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dzz

Member

From: Exmouth, South West England

Registered: 2016-12-01

Posts: 130  

Refracta2usb (non-maintainer) fixes and updates..

I need to use r2u reliably for myself. But there were some issues in the original 2.4.3 to solve:

Parts of the original were no longer working properly, mainly due to upstream changes =>Excalibur.
Some dialogs not displaying well, e.g. off-screen.
Some "wishlist" functions missing but clearly possible, e.g. fix-mbr and reformat.
Not compatible with all DE's without modification.
Probably still some more to do.

Updated (but *experimental* and *non-maintainer*) refracta2usb version, packaged with changelogs and source code:

https://exegnulinux.net/apt/pool/main/r … ~2%2B1.dsc
https://exegnulinux.net/apt/pool/main/r … 2B1.tar.xz
https://exegnulinux.net/apt/pool/main/r … B1_all.deb

Anyone interested in multiboot usb want to test this? Excalibur/freia/ceres? Official maintainer?

kapqa

Member

Registered: 2019-01-02

Posts: 807  

Re: Refracta2usb (non-maintainer) fixes and updates..

thank you,

happen to be in the fortuante situation tho have

1. relatively fresh install of devuan 6 excalibur
2. third nvme that is about to be purged of botched OS
3. wanted to test-try refracta for quite some time

am i right in assumption that with this tool could:

1. make a bootable clone of my fresh install onto a 128 GB usb stick? (would need to exclude only the virtualbox vm's to fit onto 128GB ust-stick)
2. deploy this copy-clone afterwards onto the nvme?

remember to have used knoppix in the past on a portable usb, that was when firefox was still in early version numbers and iceape was still roaming around, and i kinda liked it.

dzz

Member

From: Exmouth, South West England

Registered: 2016-12-01

Posts: 130  

Re: Refracta2usb (non-maintainer) fixes and updates..

You would need a different utility, Refracta Snapshot, to make a bootable ISO image of a running system (essentially, a clone). It's in Devuan repos.

Refracta2usb is used to make the usb itself bootable and deploy an existing ISO image (or files extracted from). Plus other related functions e.g. multiboot layouts, organising boot menus and persistence volumes. The ISO must be <4GB ..

A bootable ISO (any size) anywhere on the same machine can also be started directly from grub, using an entry in /etc/grub.d/40_custom (example only):

menuentry "Vuudu ISO boot" {
  set isofile="(hd0,7)/isos/vuudu/vuudu.iso"
  loopback loop $isofile
  linux    (loop)/live/vmlinuz boot=live findiso=/isos/vuudu/vuudu.iso
  initrd   (loop)/live/initrd.img
}

Last edited by dzz (2026-10-06 12:20:41)

fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 3,004  

Re: Refracta2usb (non-maintainer) fixes and updates..

Thanks! I downloaded it and will start using it.  I think you can stop calling yourself a non-maintainer.

dzz

Member

From: Exmouth, South West England

Registered: 2016-12-01

Posts: 130  

Re: Refracta2usb (non-maintainer) fixes and updates..

Another visit to refracta2usb. Last build working fine (here and so far) but still a few lintian warnings.

I forgot to link this post. It's relevant and the reason I started this: https://dev1galaxy.org/viewtopic.php?id=7173

A suggestion was made there to set up a git repo. That's now done (locally). It's a much easier way to track changes.

I would like to post it to https://git.devuan.org/ but wish to first ask the original maintainer's permission and any suggestions,,

I'm quite new to using git, OK with the actual commands but don't know the general etiquette and proper layouts so well.

Included as branches are snapshots of (some incompletely) tested versions going back to the original 2.4.3 with included deb packages. An automated package build script is in the 'master' branch.

Thanks in advance, original maintainer and anyone else interested.

fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 3,004  

Re: Refracta2usb (non-maintainer) fixes and updates..

Yeah, please do it. I've been meaning to put r2u on gdo starting with the earliest version I could find, but I haven't gotten around to it. I don't have any suggestions right now other than go ahead. It would be a personal repo, so if you screw it up, we can fix it or nuke it and re-do it.

Oldest version I can find right now is 0.9.1 on sourceforge. Somewhere around here I think I still have the original that I got from you. My plan is to start with the oldest I can find and commit that with a version tag, then add each successive version and do the same. That might be overkill.

dzz

Member

From: Exmouth, South West England

Registered: 2016-12-01

Posts: 130  

Re: Refracta2usb (non-maintainer) fixes and updates..

Done: https://git.devuan.org/dzz/refracta2usb .. Backup copies kept in case it gets ****ed.

I like the idea of going back as far as possible, although the older versions won't work properly in current active distributions.

Any suggestions for change, improvement, anyone wants to test, thanks in advance.