configure Samba: sudo nano /usr/local/etc/samba/smb.conf
[global]
workgroup = WORKGROUP
netbios name = AirFlashNetbios
security = user
guest account = nobody
map to guest = Bad User
usershare path = /usr/local/var/lib/samba/usershares
usershare max shares = 100
#turn on usershare. 0 is off.
usershare allow guests = yes
usershare owner only = false
And extend the extension list sudo nano /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/onboot.lst
gmp.tcz
nettle.tcz
libattr.tcz
libattr.tcz
p11-kit.tcz
samba4.tcz
We also want to backup more folder: sudo nano /opt/.filetool.lst
usr/local/etc/samba/
usr/local/var/
And we start samaba at boot time sudo nano /opt/bootlocal.sh
/usr/local/init.d/samba4 start
We need to create the shares:
cd /usr/local/var/lib/samba
sudo mkdir usershares
sudo chmod 1770 usershares
sudo chown -R nobody usershares/
filetool.sh -b
sudo net usershare add sdtest /mnt/sda "" Everyone:F guest_ok=y
sudo /usr/local/etc/init.d/samba4 restart
And we want to create mounting rules: sudo nano /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/999-usb-automount.rules
KERNEL=="sd*", ACTION=="add", SUBSYSTEM=="block", MODE="755", OWNER="nobody", RUN+="/usr/bin/mount /mnt/%k"
KERNEL=="sd*", ACTION=="add", SUBSYSTEM=="block", RUN+="/usr/local/bin/net usershare add %k /mnt/%k '' Everyone:F guest_ok=yes"
KERNEL=="sd*", ACTION=="remove", SUBSYSTEM=="block", RUN+="/usr/local/bin/net usershare delete %k"
KERNEL=="sd*", ACTION=="remove", SUBSYSTEM=="block", RUN+="/usr/bin/fuser -mk /mnt/%k"
KERNEL=="sd*", ACTION=="remove", SUBSYSTEM=="block", RUN+="/bin/umount /mnt/%k"
KERNEL=="sd*", ACTION=="remove", SUBSYSTEM=="block", RUN+="/bin/rmdir /mnt/%k"
Create rules loading script sudo nano /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/startusbautomount.sh
#!/bin/sh
sudo cp /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/999-usb-automount.rules /etc/udev/rules.d/
sudo udevadm control --reload-rules
sudo udevadm trigger
Make script executable and backup:
chmod 755 /mnt/mmcblk0p2/tce/startusbautomount.sh
filetool.sh -b
tr -d '\r' input.txt > out.txt
It is tricky to enable Bluetooth on piCore and connect to devices.
Check following links for any basic Bluetooth setup : Rasp Pi specific :
General Bluetooth setup in Linux distros : 2) *https://www.pcsuggest.com/linux-bluetooth-setup-hcitool-bluez/ 3) *https://www.pcsuggest.com/bluetooth-linux-part-2/
tinyCore keyboard: https://forum.tinycorelinux.net/index.php/topic,25245.msg161269.html#msg161269
other tinyCore posts: http://forum.tinycorelinux.net/index.php/topic,26117.msg167671.html#msg167671 http://forum.tinycorelinux.net/index.php?topic=23895.0 http://forum.tinycorelinux.net/index.php/topic,19481.30.html http://forum.tinycorelinux.net/index.php/topic,24427.0.html https://forum.tinycorelinux.net/index.php?topic=25961.0 http://www.m-opensolutions.com/bluetooth-mouse-on-tiny-core-linux/
Install the necessary extensions. Bluetooth wants the sound drivers too.
tce-load -wi firmware-rpi-bt.tcz
tce-load -wi bluez.tcz
tce-load -wi alsa.tcz
tce-load -wi bluez-alsa.tcz
tce-load -wi libasound.tcz
Optional installation
tce-load -wi blueman.tcz
You can scan, pair and connect to devices in the TC GUI after installaing blueman.tcz. Makue sure bluez service is running in TC.
To start bluetooth controller we create a script.
#!/bin/sh
# Init Bluetooth.
echo "Helle bluetooth1"
#
# tce-load -i bluez
# tec-load -i firmware-rpi-bt
#
sudo modprobe uhid
sudo modprobe uinput
sudo modprobe joydev
sudo modprobe rfkill
sudo modprobe ecc
sudo modprobe ecdh_generic
sudo modprobe bluetooth
sudo modprobe btbcm
sudo modprobe hci_uart
# list all loaded modules and who is using them
# - lsmod
# check on system errors
# - dmesg
sudo /usr/local/etc/init.d/dbus start
sudo /usr/local/etc/init.d/bluez start
sleep 1
sudo /usr/local/etc/init.d/dbus start
# firmware upload command sometimes times out on the first attempt
until sudo hciattach -t 10 /dev/ttyAMA0 bcm43xx 921600 noflow
do
echo hciattach returned $?
echo retrying hciattach
done
sleep 1
bluetoothctl power on
bluetoothctl pairable on
Make the bluetooth start script bootable and back it up
chmod 755 bt_start.sh
backup
Make sure that UserspaceHID=true is set in /usr/local/etc/bluetooth/input.conf
Set AutoEnbale=true in /usr/local/etc/bluetooth/main.conf otherwise the trusted devices will not connect by themselves.
Uncomment ReconnectionAttemps=7 and ReconnectionIntervals=1,2,4,8,16,32,64 it might help with reconnecting.
To permanently install devices you need to manually pair and trust them and then include the keys to /opt/.filetools.lst
bluetoothctl
scan on
Wait for any pairing keys and enter them on the bluetooth device if prompted.
pair 00:00:00:33:9B:58
trust 00:00:00:33:9B:58
connect 00:00:00:33:9B:58
This will only work if appropriate system device drivers are available. Not all necessary device drivers are included in the piCore distro and there are additional modules available in the modules archive. For Pi Zero 2 obain http://tinycorelinux.net/13.x/armv7/releases/RPi/src/kernel/5.10.77-piCore-v7_modules.tar.xz Check for the appropriate archive in config.txt on boot device. It lists which piCore is loaded for which board. There is v6, v7, c7l.
Extract joydev.ko and copy to /lib/modules/5.10.77-piCore-v7/kernel/drivers/input`` and then add its path to backup list sudo nano /opt/.filetool.lst```
Add kernel/drivers/input/joydev.ko: to the end of /lib/modules/5.10.77-piCore-v7/modules.dep
Also add modules.dep to backup list.
Create script top start gamepad from know device MAC address. sudo nano /home/tc/bt_gamepad.sh
Might need
libevdev-dev.tcz libevdev.tcz libudev-dev.tcz libudev.tcz
#!/bin/sh
# Connect to bluetooth device with mac or ID listed in file
if [ -s "/home/tc/btdev_controller.lst" ]
then
echo Searching for bluetooth controllers...
dev=
while [ -z "$dev" ]
do
sleep 1
dev="`bluetoothctl devices | grep -f /home/tc/btdev_controller.lst`"
done
mac=`expr "$dev" : 'Device \(..:..:..:..:..:..\) '`
sudo bluetoothctl power on
sudo bluetoothctl pairable on
# sudo bluetoothctl pair $mac
sudo bluetoothctl connect $mac
fi
Add the file above to backup list with sudo nano /opt/.filetools.lst
We need to create the gamepad device name: sudo nano /home/tc/btdev_controller.lst for example
Umido ESoul DH2
Test the setup
startx
Play with joystick. Mouse shold move.
bluealsa -S &
Create a config file like bluetooth speakers sudo nano /etc/asound.conf
defaults.bluealsa.service "org.bluealsa"
defaults.bluealsa.device ""
defaults.bluealsa.profile "a2dp"
pcm.!default {
type plug
slave {
pcm "bluealsa"
}
}
Add the file abvoe to backup list with sudo nano /opt/.filetools.lst
Automatically connecting to speakers with script sudo nano /home/tc/bt_speaker.sh
#!/bin/sh
# Connect to bluetooth device with mac or ID listed in file
if [ -s /home/tc/btdev_audio.lst ]
then
echo Searching for bluetooth speakers...
dev=
while [ -z "$dev" ]
do
sleep 1
dev="`bluetoothctl devices | grep -f /home/tc/btdev_audio.lst`"
done
mac=`expr "$dev" : 'Device \(..:..:..:..:..:..\) '`
sudo bluetoothctl pair $mac
sudo bluetoothctl connect $mac
sed -i "s/defaults.bluealsa.device \".*\"/defaults.bluealsa.device \"$mac\"/" /etc/asound.conf
fi
You need to either modify /usr/local/etc/dbus-1/system.d/bluealsa.conf (and add it to /opt/.filetool.lst) to allow the "staff" group to access Bluetooth audio, or create an "audio" group and add users to that. Otherwise you'll only be able to play through the speaker from programs running as root. ...
We need to create device pattern: sudo nano /home/tc/btdev_audio.lst
Name of your speakers here
Test the setup
tce-load -i alsa-utils
aplay test.wav
TBD
TBD
We need to back up the paired devices /var/lib/bluetooth/nn:nn:nn:nn:nn:nn so that devices can get paired automatically by addign sudo nano /opt/filetool.lst. We need to add the var/lib/bluetooth as well as var/lib/bluetooth//cache/```.
var/lib/bluetooth/00:15:83:D2:28:ED/cache or
var/lib/bluetooth/00:15:83:D2:28:ED/cache/00:04:20:F2:46:E6
Because cache is in /opt/.xfiletool.lst we had to explicityly add the cache folders. cache is in exclude folder because webbrowser cache can be large.
tce-load -i binutils
tce-load -i gcc
tce-load -i gcc_base-dev
tce-load -i gcc_libs
tce-load -i gcc_libs-dev
tce-load -i compiletc
tce-load -i python3.8
tce-load -i python3.8-dev
tce-load -i python3.8-pip
tce-load -i python3.8-setuptools
# tce-load -i libbluetooth-dev
# tce-load -i glib2-dev
# tce-load -i boost-dev
sudo date -s 2023.04.19-19:35
Installing from source
mkdir ~/python
cd ~/python
pip3 download evdev
python3 setup.py config
python3 setup.py build
sudo pip3 install -e .
Or directly
sudo pip install evdev # available globally
pip install --user evdev # available to the current user
pip3 install joystick
python-evdev https://python-evdev.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ https://youtu.be/Ro4wRQGtnBw+
tce-load -i py3.8ser
Create udev rules sudo nano /etc/udev/rules.d/99-com.rules
SUBSYSTEM=="input", GROUP="staff", MODE="0660"
SUBSYSTEM=="i2c-dev", GROUP="staff", MODE="0660"
SUBSYSTEM=="spidev", GROUP="staff", MODE="0660"
SUBSYSTEM=="bcm2835-gpiomem", GROUP="staff", MODE="0660"
SUBSYSTEM=="gpio", GROUP="staff", MODE="0660"
SUBSYSTEM=="gpio*", PROGRAM="/bin/sh -c '\
chown -R root:staff /sys/class/gpio && chmod -R 770 /sys/class/gpio;\
chown -R root:staff /sys/devices/virtual/gpio && chmod -R 770 /sys/devices/virtual/gpio;\
chown -R root:staff /sys$devpath && chmod -R 770 /sys$devpath\
'"
KERNEL=="ttyAMA[01]", PROGRAM="/bin/sh -c '\
ALIASES=/proc/device-tree/aliases; \
if cmp -s $ALIASES/uart0 $ALIASES/serial0; then \
echo 0;\
elif cmp -s $ALIASES/uart0 $ALIASES/serial1; then \
echo 1; \
else \
exit 1; \
fi\
'", SYMLINK+="serial%c"
KERNEL=="ttyS0", PROGRAM="/bin/sh -c '\
ALIASES=/proc/device-tree/aliases; \
if cmp -s $ALIASES/uart1 $ALIASES/serial0; then \
echo 0; \
elif cmp -s $ALIASES/uart1 $ALIASES/serial1; then \
echo 1; \
else \
exit 1; \
fi \
'", SYMLINK+="serial%c"
Update backup rules by adding rules to sudo nano /opt/.filetools.lst
sudo bluetoothctl
power on
discoverable on
pariable on
scan on
pair 00:00:00:33:9B:58
trust 00:00:00:33:9B:58
connect 00:00:00:33:9B:58
pair off
https://iotbytes.wordpress.com/control-raspberry-pi-gpio-pins-with-picore-and-rpi-gpio/
tce-load -wi python3.8.tcz
tce-load -wi python3.8-rpi-gpio.tcz
mkdir /home/tc/python
nano /home/tc/python/blink.py
sudo echo '/home/tc/python' >> /opt/.filetool.lst
sudo echo '# sudo python /home/tc/python/blink.py' >> /opt/bootlocal.sh
dbus sudo /usr/local/etc/init.d/dbus start sudo /usr/local/lib/bluetooth/bluetoothd -nd blutoothctl