1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB_flash_drive
2. The instructions are at http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/nslu2-general/files/Plug%20Files/readme.txt or to repeat quickly:
a. Partition the drive with "/sbin/fdisk /dev/sda".
b. Format the drive with mke2fs (if you want ext2 use the built in /sbin/mke2fs. if you want ext3, you may want to download the mke2fs in http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/nslu2-general/files/Plug%20Files/ which should have all the files you actually need and use ./mke2fs -j /dev/sda1 if sda1 is your drive.
c. Create /opt with "mkdir /opt". Then "mount /dev/sda1 /opt" and verify that it mounted with "mount". You should see that /dev/sda1 is mounted on /opt.
d. You can now download ipkg in / and uncompressed it there which will place ipkg in /opt/bin/ipkg which you verify with ls -la /opt/bin/ipkg. If it is not there you may have downloaded ipkg and uncompressed it in /opt which would give you /opt/opt/bin/ipkg and that is incorrect. That is why I made a tar install file on http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/nslu2-general/files/Plug%20Files/ called plug.tar.gz that has ipkg, wget, and nano already included and can be uncompressed directly on the usb drive (/opt). Just to make sure that you did unpackaged the files correctly you should type "ls -la /opt" and you should see bin, etc ... but no opt under /opt.
e. Then create your /etc/profile with the path that includes /opt/bin:/opt/sbin in front of the other directories in you path. Then reboot so that the system should pick up the new wget in /opt/bin/wget. Or copy it into /usr/bin/wget.
f. After the reboot, mount /dev/sda1 into /opt again and try "ipkg update".
g. if this works you can download from http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/nslu2-general/files/Plug%20Files/ mount_optext2 or mount_optext3 and add this to rcS or add the mount command itself in rcS with a "/bin/sleep 10" before it.
3. I don't know why you couldn't find /sbin/fdisk since it comes with all the pogoplugs, and I am not the one typing the command on your system. Also, fdisk is for partitioning drives, mke2fs is for formatting drives.
4. I am not sure how you unpackaged the ipkg tar file but in /opt/lib if you did "ls -la", you should have something like:
drwxr-xr-x 7 root root 140 ..
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 100 .
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 150260 libipkg.so.0.0.0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 16 libipkg.so.0 -> libipkg.so.0.0.0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 16 libipkg.so -> libipkg.so.0.0.0
5. The package should have it already for you. What you did is to copy it over to the name that ipkg can find but it takes up more space. You could have types "ln -s /opt/lib/libipkg.so.0.0.0 /opt/lib/libipkg.so.0" which is a symbolic link. I just unpackaged ipkg on my system to verify the integrity of the file and I have all three. You got ipkg to work but I would question how you unpackaged the file (hopefully with tar xzvf) and if your path statement in profile was correct. Type "set" and that should show the path and other variables.
6. You can try "ls -la /opt/lib" and see if libnsl.so.1 is located there since you did not show that above. Optware packages usually default to /opt/lib to look for library packages. You may want to try adding an /opt/lib to your path statement just to make sure.
7. As mentioned in the warning in the the Optware install page, if you are not comfortable with your Linux skills, don't perform this installation or get somebody physically there to help you that knows Linux. When Linux is using a mounted drive (which you probably did in rcS), it won't let you partition this. So if you want to repartition /dev/sda1, you need to not mount it in rcS (you shouldn't partition a mounted drive), reboot, and not run anything from it. Where did your drive come from and how large is it (was this a boot drive, you may have problems with this since other users have had problems with GPT partitioned drives, google this, it may require extra steps to erase the GPT partition. If it is over 2 TB you may need to keep the partition.)? It looks like you did not initially partition and formatted it. Also fdisk will not show ext2 or ext3 since that is a function of mke2fs for formatting (fdisk is for partitioning it does not care about the format, only partition type). Fdisk will show that it is a Linux partition of type 83, which can be used for ext2 or ext3. Mke2fs will format it for ext2 unless you want a journal then using "-j" will create ext3 (which is the same as ext2 with a journal).

So the fact that you got samba installed to a certain extent is a good sign, you just need to repeat what you have done after partitioning and formatting which could have been your problem all along and check the existence of the libraries and paths. When you do start samba, it should be "/opt/etc/init.d/S80samba start". You can then verify if it runs with "ps |grep samba" and smbd -D should be running. Then you have to make sure that your smb.conf has the correct settings. If you are using a Mac OSX system, you may want to make sure to set the password to encrypt in smb.conf or you won't be able to log in when you do go->connect to server.

Addendum:
You may want to place optware on a flash drive and just use your original drive for data (the actual shared drive).

Dude, the problem was stated above. I already gave you the solution in the paragraph before the addendum. You need to format your drive because for Linux package libraries to work, the system has to be able to create symbolic links and yours is not doing it. You in effect created a hard link to solve ipkg (actually copy) but it has to work for every package you download from optware, like samba. So now ipkg is trying to create a symbolic link and it can't for libnsl.so.l, which needs to be linked to libnsl-2.5.so. I don't know who the many are that you are asking but the problem comes back to being able to use "ln -s" to create symbolic links, so they should have been able to tell you. Hence you have to format your drive for a linux file system or these packages will not work. Any other Linux distribution is the same. So format the drive and start over or else you won't be able to upgrade later. You did not provide the results of "ls -la" on /opt/lib which would have shown what libraries were downloaded. That would have been another clue that symbolic links were created. You should have followed the last paragraph before the addendum and maybe the addendum if you don't want to format the hard drive. The command "find" is actually a package in optware along with other Linux enhancements but that requires symbolic links also.

If you don't feel comfortable with this, then try Plugapps, or Debian, you can chroot into both.

Cool Carl, now were getting somewhere. Your good! I see formatting to ext2 allowed you to get symbolic links and now libipkg.so.0 is a symbolic link and not a copied file anymore. Now the next big question, which samba package did you use since there is a bunch of them. My preference, and the only one in optware I use is samba2 which is lightweight and has everything I need to connect to other machines. By the way, a little tutorial on ipkg. Typing "ipkg" will get you all the commands. Typing "ipkg list|grep packagenameyouwant", helps you find packagenameyouwant. Typing "ipkg status|more", tells you what has been installed and dependencies. Typing "ipkg remove packageIdontwant" will remove packageIdontwant. Type "ipkg info packageinfoIwant" will give me information on the package I want. So say I want to install "find", then "ipkg list|grep find" which would give me:

ack - 1.94-1 - grep-like text finder
bsdmainutils - 6.1.6-5 - Small programs many people expect to find when they use a BSD-style Unix system.
findutils - 4.2.32-1 - File finding utilities
findutils-doc - 4.2.32-1 - Documentation for file finding utilities
fslint - 2.26-1 - A utility to find and clean various forms of lint on a filesystem.
mlocate - 0.23.1-1 - A merginging locate program to find files fast
perl-file-next - 1.02-1 - File::Next is a lightweight, taint-safe file-finding module. It is lightweight and has no non-core prerequisites.
powertop - 1.12-2 - PowerTOP is a Linux tool that helps you find programs that are consuming extra power when your computer is idle.

Then from this I would do "ipkg install findutils" and I would end up with find plus more.

Say I am trying to look for a library that some other package may have forgotten to include like libnsl.so.1. Then I would do "ipkg list|grep libnsl" which would give me:
libnsl - 2.5-4 - Network Services Library

Then "ipkg info libnsl" would in my case give this information"
Package: libnsl
Version: 2.5-4
Conflicts: uclibc
Status: install user installed
Section: util
Architecture: arm
maintainer: NSLU2 Linux
MD5Sum: d989616ab6e62e2e677fb6e3d27db4e8
Size: 42529
Filename: libnsl_2.5-4_arm.ipk
Source: /
Description: Network Services Library

Here is a link to the ipkg tutorial:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Ipkg

Since I believe that you are now on your way to being a good Linux warrior, my other suggestions are procps and coreutils. Or to cite one of the lines on my installation page for the Pro:
6. Due to older busybox, would be a good idea to install "procps", "coreutils", "bash", "findutils", and "psmisc".

Another suggestion is to use swat which should be helpful for setting up samba through the web. It is automatically installed with samba2.
http://www.nslu2-linux.org/wiki/Optware/SWAT

Then if you follow above directions, you can set up samba by going through the web page:
http://IP-address-of-your-PlugPro:901

Typing "ifconfig" will give you the ip address of your plug for eth0.

So thank you for the extra information and hopefully this helps.
Good Luck!

Addendum:
You might need to update your services file if you use swat or some other utilities http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/nslu2-general/files/Plug%20Files/services

Tizzo,
The 2GB USB Flash (thank you for not making me explain USB flash again) is way more than adequate for /opt. Optware packages really don't take up much space (could probably use an old 256MB or 512MB for samba2 with plenty of spare fun stuff). Use the guide at http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/nslu2-general/files/Plug%20Files/readme.txt and use the file plug.tar.gz at http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/nslu2-general/files/Plug%20Files/ to install the base system. You can do this in 5 to 10 minutes (ok, I can, I don't know about you). Just remember to install samba2 and use the ipkg guide above in case of any problems. Swat would probably be worth it since the biggest pain for newbies is setting up samba in smb.conf. That requires running xinetd. Swat is one of the utilities called by webmin.

Addendum (gotta have one)
When in doubt, google/bing/yahoosearch it.
Some Swat images from other Linux Sources:
http://www.howtoforge.com/samba-fileserver-with-swat-fedora8-p2
http://www.samba.org/samba/docs/using_samba/ch02.html
http://www.techrepublic.com/article/administering-samba-using-swat-for-window...
Here is an example of a user installing samba2:
http://diis.net/front/2010/09/05/installing-samba-on-your-pogoplug/

Thanks Oddball. Quick followup - I have a Dockstar, which I presume (since I can see drives as Windows shares) already has some flavor of Samba running on it. Is there any good reason to install the Optware Samba2 package? Will it give me anything that the existing Dockstar software doesn't?

OddballHero said:

So how did your Apache/Webdav combo pan out? My lighttpd/Webdav worked out for me.

Not there yet unfortunately.  Just haven't had time.  This is "recreation" for me, and that's been taking a back seat for now.  I'll let you know how it goes though.

So Carl, referring back to my post on http://www.pogoplugged.com/forum/thread/15812/Optware-problems-on-Pogoplug-Pr... earlier in the week (guess nobody reads these things). Did you install it? I thought you had this solved days ago. Here, cut and paste this "ipkg install libnsl".

Rok Carl said: Yeeees... Now it all works (Samba). So let me recap all the things I had to do in addition to the instructions, so someone later can follow these. I went through the whole procedure twice, cause I had to setup another Pogoplug Pro for a family member.

1. Even though I had my disk formatted as ext2, somehow the libipkg.so.0 was missing from /opt/lib. So I just copied it (cp /opt/lib/libipkg.so.0.0.0 /opt/lib/libipkg.so.0). I know it's funny but it works :).
2. Even though I followed the instructions, I couldn't run fdisk because the command was not found. I just imagined that my version of Busybox Linux was so stripped down that it didn't include it. But once I installed findutils I found out that I have it in /sbin/fdisk. And I was scratching my head :). So either use /sbin/fdisk or include it in $PATH.
3. Yeah, like Oddballhero said, you have to run "ipkg install libnsl" for Samba to work. Also, use the samba2 package (ipkg install samba2).

Hope that helps someone. And thanks to you Oddballhero - I don't know if I would finished this without your help!

Please, future users, dont copy, use `ln -s` to link it. 

Glad to see you got it working. And yeah, the Pro's $PATH is only /bin:/usr/bin

tizzo said: Thanks Oddball. Quick followup - I have a Dockstar, which I presume (since I can see drives as Windows shares) already has some flavor of Samba running on it. Is there any good reason to install the Optware Samba2 package? Will it give me anything that the existing Dockstar software doesn't?

I think I may have found a reason on my own to replace whatever's already there with samba2.  I started using my Dockstar in earnest for the first time the past few weeks, and I've noticed that in some scenarios, when writing to a Samba share on the Dockstar, I reliably get data corruption.  The scenarios I've tested so far involve zipping a large archive using 7zip with the output file on the Samba share, and converting audio files using WinAmp's Format Converter, again with the output going direclty to the Samba share.

If I complete either operation to a local HDD and then upload to the share, everything seems fine.  I've done some limited testing saving directly to the Dockstar through the PogoPlug Drive app, and that also seems to work, but is slower.  All of which leads me to suspect DockStar's SMB implementation.  So I think I'll be trying Samba2 after all...

OddballHero said: My general suggestions are if your network consists mostly of Windows/Linux then use samba2 (Although I use samba3 on OpenWrt) due to resources (you can also try NFS). If you network consists mostly of Macs, then use netatalk. Definitely make sure to umount or eject drives before shutting off the pogoplug. These things are basically real computer systems and need an orderly shutdown to keep files from corrupting. I occasionally hook up my drives to my desktops to do filesystem checks and maintenance. We were discussing webdav a while back and that was really easy with lighttpd (uncomment a module and point to the site/share). It took longer to setup which login security to use (htpasswd, htdigest, SSL).

Thanks man, I really appreciate all the advice.  I'm really starting to like this little device too.  It's giving me all kinds of ideas...

Anyway, couple more questions...

1.  What (if any) are the consequences of having rcS invoke mount_optext2 if my /opt drive happens not to be plugged into my Dockstar?  Looking at the script, it appears if it doesn't find a drive with a /bin directory, it just falls through leaving everything find and dandy, but just making sure.

1a.  Also, the directions in the linked text file say to invoke this at the end of rcS - but it seems to me that at this point, hdplug service will already have started, and mounted the drive for it's own use.  Am I missing something?

2.  lighttpd web site says that in order to use ssl, you need to compile openssl into the package.  Do you happen to know if the OptWare package has openssl compiled in?  If not, have you by any chance ever tried installing the GNU toolchain on a Pogoplug and using it to build a package from source?  (My main purpose for wanting webdav is to have a way to access my Dockstar from outside the house without necessarily using the Pogoplug service or their Pogo Drive software, and I'd like to do so securely).

OK, once I stopped being a wuss, I got samba2 along with SWAT up and running no problem.  Now that I'm to the point where I have to decide how to set up my shares, I've got another question - one to which I think I know (and don't like) the answer.

Does anyone know if there is any rhyme or reason as to which drive gets which device name when the Dockstar is turned on?  I'm positive that my /opt drive was showing up as /dev/sdb at one point.  Right now, it's /dev/sda.  And I see no reason to assume that it won't go back to /dev/sdb at some future reboot.  The mount_optext2 script seems to aknowledge this (it cycles through the first slice on each of /dev/sda, /dev/sdb, /dev/sdc, and /dev/sdd looking for one with an /opt/bin directory on it).

My concern is that, especially if you're doing directory-level shares, you need to know which disk is mounted at which mount point.  I've currently got two drives connected, and am trying to devise a system that is not brittle in the face of adding more drives, or having the disks assigned different device names on the next power-up.

I'm assuming that the .ceid and other files on each drive is how the Pogoplug keeps track of which drive is which.  Does anyone know of any documentation or anything that would allow for safely and reliably using this information to identify specific drives?  Or am I going to be writing a script to do the same thing as mount_optext2 to identify my shares?  Thanks.

Hmmm. Think I may have screwed something up here.

I was having trouble getting Samba2 to give me the correct access to my drives. It was looking like the fmask/dmask on the mount point, being set to 22, was preventing anyone but the owner (root) from creating directories or files. I changed my mounting script, but the drives still got mounted as 22, and denied me access, no matter what I did in my script.

So I figured the PogoPlug service might be to blame, since it was mounting my drives with the 22 mask before I got around to mounting them for Samba. So I decided to try disabling the PogoPlug service - by commenting out the line in rcS that starts it. Now, I can't seem to get in. The light on my Dockstar blinks green for a few seconds, then blinks orange perpetually. I can ping, but not telnet or ssh.

My guess at this point is that dropbear is started along with the PogoPlug service, and that by turning off one, I turned off the other. Anyone know if this is correct, and if so, any ideas on how to fix it? Thanks.

Actually I might have a way around it. I do have rcS running the Samba startup script (S80samba.sh?), which is on my /opt drive. I believe this is being reached because Samba appears to be starting, and this partition is on removable media so I can gain access to it from outside my Dockstar.

Anyway, can someone refresh my memory as to the exact name of the script that starts the Pogoplug services? It is in /etc/init.d, and is something like hbmgr.sh, or hbpmgr.sh. I'm hoping if I invoke it at the beginning of S80samba.sh I'll be able to restore ssh access. Thanks.