Installing Raspbian Lite (headless)

Get the image

Download the image as .zip from https://www.raspberrypi.org/software/operating-systems/#raspberry-pi-os-32-bit and extract it

curl -L https://downloads.raspberrypi.org/raspios_lite_armhf/images/raspios_lite_armhf-2020-12-04/2020-12-02-raspios-buster-armhf-lite.zip -o 2020-12-02-raspios-buster-armhf-lite.zip
unzip 2020-12-02-raspios-buster-armhf-lite.zip
rm 2020-12-02-raspios-buster-armhf-lite.zip

Flash the SD Card

Insert SD card and check its device name and potentially mounted partitions with lsblk -p. We may have to unmount partitions that got mounted automatically by linux.

lsblk -p          # which device is our SD card? `/dev/sdc`?
umount /media/$USERNAME/*

Now we are ready to copy the image to the card. THIS WILL DESTROY ALL DATA!

sudo dd bs=4M if=2020-12-02-raspios-buster-armhf-lite.img of=/dev/sdc conv=fsync status=progress

Pre-Initialize the SD Card

Now we can:

• enable SSH access for headless access
• give the PI a proper hostname (otherwise it will be raspberrypi)

lsblk -p
touch /media/$USER/boot/ssh                 # an empty `ssh` file to enable SSH
sudo nano /media/$USER/rootfs/etc/hostname  # the hostname to make it unique

Additional WIFI Support

If you do not want to connect the Raspberry Pi to the ethernet, you can also pre-configure your preferred WIFI network:

nano /media/$USER/boot/wpa_supplicant.conf

ctrl_interface=DIR=/var/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
update_config=1
country=DE

network={
  ssid="<Name of your WiFi>"
  psk="<Password for your WiFi>"
}

See also: https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/configuration/wireless/headless.md

First Boot

Unmount the boot and rootfs partitions:

umount /media/$USER/*

Remove the SD card, plug it into the Raspberry Pi and boot it up with connected ethernet.

If you have DHCP installed you should find your Pi with the custom hostname set above:

ping <HOSTNAME>              # alt. with the previously set hostname
ssh-copy-id pi@<HOSTNAME>    # default password should be 'raspberry'

Boot from SSD

See: https://www.tomshardware.com/how-to/boot-raspberry-pi-4-usb

Change boot options:

sudo raspi-config
# 6 Advanced Options
#   A7 Bootloader Version
#     E1 Latest
#       -> **No** (Do NOT reset to defaults)
#   A6 Boot Order
#     -> USB Boot
# Finish
#  -> **No** reboot

sudo dd if=/dev/mmcblk0 of=/dev/sda bs=1M conv=fsync status=progress
sudo shutdown now

Now power off the Pi, remove the SD card and turn it on again.

Basic setup

passwd              # change password to something random
sudo raspi-config
# Advanced -> Expand disk
# Locale Settings ->
#  -> de_DE.UTF-8
#  -> en_US.UTF-8

sudo nano /boot/config.txt
# disable wifi
# disable bluethoot

Enable cgroup_enable=memory

This is for docker as it shows up in logs as an error. See: https://www.gerbenvanadrichem.com/infrastructure/docker-on-raspbian-cgroup-not-supported-on-this-system/

sudo echo " cgroup_enable=memory " >> /boot/cmdline.txt

Enable quirks mode for second SSD

See: SSD-ISSUE

Update packages and firmware

sudo sh -c '
apt update
apt full-upgrade -y -o Acquire::ForceIPv4=true
echo "y" | rpi-update

reboot now'

Update bootloader:

sudo rpi-eeprom-update -d -a
sudo reboot now

Install Docker and docker-compose

See: https://dev.to/rohansawant/installing-docker-and-docker-compose-on-the-raspberry-pi-in-5-simple-steps-3mgl

Pre-requisits

sudo apt install apt-transport-https ca-certificates curl gnupg2 python3-pip

Docker

curl -sSL https://get.docker.com | sh
sudo usermod -aG docker pi

docker-compose

sudo apt-get install -y libffi-dev libssl-dev python3 python3-pip
sudo apt-get remove python-configparser
sudo pip3 install docker-compose