Sunday, May 4, 2014

Nexus 7 Linux Deploy on OTG USB 32GB Flash Drive

I own a Nexus 7 (2013) and have successfully installed Kali on a 32 GB flash drive.
Linux Deploy is a really neat tool that takes full advantage of chroot to boot many linux distros including Ubuntu, Arch, Gentoo, and OpenSuse.
Your mileage may vary with other tablets, but the following describes my working implementation.
  1. In your favorite android rom, acquire Linux Deploy.
  2. Format your flash drive to Ext4 using another computer. (I don't believe any android apps have this capability yet)
  3. Insert the flash drive into the OTG cable and then into the Nexus.
  4. Start up Linux Deploy and create a new profile.  A profile contains all of the settings required to start and maintain the desired linux distro.  1 distro per profile.
  5. You can set whatever linux distro you'd like, but the key to keeping the distro on the flash drive is in the installation type.
  6. Select "partition" as the installation type and Ext4 as the format.
  7. Now to set the installation path.
  8. You will see 3 vertical dots on the top right hand corner.  Select this, then press status.
  9. A bunch of directories and settings will populate.  On the bottom you will see the device path(s) for the usb flash drive partitions.
  10. Copy the device path you want to install the operating system on and paste it into the installation path.
  11. Select the Install button at the top of the list of configurations and you should be good to go!
I hope this helped somebody! Props to the developer of Linux Deploy, excellent work.

2 comments:

  1. The same can be done in my Moto X2 (2014) right ??

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    Replies
    1. Your mileage may vary, but ideally yes, it can be done on the Moto X2.

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