May 2005 Archives

This tarball contains the Linkstation telnet binary and a script that inserts the binary into a Linkstation 1.4x firmware installer and configures inetd to run telnetd at system startup. Read the instructions at the top of the shell script. I haven't actually tested to see if this works, but if it doesn't it shouldn't take much more effort to fix it.

This approach saves bandwidth compared to downloading a new 37 megabyte installer for each tiny change.

I wanted to add a few features to my Linkstation HD-H120LAN, but the newer versions of the 1.4x firmware are password-protected and don't have the same vulnerabilities as earlier versions that allowed hobbyists to tinker with them.

So this is what I did. (These instructions assume you're already experienced with Linkstation/Kuro Box hacking.)

• Download the 145_13 firmware update and extract firminfo.txt, ramdisk.image.gz, and vmlinux.gz from the firmimg.bin in it.
• gunzip ramdisk.image.gz and mount it using sudo mount -o loop ramdisk.image /mnt/linkstation/.
• cd to /mnt/linkstation/bin, and move unzip to real_unzip.
• Add a new unzip with the following contents:

   #!/bin/bash
   echo "$*" >> /cmdline
   `real_unzip $*`

• chmod a+x unzip
• umount the image and gzip -9 it back up again.
• Using setsum from the Kuro/Linkstation GPL toolchain, create a new firmimg.bin: linux-2.4.17_mvl21-sandpoint/arch/ppc/boot/utils/setsum/setsum firminfo.txt vmlinux.gz -r ramdisk.image.gz -o firmimg.bin
• Flash firmimg.bin to /dev/fl3.
• Replace the original firmimg.bin in the firmware update download and re-run HD-HLAN FWUpdate.exe.
• When the setup is done, telnet into the Linkstation and cat /cmdline.
• See the command line used to unzip image.dat: -P NFM_TUPSBHFNFM_TUPSBHF /mnt2/image.zip -d /mnt2

I confirmed the password works with 145_13, 146_10, and 147. Have fun.

If you send text/SMS messages to your formerly AT&T Wireless, now Cingular phone using xxxyyyzzzz@mobile.att.net, you may have noticed the address recently stopped working. Use xxxyyyzzzz@mmode.com instead and it should work.

Congratulations to my friends and former coworkers at Qurb, who just released their 4.0 beta. As I understand it, 4.0's principal new feature is an RSS/Atom aggregator. "Feed reader" is a less techy term for the same thing, but it's less likely to be properly indexed by search engines ;).

It seems like just last week that 3.0 went final. Qurb is really picking up steam!

Recycle and parent in one step: Ikea assembly instructions make great coloring books.