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Guide to install InkBox on a Kobo Nia manually, step by step

Because tinkering with open source software is easier

This guide could also help you port InkBox to another device.

note for tux-linux, look at "*" points

The "From inkbox repo" points are easier, and will work for 100%. "From source" is dedicated to understand the automated process, to know whot changes are made to make inkbox working

For errors, check links.md and the Fixes section

Here is the copy of the discord chat as of 25.02.2022

Kobo Nia.zip

Backup the SD card

Don't brick your device.

dd if=/dev/mmcblk0 | xz > kobo-backup.img.xz

Get the toolchain

The working toolchains are:

Simply unpack it to ~/.local/. Remember to delete the previous toolchain there, and make sure that in ${PATH} the .local directory is first.

Adjust the parameters of make and the CROSS_COMPILE environment variable to your needs.

Compiling the bootloader

  1. From inkbox repo

Clone InkBox kernel repository and change directory into the Nia bootloader sources (or make a symlink of this location):

sudo mkdir -p /home/build/inkbox
sudo chown -R "${USER}:${USER}" /home/build
cd /home/build/inkbox && git clone https://github.com/Kobo-InkBox/kernel
cd kernel/bootloader/mx6ull-n306
  1. From source

Get the sources: https://github.com/kobolabs/Kobo-Reader/blob/master/hw/imx6ull-nia/bootloader.tar.bz2

* whot did you changed to make it work? how to do this, which file to edit? for example:

change kernel sector to 81920 and load size to 18432  in ntx_comm.c

To get the config, for Kobo Nia there are 2:

mx6ull_ntx_lpddr2_256m_defconfig
mx6ull_ntx_lpddr2_256m_mfg_defconfig

mfg means "manufacturing", so grab the normal one:

make -j$(($(nproc)*2)) ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-nickel-linux-gnueabihf- mx6ull_ntx_lpddr2_256m_defconfig

This will setup the sources according to the chosen configuration. Configuring with menuconfig needs special parameters, for example: ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-linux-gnueabi- Compile with:

make -j$(($(nproc)*2)) ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-nickel-linux-gnueabihf-

Now, there should be two important files, u-boot.imx and u-boot.bin. For the Kobo Nia the .imx file is working for me. To choose how to install the bootloader look at the upgrade script in the stock Kobo firmware:

if [ `echo $UBOOT | grep -c imx` == 1 ]; then
        dd if=$UBOOT of=/dev/$DEVICE bs=1K seek=1
    else
        dd if=$UBOOT of=/dev/$DEVICE bs=1K seek=1 skip=1

So, for Nia, it is:

dd if=$UBOOT of=/dev/$DEVICE bs=1K seek=1

If something does not work, look at the image of the SD card in an hexadecimal viewer/editor, compare headers and read the dd man page.

SD card

Connect the eReader to a PC with the USB cable and execute ums 0 mmc 0 in U-Boot via a serial connection.

Launch sudo fdisk /dev/sdcard (of course, replace sdcard with your SD card's device node), clear the partition table with o, look up the partition with p, and n to add a partition.

Important: set the Start and End sectors exactly like said below. InkBox OS will probably not boot otherwise.

Device      Boot   Start     End Sectors  Size Id Type
/dev/nbd0p1        49152   79871   30720   15M 83 Linux
/dev/nbd0p2       104448 1128447 1024000  500M 83 Linux
/dev/nbd0p3      1128448 1390591  262144  128M 83 Linux
/dev/nbd0p4      1390592 8388607 6998016  3.3G 83 Linux

The last partition can be extended to the end of the SD card.

Format the four partitions with the command below:

mkfs.ext4 -O "^metadata_csum" /dev/sdcardp${partition}

Finally, write the Root kernel flag to a specific sector of the SD card, which will allow us to interface with the device via USBNet, SSH, etc. and have root access:

printf "rooted\n" | dd of=/dev/sdcard bs=512 seek=79872

Kernel

1. From inkbox repo

First, follow the steps in the "Bootloader" part to set up InkBox's "kernel" repository.

With the build_kernel.sh script in InkBox repository:

Change directory into /home/build/inkbox/kernel, then run:

env GITDIR="${PWD}" TOOLCHAINDIR="${PWD}/toolchain/arm-nickel-linux-gnueabihf/" THREADS=$(($(nproc)*2)) TARGET=arm-nickel-linux-gnueabihf scripts/build_kernel.sh n306 root

2. From source

Get the source: https://github.com/kobolabs/Kobo-Reader/blob/master/hw/imx6ull-nia/kernel.tar.bz2

Grab the config from arch/arm/configs/imx_v7_kobo_defconfig and copy it to the main directory as .config

Create a symlink to your cloned repo from /home/build/inkbox/kernel/. The script getting busybox is static.

* I have writed this sentence, and now I don't know whot a talked about. Could you clarify?

Enable Loopback device support, FUSE and SquashFS with XZ support.

* whot are the specific "names" of the changes? so it would be easy to paste the name in menuconfig, using "/" and then enable this feature

Set the CONFIG_CMDLINE_FORCE option to y and change the CONFIG_CMDLINE option with the contents below.

console=ttymxc0,115200 rootwait rw no_console_suspend hwcfg_p=0x8ffffe00 hwcfg_sz=110 waveform_p=0x8ff71a00 waveform_sz=582529 ntxfw_p=0x8ff71400 ntxfw_sz=1034 mem=255M boot_port=1 rootfstype=ext4 root=/dev/mmcblk0p1 quiet

* where to set it, in which file?

Write the kernel to the SD card:

dd if=zImage-root of=/dev/sdcard bs=512 seek=81920

If now the kernel boots, and the screen flashes, its propably half the way to port inkbox to it

rootfs

get the rootfs, but clone it as root ( to avoid permissions problem later on the kobo ):

sudo git clone https://github.com/Kobo-InkBox/rootfs

Enter the directory, execute as root:

env GITDIR="${PWD}" ./release.sh

create your keys:

openssl genrsa -out private.pem 2048
openssl rsa -in private.pem -out public.pem -outform PEM -pubout

* tux-linux, explain here the key part, becouse propably creating your own is not a good idea? also the gui bundle needs to be verified with the same key so idk

sign the rootfs:

openssl dgst -sha256 -sign private.pem -out rootfs.squashfs.dgst rootfs.squashfs

Now copy the rootfs.squashfs.dgst and rootfs.squashfs to the third partition ( 128M one )

clone the repo: https://github.com/Kobo-InkBox/emu

* is it needed to clone it as root too?

Execute those commands, where [location-of-p4] is the biggest partition ( where userdata X11/KoBox images as well as GUI bundle and other things are stored )

cat sd/user.sqsh.* > sd/user.sqsh
sudo unsquashfs -f -d [location-of-p4]/ sd/user.sqsh

get the gui bundle:

wget 23.163.0.39/bundles/private/update-n306.isa

and copy it to partition 4, with name update.isa to the folder update

* Is that all?