$ smbclient -L //localhost/
Domain=[NAS] OS=[Unix] Server=[Samba 3.0.26a]

        Sharename       Type      Comment
        ---------       ----      -------
        TTTTTTTTTTTT    Disk
        llllll          Disk
        IIIII           IPC       IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
Domain=[NAS] OS=[Unix] Server=[Samba 3.0.26a]

        Server               Comment
        ---------            -------

        Workgroup            Master
        ---------            -------
        WORKGROUP

that is every “share” appears with first letter of share name, repeated length+1 chars of the name length.

This is caused by a bug of gcc compiler for ARM, that fails code generation if you use any level of optimization. This bug affect Samba up to release 3.0.28-1, and will be corrected in the 3.0.28-2 release of the Debian package.

References:

• Debian bug report #445566
• Honza Stastny website, that talk about this bug, and the battle to bring Samba to life on his Mybook

Note

The disk I installed on my Mybook (the one I use to made all the tests) fails, without warning, after less than five months. Having smartd installed not helped at all…
So I’m currently unable to do more tests, or give any help.
I’m sorry.

The main reason is those backups are made with partition imaging software (like Partition Magic or Partimage), and some guide includes instruction to save partition table and MBR, too. Right, but there are more data on disk that needs to be saved, and that cannot be recovered in any other way that do a raw image of a number of sector at the start of the disk.

Mybook disk configuration

In picture you can see schematic of the typical WD Mybook WE disk. At the start (in absolute sector 0) there are MBR and partition table (in blue). The partition table point to partitions, stored after some hundred of sector away (in yellow). The original partition table of Mybook place the first partition start on cylinder 4, that is over 48,000 sectors far away from MBR.

Why?

Because in that space there is some software that is vital for Mybook startup process: the bootloaders (in red in figure)!

So, if you want a really complete and working backup, you must save all this sectors in a raw file, using Linux command dd.

A rough procedure can be: use sfdisk to get the exact sector of start of partition sda1:

# sfdisk -d /dev/sda
# partition table of /dev/sda
unit: sectors

/dev/sda1 : start=    48195, size=  5879790, Id=fd
/dev/sda2 : start=  5927985, size=   208845, Id=fd
/dev/sda3 : start=  6136830, size=  1975995, Id=fd

In this example sda1 starts at sector 48195. Well, when we save the MBR we use the command:

# dd if=/dev/sda of=sda-mbr bs=512 count=1

But this save only first sector. We need to save all the sector up to start of sda1 partition, so the command must be:

# dd if=/dev/sda of=sda-mbr bs=512 count=48195

Of course, change the number 48195 to match your disk configuration.
So, now we have the content of the entire space from MBR to start of sda1 partition, with all the bootloaders included.

Now the backup is really complete.

Using mldonkey on the Revived Mybook we have a complete peer to peer client with web interface. It uses edonkey/emule and bittorrent protocols/networks.

As usual, first step is installing mldonkey:

# apt-get install mldonkey-server
. . .

During installation, apt asks for automatically launch mldonkey on system startup. We can reply affirmatively.
As the installation end, we have mldonkey up and running, but we have two problems:

• mldonkey places all working and temp files in /var/lib/mldonkey. If we use a partitioning scheme with root filesystem and home filesystem this lead to fill root partition and cause malfunctions on Mybook.
• mldonkey web interface is accessible only from 127.0.0.1, that is useless.

So, we stop mldonkey server:

# /etc/init.d/mldonkey-server stop

then move the working directory in the /home partition:

# mv /var/lib/mldonkey /home

and set the new working dir in file /etc/default/mldonkey-server that is:

# MLDonkey configuration file
# This file is loaded by /etc/init.d/mldonkey-server.
# This file is managed using ucf(1).

MLDONKEY_DIR=/var/lib/mldonkey
MLDONKEY_USER=mldonkey
MLDONKEY_GROUP=mldonkey
MLDONKEY_UMASK=0022
LAUNCH_AT_STARTUP=true
MLDONKEY_NICENESS=0

in that way:

# MLDonkey configuration file
# This file is loaded by /etc/init.d/mldonkey-server.
# This file is managed using ucf(1).

MLDONKEY_DIR=/home/mldonkey
MLDONKEY_USER=mldonkey
MLDONKEY_GROUP=mldonkey
MLDONKEY_UMASK=0022
LAUNCH_AT_STARTUP=true
MLDONKEY_NICENESS=0

Next, we open file /home/mldonkey/downloads.ini, and we locate the line with:

 allowed_ips = [
  "127.0.0.1";]

This is the list of IP address enabled to access mldonkey web interface. We can modify it as explained here. I.e. to enable access from all PC in the network 192.168.1.x we can change in:

 allowed_ips = [ "192.168.1.0/24";
  "127.0.0.1";]

Make sure that mldonkey is stopped when modify this file: in the shutdown mldonkey writes down current configuration and overwrites all our changes.
Next we can start again mldonkey, and point our browser to: http://mybook-ip-address:4080/.
Note that mldonkey requires about a minute to start, and is a memory eater, so there will be some problems if your Mybook is loaded with Samba and CUPS.
That’s all.

How to add Windows™ compatible file sharing in the Revived Mybook.

Before installing Samba, it is suitable to install CUPS, too.
To install Samba and the web administration tool, SWAT, we use this command:

root@mybook:~# apt-get install swat
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
  openbsd-inetd samba samba-common samba-doc tcpd update-inetd
Suggested packages:
  samba-doc-pdf
Recommended packages:
  smbldap-tools
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  openbsd-inetd samba samba-common samba-doc swat tcpd update-inetd
0 upgraded, 7 newly installed, 0 to remove and 19 not upgraded.
Need to get 14.4MB of archives.
After unpacking 32.3MB of additional disk space will be used.
. . .

During the installation, installer ask for:

• Workgroup/Domain
• If you want to use WINS coming from DHCP

As the installation ends, you have Samba ready to work. If you haven’t SWAT running, use this command:

dpkg-reconfigure openbsd-inetd

that reads /etc/inetd.conf file and set inetd to automatically start at system boot.

Now you can start managing shares and users, pointing your browser to: http://ip-of-your-mybook:901/. You asked for login/password (that is root/root password).
Remember that Samba requires that Unix user must exist before you can add it to Samba users.
To create Unix user you can use:

# useradd -m username

that adds user “username” to Unix users and create (with -m switch) the home directory.
In this case you can assign users to private directories, and every user can manage his files, accessing with Samba password.
You can refer to immense documentation in the Samba website.

That’s all.

How to enable the Revived Mybook as a print server for USB or network printers.

First of all, we install CUPS print server:

root@mybook:~# apt-get install cupsys
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
  cupsys-common defoma file fontconfig-config gs-common gs-esp gsfonts
  libcairo2 libcupsimage2 libcupsys2 libdbus-1-3 libexpat1 libfontconfig1
. . .
. . .
Need to get 24.9MB of archives.
After unpacking 76.0MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y

as you can see this will install a lot of packages… so please be patient.
As the installation ends, open the file /etc/cups/cupsd.conf and locate the line with:

Listen localhost:631

change in:

Listen *:631

and restart CUPS:

# /etc/init.d/cupsys restart

This will enable CUPS to listen on external interface eth0.
Locate the line with:

DefaultAuthType Basic

and add immediately after this line:

DefaultEncryption Never

Locate the section:

<Location />
  Order allow,deny
  Allow localhost
  Allow @LOCAL
</Location>

and change in:

<Location />
  Order allow,deny
  Allow localhost
  Allow all
</Location>

This will allow access to any computer in the network.
You can also use:

Allow 192.168.x.y/255.255.255.0
Allow @LOCAL
Allow *.mydomain

Refer to CUPS documentation included in CUPS administration web pages.
Locate the section:

<Location /admin>
  Order allow,deny
  Allow localhost
</Location>

and change in:

<Location /admin>
  AuthType Basic
  Require user @SYSTEM
  Order allow,deny
  Allow localhost
  Allow all
</Location>

This will allow access to remote administration, but requires user/password (i.e. user root and the same password of the root user in the Mybook)
The same you must do in:

<Location /admin/conf>
  AuthType Basic
  Require user @SYSTEM
  Order allow,deny
  Allow localhost
  Allow all
</Location>

Restart cupsys:

# /etc/init.d/cupsys restart

Now you can add printers.
For best use, I advise to use only “raw” printers in Mybook CUPS server, and use the driver of the printing computer, this is the best situation.
If you have HP Jetdirect network printer, when adding printer, in the Device you must choose “AppSocket/HP JetDirect”, and in URI you must insert the string:

socket://hostname:9100

where “hostname” is the IP address of the printer, or the name if resolved from your DNS.
If you have USB printer first connect the printer to the Mybook, next go in “Add printer” from the administration web. In the Device page you should see your printer listed in the combo box. In some cases CUPS doesn’t allow you to define printer as “raw” in this step, but if you select any driver and install the printer, next you can go in Printers and change the configuration of the printer to “raw”.
That’s all.

Leds are placed in two “rings”, outer and inner. Outer ring use four leds, and kernel uses it to shows general activity, with effect like a rotating lamp (clockwise), and can be used to notify some special conditions. Inner ring uses six leds, and can be used as a “fuel gauge”. I.e. it can be lit progressively like an empty/full indicator.
To lit it, we use a special file in /sys directory, available only when kernel module wdc-leds is loaded (should be loaded at system boot if you use my root filesystem).
File is: /sys/devices/platform/wdc-leds/leds:wdc-leds:fuel-gauge/brightness and accept a value from 0 to 255. To write a value in it we use the command:

# echo 50 > "/sys/devices/platform/wdc-leds/leds:wdc-leds:fuel-gauge/brightness"

This will lit three leds of the inner ring (at 5, 7 and 9 o’clock).
Equivalence between value and leds is:

• value from 0 to 32: lits one led (5 o’clock)
• value from 33 to 49: lits two leds (5 and 7 o’clock)
• value from 50 to 66: lits three leds (5, 7 and 9 o’clock)
• value from 67 to 82: lits four leds (5, 7, 9 and 11 o’clock)
• value from 83 to 96: lits five leds (5, 7, 9, 11 and 1 o’clock)
• value from 97 and upper: lits all leds.

In this picture you can see how leds are lit.

There is no value to put off all leds, even with 0 the first led lits (only unloading module).
Known that is really simple to arrange a “space meter” using leds, or a visual progress bar.

A photo gallery of Mybook, during operations described here.

Il connettore usato per la console seriale.
Serial console connector.

Lo stesso connettore visto dall’esterno.
Same connector, external view.

Altra vista dall’esterno.
Another external view.

La posizione del connettore sullo stampato del Mybook.
Serial connector position in Mybook PCB.

Il Mybook riassemblato con il connettore della console seriale in alto a sinistra.
Reassembled Mybook, with serial connector on the upper left.

Un dettaglio del connettore dopo il riassemblaggio del Mybook.
Connector detail after assembling Mybook.

Now we install log daemons for Mybook.
(Note: if you install a root filesystem image release 20070826 or newer, you need only logrotate, syslog and klog daemons are already installed and operative)

Come primo servizio, dato che l’immagine del filesystem è realmente ridotta, ci occorre il log di sistema e del kernel, dato che saranno i primi posti dove andremo a guardare in presenza di problemi. Il primo passo è l’installazione dei demoni di log:

root@mybook:~# apt-get install sysklogd
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
  klogd
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  klogd sysklogd
0 upgraded, 2 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 104kB of archives.
After unpacking 194kB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y
...
Setting up klogd (1.5-1) ...
Starting kernel log daemon....

Setting up sysklogd (1.5-1) ...
Starting system log daemon....

Poi installiamo anche il pacchetto logrotate, che impedisce ai file di log di diventare troppo grandi, creandone di nuovi ed archiviando i vecchi periodicamente:

root@mybook:~# apt-get install logrotate
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Recommended packages:
  mailx
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  logrotate
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 19 not upgraded.
...
Setting up logrotate (3.7.1-3) ...

E’ tutto. I file di log saranno nella directory /var/log e periodicamente verranno ruotati e cancellati i più vecchi.

As first service, we need system and kernel logs, the first places where to look when in troubles, so we going to install log daemons:

root@mybook:~# apt-get install sysklogd
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
  klogd
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  klogd sysklogd
0 upgraded, 2 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 104kB of archives.
After unpacking 194kB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y
...
Setting up klogd (1.5-1) ...
Starting kernel log daemon....

Setting up sysklogd (1.5-1) ...
Starting system log daemon....

Next, we install the logrotate package, to avoid excessive grow of log files:

root@mybook:~# apt-get install logrotate
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Recommended packages:
  mailx
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  logrotate
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 19 not upgraded.
...
Setting up logrotate (3.7.1-3) ...

That’s all. Log files are in the /var/log directory, and will be rotated periodically, deleting oldest.

After reviving the Mybook, we need to made it usable. With this post, I start a thread in english and italian language on how to add functions and services to the revived Mybook.

Il primo passo è aggiungere il supporto per l’internazionalizzazione, dato che nell’immagine rilasciata qui non è incluso per ragioni di spazio.
I pacchetti da installare sono locales e locales-all, ma per prima cosa ricordiamoci di aggiornare l’elenco dei pacchetti nel deposito Debian:

# apt-get update
Get:1 http://ftp.it.debian.org lenny Release.gpg [189B]
Get:2 http://ftp.it.debian.org lenny Release [68.5kB]
...
Fetched 251kB in 4m9s (1007B/s)
Reading package lists... Done

e di seguito andiamo ad installare quanto necessario:

root@mybook:~# apt-get install locales locales-all
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
  lzma
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  locales locales-all lzma
0 upgraded, 3 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 6959kB/7085kB of archives.
After unpacking 14.5MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y
...

Durante il processo possono apparire dei messaggi di perl che lamenta l’impossibilità di impostare il locale, ma possiamo ignorarli senza problemi. Dopo un paio di minuti l’operazione termina. Ora abbiamo il pieno supporto per l’internazionalizzazione, e perl non si lamenterà più.

First step is add support for internationalization, that is not included in the filesystem image here, for space saving.
Packages needed are locales and locales-all, but before we going to update the package list from Debian repository:

# apt-get update
Get:1 http://ftp.it.debian.org lenny Release.gpg [189B]
Get:2 http://ftp.it.debian.org lenny Release [68.5kB]
...
Fetched 251kB in 4m9s (1007B/s)
Reading package lists... Done

and after we install what requested:

root@mybook:~# apt-get install locales locales-all
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
  lzma
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  locales locales-all lzma
0 upgraded, 3 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 6959kB/7085kB of archives.
After unpacking 14.5MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y
...

During installation process we may view some warnings from perl that say it is unable to set locale. We can safely ignore that. After a couple of minutes the process ends. Now we have full locale support, and perl does anymore complains about it.

• Un nuovo kernel
• Un nuovo root filesystem basato su Debian “lenny”

There are some good news:

• New kernel
• New root filesystem, based on Debian “lenny”

Le istruzioni sono cambiate, ma sempre qui, il nuovo kernel ed il filesystem di root sono prelevabili qui.
Il MyBook prende l’indirizzo di rete via DHCP, quindi serve un server DHCP attivo nella rete in cui viene connesso. Oppure modificare il file /etc/network/interfaces per assegnare un indirizzo statico.
Per accedere via SSH: utente “root”, password “mybook” (senza virgolette)

New instructions are here. A new root filesystem and a new kernel are here.
Now the MyBook get an IP address via DHCP, so you need a DHCP server in your network. Or you can modify the file /etc/network/interfaces to assigna a static IP address.
To logon through SSH: user “root”, password “mybook” (without quotes)