This is a modified version of Crouton which installs Fedora onto your Chromebook. This version isn't nearly as polished as the main version of Crouton with Debian/Ubuntu. Please don't use this if you aren't familiar with the Crouton project as it is much better than this version. This specific version ditches the old X server with Freon idea, and uses Wayland which is built-in in the latest versions of Chrome OS. It is much simpler and actually faster.
This project is now in the hands of one awesome dude - @boydkelly who picked up where I left off. My chromebook is gone (I sure miss it) but you all are in good hands. :)
All the work here is based on the official Crouton version which can be found here:
https://github.com/dnschneid/crouton
and on this (now a bit old, but still fantastic source) fork for Fedora 20:
https://github.com/divx118/crouton/tree/fedora
I am eternally grateful for these versions, and all the credits should go to their authors. I merely played with them and modified them a bit.
Original Crouton Fedora:
https://github.com/nmilosev/crouton-fedora
My original blog post about crouton-fedora:
http://nmilosev.svbtle.com/crouton-with-fedora-chroot-chromebook
The version 2.0:
http://nmilosev.svbtle.com/crouton-with-fedora-chroot-2-0
The Crouton Fedora chrome app and VNC instructions:
http://nmilosev.svbtle.com/fedora-crouton-connector-chrome-app
Installing VirtualBox:
https://nmilosev.svbtle.com/virtualbox-and-crouton-fedora
Running Docker:
https://nmilosev.svbtle.com/docker-on-crouton-fedora-24
Crouton Fedora + Wayland. Yes, please!:
https://nmilosev.svbtle.com/crouton-fedora-wayland-yes-please
If you want maximum stability, please use official Crouton and install Debian or Ubuntu. This may break with an update or might not even work at all. Things may break at anytime. This needs a lot more work. You have been warned.
- Developer unlock your chromebook
- Open crosh shell
- Use sudo or get root
cd /usr/local
sudo curl -L -# https://github.com/nmilosev/crouton-fedora-wayland/archive/master.tar.gz -o crouton-fedora-wayland.tar.gz
sudo tar xvf crouton-fedora-wayland.tar.gz && rm crouton-fedora-wayland.tar.gz
sudo sh ./crouton-fedora-wayland-master/installer/main.sh -r fedora -t fedora
This installs the CLI version and support for Wayland.
To enter Fedora: sudo enter-chroot
A good practice is to also include a parameter -p to install this Crouton to the non-default path since it breaks the official Crouton if you have it installed. For example:
sudo mkdir /usr/local/crouton-fedora
sudo sh ./crouton-fedora-master/installer/main.sh -r fedora -t fedora -p /usr/local/crouton-fedora
sudo sh /usr/local/crouton-fedora/bin/enter-chroot
Please consult the offical Crouton documentation for this.
With this paramter, you can also install Crouton Fedora onto your sd card or your USB drive. Just please remember, that performace will be greatly reduced if your SD card/USB drive is slow.
Wayland support is built in directly. If you only want a CLI you have to modify the installation files.
Some applications (GNOME) can actually run on ChromeOS without a compositor. Others will require Xwayland.
Just run native Wayland applications from shell. Most?? Wayland apps work out of the box. Others have issues. Sakura Terminal works fine. QT Wayland apps have not been tested yet. We are trying to work through them and any suggestions work-arounds, patches are welcome!.
To start the compositor type wayland, there is an alias setup. Weston will start in full screen, but it is just a Chrome OS window, you can easily make it smaller or Alt+Tab from it. There are sometimes issues with double cursor appearing, which I am looking into, sorry. To close Weston, you can close its window from ChromeOS multitasking view or just Ctrl+C into crouton shell.
How much space do I need?
- ~3GB for the GNOME + CLI installation.
- ~2GB for the XFCE + CLI installation.
- ~700MB for CLI only.
My download is slow or not working...
Modify the defaults file in installer/fedora folder. You can find mirrors on the fedora mirror list site.
What works with F30 crouton-fedora-wayland?
Most gnome/gtk-3 apps work out of the box. Sometimes you may need to start with dbus-run-session for best results. (ie nautilus)
Some major apps that work great are: Firefox, Meld, Libreoffice, Totem (gnome-videos), Gedit and many more.
If you want a Wayland terminal, try Sakura, and other Wayland terminals. Gnome-terminal doesn't work yet....
Run Xwayland to support X11 apps. If you want an X11 desktop such as i3 or *box, you can install that, edit your .xintrc and then startxwayland. Not all dependencies are pulled in. You may have to manually install the following packages: -hostname -xorg-x11-xauth -xorg-x11-xinit-session -xorg-x11-xinit
Weston works fine on my hardware although it complains it wants egl. If I install mesa-dri-drivers which provide this, then Weston becomes slow to the point of not being functional. My workaround is to remove mesa-dri-drivers. YMMV.
What notably doesn't work? (yet....)
-
Full Wayland gnome-shell desktop. It should... but we're not there yet.
-
Nautilus. Looks great, and it is snappy and functional but for some weird reason drag-and-drop doesn't work.
-
Some X11 apps like gvim or emacs... Sorry!
Virtual Box/Docker?
These might work. Check the useful links section.
crouton (including this eloquently-written README) is copyright © 2019 The crouton Authors. All rights reserved. Use of the source code included here is governed by a BSD-style license that can be found in the LICENSE file in the source tree.
Fedora is property of Red Hat Corporation.
I'm merely a mortal, if anybody is offended by this code, please inform me, and it will be taken down immediately.