Raspberry Pi 3 image spec

This repository contains the files with which the image referenced at https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi3 has been built.

Option 1: Downloading an image

See https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi3#Preview_image for where to obtain the latest pre-built image.

Option 2: Building your own image

If you prefer, you can build a Debian buster Raspberry Pi 3 image yourself. For this, first install the requirements of vmdb2. Then run the following:

git clone --recursive https://github.com/Debian/raspi3-image-spec
cd raspi3-image-spec

Then edit raspi3.yaml to select the Debian repository that you want to use:

• If you want to use the snapshot with which the build was tested, use http://snapshot.debian.org/archive/debian/20171007T213914Z/. This is what is pre-configured in raspi3.yaml. However, due to a missing feature on snapshots, to make the build work, you have to disable an expiration check by APT. To do so, edit raspi3.yaml to replace all apt-get invocations with apt-get -o Acquire::Check-Valid-Until=false
• If you want to use the latest versions of each software, you can replace http://snapshot.debian.org/archive/debian/20171007T213914Z/ in raspi3.yaml with the URL of your favorite Debian mirror. Of course, this means that the build may break if there are regressions in the latest versions.

Once you have edited raspi3.yaml, you can generate the image by issuing:

sudo ./vmdb2/vmdb2 --output raspi3.img raspi3.yaml --log raspi3.log

Installing the image onto the Raspberry Pi 3

Plug an SD card which you would like to entirely overwrite into your SD card reader.

Assuming your SD card reader provides the device /dev/sdb, copy the image onto the SD card:

sudo dd if=raspi3.img of=/dev/sdb bs=5M

Then, plug the SD card into the Raspberry Pi 3 and power it up.

The image uses the hostname rpi3, so assuming your local network correctly resolves hostnames communicated via DHCP, you can log into your Raspberry Pi 3 once it booted:

ssh root@rpi3
# Enter password “raspberry”