Re: RPi openelec on read-only SDcard

[Laser-Man]

You need to store settings and logs somewhere.

right, but this could be a NFS or CIFS mount.

To have OpenELEC work on a readonly device will not happen. Kodi needs to store/update its databases with video information.

It is not as stable as it looks like. Whether from plugins or from whatever, all my KODI systems loosing parts of functionality after some month. I have to set up them again (dd from archived file to sdcard), and that's it. It is never ever the power supply, and never ever a power net shortage (Germany 99.999% power supply). Most times, a RPi hangs during data base refresh or update, up to 3 times a year it hangs during video play (DVB-T recorded). I guess, all my disk broken issues came from "I had to disconnect the PSU, after the RPi/KODI device hangs". Attaching RPI battery UPS to 2 of the 5 just made resetting them more complicated. UPS did not made it more stable.

My 5 cents after 2.5 years of using a total of 5 RPis (2x RPi1 B2 with RaspBMC, OpenELEC and 3x RPi 2 with OpenELEC and OSMC):

• The system itself could be more robust by being completely read-only.
  
• the folder /var/config f.i. could be read only until explicitly mounted rw to sync the new config, then remounted ro again
  
• the /var/config content would redirect the database to an external one (or to the localhost, depending on what the user configured)
  
• the /var/config content would redirect/reference to the final folders and files, which would reside on a ramdisk copy or on a network mount (depending on what the user configured)
  

such a system would get only 3 to 10 writes the year, explicitly requested and password-confirmed by the admin.
The remaining time, it would be completely read-only and nothing could ever crash the disks.

I have enough knowledge about debian to setup such systems in general, but can't do it neither in OpenELEC nor in OSMC in special. And finally I don't know enough to change KODI this way. I'd be lost after strace'ing what files are written. Finally, I miss the knowledge to modify an image builder process this way.

Would be cool to come together with somebody who knows the rest...