To install voidlinux on a Pi we'll have to do a chroot install. For official documentation on installing from chroot for void see here.
We need to install via chroot because the live images are made specifically for 2GB SD cards.
"These images are prepared for 2GB SD cards. Alternatively, use the ROOTFS tarballs if you want to customize the partitions and filesystems."
The installation can split out into 4 rough steps
Because we're going to be creating an aarch64 system you'll need some tool that will allow you run aarch64 binaries from a x86 system. To accomplish this we'll need the binfmt-support and qemu-user-static packages. To install them you can run
# NOTE: You have to install qemu-user-static _second_
# if you don't you wont get the files you need in /var/lib/binfmts/
# If you do it the wrong way you can try
# doing xbps-reconfigure -f qemu-user-static
sudo xbps-install binfmt-support qemu-user-static
We'll also need to enable the binfmt-support service. To do this, run
sudo ln -s /etc/sv/binfmt-support /var/service/
Now you're one step away from being able to run aarch64 binaries in the chroot on your x86 system, but we'll get to that later.
This is tricky because it can depend a little based on what you want to do. In my case I didn't allocate any swap space and kept the home directory on the root partition which keeps things pretty simple.
In this case we're going to need two partitions. One 64MiB partition that is marked with the bootable flag and has the vfat type (0b in fdisk). And the other that takes up the rest of the SD card with type linux (83 in fdisk).
To create these partitions with fdisk run sudo fdisk /dev/sda where /dev/sda is the path to your disk. The path to your disk can be found running lsblk before and after plugging in the disk and seeing what shows up. Once fdisk drops you into the repl you can delete the existing partitions with the d command.
Make a new partition with the n command, make it a primary partition with p, make it partition 1, and leave the first sector blank, which will keep it as the default. For the last sector put +64M which will give us a 64MiB partition (if you're asked to remove the signature it doesn't matter because we'll be overwriting that anyway). Use the a command to mark partition 1 bootable and lastly use the t command to make partition 1 type 0b, which is vfat.
Now the root partition, use n to make a new partition, then leave everything else default. This will consume the rest of the disk for this partition. Same as before, if it asks you to remove the signature it doesn't matter because we'll be overwriting now. To set the type label use the t command and set it to type 83 which is the linux type.
That's all we need to do to setup the partitions. Make sure to save your changes with the w command!
The disk should be correctly partitioned now!
This part is easy. Assuming the device is located at /dev/sda, partition 1 is the boot partition, and partition 2 is the root partition, just run these two commands.
mkfs.fat /dev/sda1 # Create boot vfat filesystem
mkfs.ext4 -O '^has_journal' /dev/sda2 # Create ext4 filesystem on the root partition (with journaling)
For this step we'll need both partitions we set up earlier to be mounted. To mount the partitions run
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt
mount /dev/sda2 $MOUNT_PATH # Mount the root partition to the mount point
mkdir -p $MOUNT_PATH/boot # Create a directory named "boot" in the root partition
mount /dev/sda1 $MOUNT_PATH/boot # Mount the boot partition to that boot directory
Now we just need to extract the rootfs into our mount point.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
ROOTFS_TARBALL='/home/me/Downloads/void-rpi3-PLATFORMFS-20210930.tar.xz' # Replace with the path to the tarball you download from https://voidlinux.org/download/
# x - Tells tar to extract
# f - Tells tar to operate on the file path given after the f switch
# J - Tells tar to extract using xz, which is how the rootfs happens to be compressed
# p - Tells tar to preserve permissions from the extracted directory
# -C - Tells tar where to extract the contents to
tar xfJp $ROOTFS_TARBALL -C $MOUNT_PATH
That's it for this step! You might notice that we didn't explicitly copy anything into the $MOUNT_PATH/boot directory. The rootfs provided by void contains a /boot directory which will get placed into the $MOUNT_PATH/boot directory when we extract the tarball.
This step is technically optional. If we just wanted to get a system up and running, we could plug the SD card in right now and it would boot up. We wouldn't have any packages (including base-system, which gives us dhcpcd, wpa_supplicant and other important packages), but it would boot. Additionally, the RaspberryPi's (at least mine) doesn't have a hardware clock so without an ntp package we won't be able to validate certs (because the time will be off) which prevents us from installing packages.
Some of the things we want to configure are most easily through a chroot. The problem is that the binaries in the rootfs we copied over are aarch64 binaries.
aarch64 binaries in the chrootBecause your x86 system cannot run aarch64 binaries we need to emulate the aarch64 architecture inside the chroot. To accomplish this we copy an x86 binary that can do that emulation for us into the chroot, and then pass all aarch64 binaries through it when we go to run them.
If you've installed the qemu-user-static package you should have a set of qemu-*-static binaries in /bin/. For a RaspberryPi 3, we want qemu-aarch64-static. Copy that into the chroot.
cp /bin/qemu-aarch64-static <your-chroot-path>
Now you're ready to run the aarch64 binaries in your chroot.
To create a usable system there's a few things we need to setup that are somewhere between recommended and mandatory; the base-system package, ssh access, ntp, dhcpcd and a non-root user.
Because running commands in the chroot is slightly slower due to the aarch64 emulation we'll try to setup as much of the rootfs as possible without actually chrooting.
First we should update all the packages that were provided in the rootfs.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
# Run a sync and update with the main machine's xbps pointing at our rootfs
env XBPS_ARCH=aarch64 xbps-install -Su -r $MOUNT_PATH
Just install the base-system package from your machine with the -r flag pointing at the $MOUNT_PATH.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
# Install base-system
env XBPS_ARCH=aarch64 xbps-install -r $MOUNT_PATH base-system
We just need to activate the sshd service in the rootfs.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
ln -s /etc/sv/sshd $MOUNT_PATH/etc/runit/runsvdir/default/
There's two thing here that look odd; 1. we're symlinking to our main machines /etc/sv/sshd directory and 2. we're placing the symlink in /etc/runit/runsvdir/default/ instead of /var/service like is typical for activating void services.
chroot'ed in, or when the system is running on the Pi /etc/sv/sshd will point to the Pi's sshd service./var/service doesn't exists until the system is running and it when the system is up /var/service will be a series of symlinks pointing to /etc/runit/runsvdir/default/ so we can just link the sshd service directly to the /etc/runit/runsvdir/default/.For security reasons I recommend disabling password authentication.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
sed -ie 's/#PasswordAuthentication yes/PasswordAuthentication no/g' $MOUNT_PATH/etc/ssh/sshd_config
sed -ie 's/#KbdInteractiveAuthentication yes/KbdInteractiveAuthentication no/g' $MOUNT_PATH/etc/ssh/sshd_config
We need an ntp package because the RaspberryPi doesn't have a hardware clock so when we boot it up the time will be January 1, 1970 which causes cert failures resulting in certificate validation failures that prevent us from installing packages and more.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
env XBPS_ARCH=aarch64 xbps-install -r $MOUNT_PATH openntpd
ln -s /etc/sv/openntpd $MOUNT_PATH/etc/runit/runsvdir/default/
Same as before we just install the package with our local xbps package manager pointing to the chroot and then setup the package to run at the end of symlink chain.
The base-system package should have covered the install of dhcpcd, so all we have to do is activate the service. Like before, we'll symlink directly to the end of the symlink chain.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
ln -s /etc/sv/dhcpcd $MOUNT_PATH/etc/runit/runsvdir/default/
This probably depends on your use-case, but having everything running as root is usually bad news, so setting up a non-root user which we can ssh in as is probably a smart idea.
This is the first part of the configuration that is truly best done inside the chroot, so make sure you have the filesystem mounted and have copied the qemu-aarch64-static binary into chroot.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
# After executing this command all subsequent commands will act like
# you're running on Pi instead of your main machine
chroot $MOUNT_PATH
USERNAME='me' # Replace with your desired username
groupadd -g 1000 $USERNAME # Create our user's group
# Add our user and add it to the wheel group and our personal group
# Depending on your needs you could additionally add yourself to
# other default groups like: floppy, dialout, audio, video, cdrom, optical
useradd -g $USERNAME -G wheel $USERNAME
# Set our password interactively
passwd $USERNAME
sed -ie 's/# %wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL/%wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL/g' $MOUNT_PATH/etc/sudoers # Allow users in the wheel group sudo access
At this point the root account's password is still "voidlinux". We wouldn't want our system running with the default root password, so to remove it run
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
chroot $MOUNT_PATH # Run this if you're not in the chroot
passwd --delete root
If you set up ssh access and disabled password authentication you'll want to add your ssh key to the rootfs.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
USERNAME='me' # Replace with your desired username
mkdir $MOUNT_PATH/home/$USERNAME/.ssh
cat /home/$USERNAME/.ssh/id_rsa.pub > $MOUNT_PATH/home/$USERNAME/.ssh/authorized_keys
According to the void docs we should remove the base-voidstrap package and reconfigure all packages in the chroot to ensure everything is setup correctly.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
chroot $MOUNT_PATH
xbps-remove -y base-voidstrap
xbps-reconfigure -fa
Now that we're done in the chroot we can delete the qemu-aarch64-static binary that we put in there.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
rm $MOUNT_PATH/bin/qemu-aarch64-static
Make sure to unmount the disk before removing it from your machine because we wrote a lot of data and that data might not be synced until we unmount it.
MOUNT_PATH='/mnt/sdcard' # Replace with any path to an empty directory. By convention it would be in /mnt (same mount path as above)
umount $MOUNT_PATH/boot
umount $MOUNT_PATH
Lastly, with some care, a lot of these steps can be combined. To see what that might look like check out this repo
Now you should be able to put the SD card into the Pi, boot it up and have ssh access!