I have tried burning GambOS to two different usb drives.  Neither of them will boot, in spite of having no problem with other Debian based distros.  Is this designed only to be used in a VM?

Hi and welcome. You have to set the oflag option.
Look here: Install GambOS

Best regards
Poly

dmontaine said

I have tried burning GambOS to two different usb drives.  Neither of them will boot, in spite of having no problem with other Debian based distros.  Is this designed only to be used in a VM?

Welcome to GambOS.
Poly already gave you a solution to your problem, being reading the instruction.  

The answer to your question "Is this designed only to be used in a VM?" is NO, it is a normal amd64 iso to install or a regular PC and can also be installed on a VM.

Make sure that, once installed, to apply a patch that simply installs some packages needed for a later guide being Gambas Book 2 - still in development. The patch can be found here on the website, instructions included.

Take the time to read all instructions, as a lot of time has been spend to explain everything in detail, to prevent you from struggling, wasting time and having to ask questions on things that are already explained

Enjoy GambOS…

 I had originally used the command

sudo dd bs=4M status=progress if=gambos-2.0-build-25-bookworm-mate-amd64.iso of=/dev/sda | sync

I changed to your recommended command of

sudo dd bs=4M status=progress if=gambos-2.0-build-25-bookworm-mate-amd64.iso of=/dev/sda oflag=sync

Neither works.  Can not boot from the resulting USB drive,
Tried on multiple USB drives from different quality brands.

Burning an iso to the same usb drive using a Bookworm image from Debian does work.

 Why do you not use the order of the command in the instruction?
I don't know if this matter, but I have firstly the same problem than you, but this command allways function for me.
I install many test image which this command, allways with success.
Please try it out and report back.
And thanks for reporting this problem.

dmontaine said

I had originally used the command

sudo dd bs=4M status=progress if=gambos-2.0-build-25-bookworm-mate-amd64.iso of=/dev/sda | sync

I changed to your recommended command of

sudo dd bs=4M status=progress if=gambos-2.0-build-25-bookworm-mate-amd64.iso of=/dev/sda oflag=sync

Neither works.  Can not boot from the resulting USB drive,
Tried on multiple USB drives from different quality brands.

Burning an iso to the same usb drive using a Bookworm image from Debian does work.

Very strange as both me and Poly did create a bootable USB with the same iso.
Maybe adding status=progress will tell more
Maybe the iso got corrupted somehow during download is all I can think of right now.

It is hard to troubleshoot a matter that works for me but not for you.
Report back if a renewed download solved it or not, so I can further try to figure out what might be going on.

dmontaine said

Burning an iso to the same usb drive using a Bookworm image from Debian does work.

sudo dd if=gambos-2.0-build-25-bookworm-mate-amd64.iso of=/dev/sda bs=4M oflag=sync  status=progress


Syntax: input file (if=) output file (of=) and then the [options].

and not:

sudo dd bs=4M status=progress if=gambos-2.0-build-25-bookworm-mate-amd64.iso of=/dev/sda oflag=sync


I don't know exactly how it works with dd, but with ffmpeg or imageMagick, it does matter in which order the commands are entered.
These programs have clear syntax rules.
So it's only a small possibility, but it would be really nice if you could try it again.
But I agree with you, with a normal installation of Debian or Devuan, this is not necessary for image files.
We are only a small group of testers, but after we all had problems with the installation at the beginning, this command led to success in all cases.
In other cases, certain data does not seem to be transferred for some reason. The image was always recognized on my system, but the system always hung when starting up.
I'm sure gbWilly is already working on a solution.

Please try it out, Thanks

best regards
Poly

 Used your recommended dd command with the parameters in a different order.  Same problem.  I was able to use the ISO with a virtual machine.  But with no installer, I could not write it to the virtual drive and had to just run it from the virtual USB drive.

 Hi,

can you give some more information what happened?
Did it crash before the boot-menu?
For me, before I use the dd-command with the options in the exact order I posted above, it always crashed after the boot-menu. I got a black-screen with endless loop.
Can you also give some infos about your system, please?

To answer your question, GambOS is not intended to be use only in virtual system.
I for example use it only as normal install on my old computer.
And let me tell you, I like it very much.
I used it actually as my main system, because it is much smaller than my before preferred Devuan KDE System.
Nevertheless it is in early stage , so there could be bugs.
So your informations about your problems are very important for gbWilly to make GambOS better.
Thanks
Best regards
Poly

dmontaine said

Used your recommended dd command with the parameters in a different order.  Same problem.  I was able to use the ISO with a virtual machine.  But with no installer, I could not write it to the virtual drive and had to just run it from the virtual USB drive.

1. Did you do a live boot, because then you do not get an installer.
There are 2 options in the menu. You need the second one to install, the first is a live boot, running GambOS from RAM!
See first screenshot on this page: https://gambos.gambas.…downloads/installiso.html

2. Try to provide some more details, as it is hard to troubleshoot without input.
At what point does install fail?
Maybe a picture of the situation you end up with?
Any output shown before that might indicate something not going ok.
Any output shown when creating the iso on USB using dd might help.
What system, BIOS setting to boot etc. All details could matter.

On my system the iso placed on a USB works and installs on a real system.
Polly installed on a real system and so did cogier. So, that is 3 different real systems successfully installed before even making GambOS iso public

I have GambOS running in 3 VM's QEMU/KVM. Bruce tested it on Virtual Box. All were running just fine. Also all tested before GambOS went public.
There were 24 builds before this one to address all issues and get to this point and if a build 26 is needed, I will gladly do so, if I know what the issue is I need to address and solve.

 I found out what the problem is.  I was trying to install on a fairly new LG Ultimate laptop where the install was failing.  I then tried it on an older HP Elitedesk mini.  On the mini, trying to boot from the USB in UEFI mode failed, however booting in Legacy mode worked.  The LG laptop only will boot from USB drives in UEFI mode. There is no option in the BIOS to turn on Legacy support.

dmontaine said

I found out what the problem is.  I was trying to install on a fairly new LG Ultimate laptop where the install was failing.  I then tried it on an older HP Elitedesk mini.  On the mini, trying to boot from the USB in UEFI mode failed, however booting in Legacy mode worked.  The LG laptop only will boot from USB drives in UEFI mode. There is no option in the BIOS to turn on Legacy support.  An ISO image of Bookworm from Debian will boot in UEFI mode, the GambOS version of Debian Bookworm will not.

Okay, that is something I can work with for a future build.
Seems like all testers happen to have the legacy boot options.
Really good to know.

Thanks for reporting and enjoy GambOS  

 I did a bit more research.  The Debian 12 installer from Debian has the same problem.  I usually have used spins of Debian 12; Mint LMDE 6 or Bunsenlabs, both of which install with no problems on my laptop.  The Debian 13 installer from Debian has fixed the problem and now will do a UEFI boot from the USB.

dmontaine said

I did a bit more research.  The Debian 12 installer from Debian has the same problem.  I usually have used spins of Debian 12; Mint LMDE 6 or Bunsenlabs, both of which install with no problems on my laptop.  The Debian 13 installer from Debian has fixed the problem and now will do a UEFI boot from the USB.

I do believe I can fix this in a next build.
But that will be post forum transfer to a new cms.

Thank you for your report, it is really helpful in improving on GambOS.

I made a UEFI bootable iso. If you would like to try it (test it) let me know.  
I'll give you access to a download and an honorable mention it the About GambOS