Pico 8 Linux Laptop
Intro
The guide below shows how to configure a laptop to automatically boot and launch Pico 8. The laptop will shutdown when the SHUTDOWN
command is issued in Pico 8 console.
Requirements
- Laptop supporting Ubuntu 22.04 Server: x86/64 or arm32/64 (I used the Asus Vivobook Go 12.)
- Disk space required: 4GB (8GB is better)
- Pico 8 License
Install Ubuntu
If Windows is installed use MMC / Disk Management to shrink the Windows partition.
Install Ubuntu 22.04 Server (e.g. USB - press ESC or F2 to enter bios);
After booting the Ubuntu 22.04 Server Installer:
- Select Install Ubuntu Minimal
- If you want to keep Windows, make sure you are not overwriting the partition. Ubuntu will dual-boot if not installed on a full disk.
- During installation, configure the administrative user. You will use this to update Pico8, etc.
- You may want to install OpenSSH Server if you'd like to
ssh
to /scp
from the Pico8 Laptop.
Configure Ubuntu 22.04 Minimal Server
Either log-on to local console or, if OpenSSH was installed, remote in using ssh.
Install dependencies
sudo apt install xinit xterm alsa-utils mingetty unzip |
Create and configure Pico8 user
The p8
user will run Pico8. Auto-logon will be configured as well.
sudo useradd -m -s /bin/bash p8 sudo passwd p8 sudo usermod -aG sudo p8 sudo usermod -aG audio p8 alsamixer |
Reboot
sudo reboot now |
Test audio
To test speakers use either of the following:
speaker-test
alsabat-test
Press Ctrl+C to stop.
Test video
startx xterm
Move mouse to go over the terminal and press Ctrl+D to exit.
Configure auto-logon for the P8 user
Taken from <https://askubuntu.com/questions/168706/how-do-i-auto-login-as-root-into-the-tty-upon-boot>:
sudo su mkdir -p /etc/systemd/system/[email protected] cat > /etc/systemd/system/getty\@tty1.service.d/override.conf <<- "_EOF_" [Service] ExecStart= ExecStart=-/sbin/mingetty --autologin p8 --noclear tty1 _EOF_ systemctl enable [email protected] |
Reset and test auto-logon:
reboot now
After reboot, p8 user should automatically log-in (no password required).
Important:
- To switch to another terminal/user at any point: Ctrl+Alt+F2 (or F3-F6).
- To terminate pico8 from another console:
sudo killall pico8
Download Chromium and Pico8
We will use Chromium to log-on to and download Pico8.
sudo snap install chromium startx chromium |
Download your Linux purchased copy of Pico-8 from https://www.lexaloffle.com/. Match your CPU architecture (x64 is most common.)
Exit Chromium and search for your download:
find ~/snap | grep pico |
Copy the zip file to p8
's home folder. Extract the linux pico-8 into ~/pico-8
.
Note Press TAB to autocomplete file names. Folder names must match in order for auto-run to work.
cd ~ cp <location_of_pico8_zip> . unzip pico-8<version>.zip |
Test Pico-8
Note to eliminate mature content, you need to pass -splore_filter 1
cd ~/pico-8 startx ./pico8 -fullscreen_mode 0 [-splore_filter 1] |
To exit Pico8, type SHUTDOWN
.
Configure Pico 8 (Optional)
You can also use nano or any other editor. At a minimum, fullscreen_method
must be set to 0
for input to work in xinit/startx:
vim ~/.lexaloffle/pico-8/config.txt
Note Likely cause for fullscreen_method is that SDL2 requires a Window to work: (https://stackoverflow.com/questions/44777929/sdl2-keyboard-detection-doesnt-work)
Set Pico-8 Autostart
cat > ~/.xinitrc <<- "_EOF_" cd ~/pico-8 ./pico8 -fullscreen_method 0 -splore_filter 1 shutdown now _EOF_ |
cat > ~/.bash_login <<- "_EOF_" startx _EOF_ |
Restart the system:
sudo reboot now |
The system should now auto-boot Ubuntu, auto-login p8 and start Pico8.
When you SHUTDOWN
pico8, your computer should also shutdown.
Recovery
Ubuntu Console
In case you need to make changes, at any time you can log-in with the administrator user you've configured during Ubuntu install to another console:
- Ctrl+Alt+F2 (to F6)
- Log-on with admin user
Booting back to Windows
During boot, you will see a menu for GNU GRUB. Select Windows Boot Manager to go back to windows.
When you restart Windows, the menu goes back to Ubuntu default.
Optimizing Boot Time
Grub Wait Time
By default, GRUB will wait for 10 seconds for the user to make a selection. This is changing to 1 second. Note that 0 means default.
Use the Recovery step to log-on to another console.
sudo vim /etc/default/grub |
Edit the file to change GRUB_TIMEOUT=1
sudo update-grub |
Remove Unneeded Services
From https://askubuntu.com/questions/10290/how-do-i-improve-boot-speed
Use the following to identify long-running tasks during start-up.
systemd-analyze systemd-analyze critical-chain systemd-analyze blame |
A few services I have disabled. It's important to maintain the Internet, Wifi services to allow splore
access.
sudo systemctl disable snapd.service --now sudo systemctl disable snap.lxd.activate.service --now sudo systemctl disable snapd.seeded.service --now sudo systemctl disable cloud-init.service --now sudo systemctl disable cloud-final.service --now sudo systemctl disable cloud-init-local.service --now sudo systemctl disable snapd.apparmor.service --now sudo systemctl disable cloud-config.service --now sudo systemctl mask systemd-networkd-wait-online.service |
![](/gfx/set_like0.png)
![](/gfx/top_drop.png)
![](/media/14590/2_2bitchuck.png)
This is a great guide, thanks for sharing! I love when "obsolete" hardware is put to good use.
![](/gfx/set_like0.png)
![](/gfx/top_drop.png)
![](/bimg/pi/pi26.png)
Nice guide! That's a clever trick with the shutdown command, too.
For anyone interested, Debian might be a bit lighter than Ubuntu for older hardware. Going even further, Raspberry Pi version of PICO-8 works on postmarketOS (based on Alpine Linux) on aarch64 devices (ARM8 architecture, which includes newer Raspberry Pi, PinePhone, and most recent smartphones). All it needs is a gcompat package (because postmarketOS uses musl instead of glibc, installable via apk add gcompat
). So you might be able to repurpose an old smartphone or a tablet as a PICO-8 device, too.
[Please log in to post a comment]