Re: yaboot problems (still -- suggestions welcome!)

On Wed, May 24, 2000 at 05:52:23PM -0400, Tom wrote:

I've been struggling with it for over a week now, but am still unable to

yaboot (though I think I've made some minimal progress).

I have a G4/500 with linux on a dedicated external scsi drive (Adaptec
2906 card).

Per OF, the card corresponds to:
/pci@f2000000/pci-bridge@d/pci9004,7850@2/@2  (It is device 2 on the
scsi chain, or at least that's what the back of the hard drive implies.)

pdisk says the bootstrap partition is #2:
Partition map (with 512 byte blocks) on '/dev/sda'
 #:                type name                   length   base    ( size )

 1:    Apple_UNIX_SVR2 /            7785303 @ 204     (  3.7G)
 2:    Apple_HFS "bootstrap"         65638 @ 7785507 ( 32.0M)

this is a waste of space, since your swap partition is right below
perhaps you would want to delete them both and create the bootstrap
partition as 800K and the swap partition as 544.  

you should at the very least delete it and recreate it with the
correct Apple_Bootstrap partition type, otherwise macos will screw it
up. 

 3:    Apple_UNIX_SVR2 swap    1048592 @ 7851145 (512.0M)
 [rest deleted]

Set the relevant line in /boot/ofboot.b (which is cp'd from the
menu_ofboot.b):
" Booting Yaboot ..." cr " boot sd:2,yaboot" eval

My /etc/yaboot.conf is as follows:
--------------
default=Linux-Stable

## change to your bootstrap partition ie /dev/hda2
boot=/dev/sda2
device=sd:
timeout=20
install=/boot/yaboot
magicboot=/boot/ofboot.b

image=/boot/vmlinux
 label=Linux-Stable
 root=/dev/sda1
 read-only
 partition=2

append= "video=aty128fb:vmode:17;cmode:24"
-----------------

Now, in OF, when I try to set sd as a devalias, it tells me the nvramrc
isn't valid.  When I printenv, I don't see it showing up anywhere (but
maybe I don't know what to look for, exactly?).

nvalias is the proper command to create an alias, though i find it
simpler to just enter the full path in yaboot.conf and ofboot.b.  that
way you 1) don't have to fsck with OF.  and 2) don't have to fsck with
OF if your nvram gets erased.

When in OF and I try to boot directly by providing the OF path manually,

I get this error:
method <open> not found ; ihandle=ff9c4980 phandle=ff8a9708 method
<close> not found ihandle=ff9c4980 phandle=ff8a9708 can't OPEN:
/pci@f2000000/.... {etc}.
I don't know what this means or what to do with this information.
(Anyone have any idea?)

exactly what boot command did you use? it should be as follows:

boot /pci@f2000000/pci-bridge@d/pci9004,7850@2/@2:2,yaboot

you can put that in ofboot.b.

if that is what you used then it looks to me like the scsi card is not
really OF supported, can you boot macos off of it?  (if you have macos)

One last thing: I have managed in the past week to get ybin working (my
bootstrap was mounted in the mtab).

yes you bootstrap partition should never be mounted anywhere, not in
linux, not in macos.  treat it like a bootblock that is all it is.
your kernels belong in your ext2 root filesystem.

-- 
Ethan Benson
http://www.alaska.net/~erbenson/

I saw it noted in the preliminary yBin/yaBoot documentation that a
newer kernel was recommended, suggesting a 2.2.15pre3 or later.

Is there anything specific about the 2.2.14 that won't allow it to work?

I'm using a 2.2.14 kernel built from standard source (ftp.kernel.org)
with the 2.3.50 usb backport.

I tried that backport with a 2.2.15 kernel, and it boots (BootX), but
when booting the typical USB info doesn't scroll by the screen and no
usb devices are available (for example, upon starting X, error 19,
can't open usb mouse device)

Part of me thinks that may be BootX related, I had to upgrade BootX
when switching to my current kernel due to usb weirdness, but I don't
know for sure.

I know the FAQ is up, but its not quite finished yet- (but what is
done is very good so far)

The way I made a boostrap partition was to first create apple hfs
partition. I then wrote down the start block and length in blocks,
and (using pdisk) deleted the partition, using a C {create by
specified type), entering Apple_Bootstrap when it asked for file
system type.

Is that correct?

***

The drive my bootstrap partition will be located on is internal scsi,
attached to an adaptec 2930u controller.

I'm fairly sure I can find the full path to the device in the open
firmware, but interestingly enough- Apple System Profiler does NOT
see the scsi card or give any info on it.

It does not appear in the pci devices, although volumes attached to
the card ARE seen by System Profiler, and seen on bus 1 (opposed to
the built in bus 0)

Weird.



Thanks,
Michael A. Peters


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Michael A. Peters--		http://216.22.163.20/Linux_Pages/
				http://www.linuxzombies.com/
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