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Make a tarball with the One Button Installer

Introduction

If you want to make a tarball, you can make it 'general' using the OEM configuration option.

OEM is not necessary, you can also make a tarball from a system that is installed with a normal user id and a password, that you select. In this case, skip preparing for an OEM installation.

In the Ubuntu flavours including Lubuntu you can press F4 at an early stage of the installation to make it an OEM installation. This is not fully implemented in the re-spin Bento, but I found a tip via the internet, and was able to make it work in Bento. It is worth testing the same method in other re-spins of Ubuntu (although it does not work in all of them; I failed using it in Linux Mint 13 'Maya' Cinnamon 32-bit, based on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS).

Preparation when built in (F4) OEM configuration does not work

User input

Install the system manually with the following IDs:

    User name: OEM
    Login name: oem
    Password:123456  # can be anything
    Hostname: oem    # that is 'computer name'

It is not important if the oem user will be automatically logged in or not. A user in that stage probably needs the password anyway. If [s]he wants to add a program package, superuser privileges are necessary and the password must be used.

OEM-config

Install oem-config like this:

   sudo apt-get install oem-config
   sudo apt-get install oem-config-gtk

and copy the starter from the menu to the desktop for

   sudo oem-config-prepare

Language support

Finally to make it easier to install full language support, install (if not already installed)

   sudo apt-get install language-selector-gnome

and the end user should run 'Language Support' from the Settings menu, select and install the own language and probably make it work for the whole system. After reboot it will work properly (at least Swedish, also keyboard settings).

Tweaking

You may or may not want to add or tweak something else. But remember that a lot of tweaking is specific to the user's environment, and that kind of tweaks will not be ported to the new user, but will be wiped, when the user oem is wiped.

Check that the system is prepared

Anyway, let us say that the system is as you want it. Maybe with some tweaks by you, but no proprietary driver, and only two partitions, a root partition and a swap partition.

Cleaning

I usually clean the cached files with the *janitor* of Ubuntu Tweaks

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tualatrix/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-tweak

Maybe you prefer to do it manually or with some other method.

Make tarballs

If you want to, you can make two tarballs like I did with Bento

Bento12.04.04-oem0.tar.xz  # in OEM mode, password: 123456
Bento12.04.04-oem1.tar.xz  # OEM: ready for the end user

But if you think it is enough with one tarball, make it 'ready for the end user', in other words after activating the 'end-user-icon'.

Boot into the One Button Installer

Shut down the system. Insert a USB drive with the OBI. Boot into the OBI. Check which partition is the root partition (the system to be imaged to a tarball. It is convenient, if it is /dev/sda1, but possible with other partitions too.

Menu item 'Make tarball'

If /dev/sda1 contains the root partition of the system to be imaged, go ahead and select 'Make tarball' at the starter menu.

Run mktbl from the bash shell

Otherwise, quit to the bash shell (or if you run the GUI version, open a terminal window). Start mktbl manually like this:

sudo bash mktbl
[sudo] password for sudodus:
----------------------------------------------------------------
Usage:   sudo mktbl [source-partition] [compression] [filename]
Default: sudo mktbl  /dev/sda1  xz  ball
The file extension tar.xz or tar.gz is added automatically
Example: sudo mktbl  /dev/sdb5  gzip  myversion-123
Run from bash if not default
----------------------------------------------------------------
Run sudo mktbl to make a tarball of the files in /dev/sda1
You may need to remove some existing tarballs,
'*.tar.gz' and '*.tar.xz' from the tarballs directory
to make space for the new tarball
These main commands are prepared:
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt
cd /mnt
tar -cvJf ~/tarballs/ball.tar.xz .
Do you want to continue? (y/n)

Answer n (no) and edit the command like, for example

sudo bash mktbl /dev/sdb5

if /dev/sdb5 contains the system to imaged to a tarball.

xz is the default compression and ball is the default name. Use xz. Add the appropriate name here (without extension) if you wish. You can also rename the file afterwards.

Rename the tarball

If you want to create more than one tarball, you must rename it, otherwise the old tarball

ball.tar.xz

will be overwritten with the new one (if you use the default name).

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