Here's a slightly updated version of my steps. In short, this is what I did to get my N800 to boot OS2008 from MMC. Note that all shell commands need to be entered as root (except for the very first command).


1) upgraded my N800 to OS2008, http://europe.nokia.com/A4305010
2) enabled the Maemo Extras repository in Application Manager and added http://repository.maemo.org, Distribution: (blank) Components: free non-free
3) installed openssh using Application Manager
4) defined a root password (openssh's installer prompted for this)
5) opened xterm and:

# ssh root@localhost

(optional step - Added to following lines to the end of sudoers)
# visudo
user ALL = (ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
root ALL = (ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL

6) created two (512 MB and 7 GB) partitions on my 8 GB SD card. Adjust the values for mmcblk0p1 and mmcblk0p2 to reflect the SD card you are using. One unit is equal to 32768 bytes so 16384 units/blocks is 512 MB.

# apt-get install e2fsprogs
# umount /media/mmc1
# umount /media/mmc2
# sfdisk /dev/mmcblk0
/dev/mmcblk0p1:1,16384,6
/dev/mmcblk0p2:16385,,83
/dev/mmcblk0p3:
/dev/mmcblk0p4:
# reboot

7) created file systems on the card:

# umount /media/mmc1
# umount /media/mmc2
# mkdosfs /dev/mmcblk0p1
# mke2fs /dev/mmcblk0p2
# reboot

8) downloaded http://fanoush.wz.cz/maemo/initfs_flasher.tgz using the N800 browser and saved it to: /home/user/MyDocs/.documents/ (default location)

9) unpacked it and ran the script:

# cd /home/user/MyDocs/.documents/
# tar zxf initfs_flasher.tgz
# cd initfs_flasher
# ./initfs_flash

10) installed the kernel modules:

# insmod /mnt/initfs/lib/modules/2.6.21-omap1/mbcache.ko
# insmod /mnt/initfs/lib/modules/2.6.21-omap1/ext2.ko

11) mounted the file systems to be cloned:

# mount /dev/mmcblk0p2 /opt
# mount -t jffs2 -o ro /dev/mtdblock4 /floppy

12) cloned the files from /floppy to /opt:

# tar cf - -C /floppy . | tar xf - -C /opt

(This takes quite a while. Observe any errors it might, but shouldn't, display. Change to "tar xvf" if you want verbose output.)

13) set up the MMC as a boot option and rebooted the device:

# umount /opt
# umount /floppy
# chroot /mnt/initfs cal-tool --set-root-device ask:mmc2
# reboot