Alpine Linux support: my progress

[psypete]

Hi there,

I have a Dell D6000 Universal Dock that I need to unplug my HDMI cable into and plug into my laptop to use my monitor, and I would love it if I could just keep it plugged into the dock.

However, I am an insane person, because my laptop runs Alpine Linux. Alpine is a non-glibc Linux distribution, so I understand why this isn't supported yet. However, I'm halfway decent at software development, and would be happy to help support this platform.

Here is how far I've gotten:

1. Install Alpine Linux 3.17.1

2. Install the linux-lts-dev package

sudo apk add linux-lts-dev

3. Install dkms

git checkout https://github.com/dell/dkms.git
cd dkms
git checkout v3.0.10
sudo make install

4. Download displaylink Ubuntu installer and unpack it

- Go to https://www.synaptics.com/products/d...1?filetype=exe and download
- Go to download directory
- Unpack file

unzip "DisplayLink USB Graphics Software for Ubuntu5.6.1-EXE.zip"
mkdir displaylink
bash displaylink-driver-5.6.1-59.184.run --target displaylink
cd displaylink

5. Patch the evdi source code

mkdir evdi.tmp
tar -C evdi.tmp -xvzf evdi.tar.gz
cd evdi.tmp
patch -p1 <<'EOPATCH'
diff -Naur foo2/library/evdi_lib.c foo/library/evdi_lib.c
--- foo2/library/evdi_lib.c	2022-07-13 09:58:06.000000000 -0400
+++ foo/library/evdi_lib.c	2023-04-06 21:22:50.248134186 -0400
@@ -23,6 +23,8 @@
 #include <sys/types.h>
 #include <unistd.h>
 
+#include <linux/limits.h>
+
 // ********************* Private part **************************
 
 #define MAX_DIRTS           16
EOPATCH
tar -cvzf ../evdi.tar.gz .
cd ..

6. Truncate the Makefile.gcc-plugins script

sudo truncate -s 0 /usr/src/linux-headers-$(uname -r)/scripts/Makefile.gcc-plugins

7. Run the displaylink installer

sudo env SYSTEMINITDAEMON=runit ./displaylink-installer.sh

Amazingly, the installer seems to have worked. I'm going to reboot and see what else needs to be done to make it work, probably involving making dkms work properly on Alpine