Bug#248047: Cobalt install
On Wed, May 19, 2004 at 01:40:15AM +0100, Martin Michlmayr wrote:
> > The LCD could be more verbose, i.e. after "loading debian-installer"
> > it could say "connect to the console now".
>
> I will consider doing this unless we get SSH support.
With ssh, it should display "now telnet to xx.xx.xx.xx", like the
(inofficial?) woody installer
(http://devel.alal.com/pipermail/cobalt-22/2002-July/000298.html)
does.
> > > - support installs via SSH, w/o serial console
> > Definitely. And an option to set the serial baudrate (from CoLo
> > onwards) to other speeds, i.e. 9600 like god intended.
>
> d-i and colo should just support any baud rate... however, I have no
> idea how to change the Cobalt to something else. Do you know?
I don't think you can change the baud rate used by the cobalt firmware
-- my idea would have been to let colo and the following steps use a
different speed than 115200, but I've got no idea how to tell colo
about it.
> > The partitioning tool doesn't set the swap partition type on the swap
> > partition (it works, so it's a cosmetic error).
>
> I've seen this too recently. I've to check if this is still there.
It does the right thing now.
> > inittab apparently has entries for virtual terminals, which those
> > messages:
> > INIT: Id "2" respawning too fast: disabled for 5 minutes
> > INIT: Id "3" respawning too fast: disabled for 5 minutes
>
> This should be gone now (in unstable).
Yup, inittab looks good.
installation report revealing a show-stopper:
> Do you perhaps have time to test an installation from unstable? You
> can use the initrd from
> http://people.debian.org/~tbm/d-i/images/mipsel/daily/cobalt/netboot
> (same kernel as before), and the install unstable rather than testing.
OK; I re-fetched the whole setup from that URL into /nfsroot on
bauer.tahina.priv.at (192.168.55.3), which is NFS-exported and has the
TFTP server:
# ls -lR
.:
total 4162
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 May 20 17:02 boot -> ./
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 213 May 19 02:22 default.colo
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 1448550 May 19 02:22 initrd.gz
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2652775 May 19 02:23 vmlinux-2.4.25-r5k-cobalt
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 44836 May 19 02:23 vmlinux.gz
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 44836 May 19 02:23 vmlinux_RAQ.gz
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 44836 May 19 02:23 vmlinux_raq-2800.gz
dhcpd.conf (2.0pl5-11):
host remailer {
hardware ethernet 00:10:E0:00:30:F5;
fixed-address remailer.tahina.priv.at;
option routers 192.168.55.1;
option root-path "/nfsroot";
next-server 192.168.55.3;
filename "/boot/default.colo";
}
Boots fine, menu comes up on LCD, select "TFTP", installer boots.
Interesting points:
- when the installer comes up on the serial console, the LCD
still shows "loading debian-installer".
- it asks for an IP address and other network config data -- it should
just use the data it already has gotten via DHCP (ISTR the woody
netinst does just that)
- it mis-configures the IP address -- I entered
"192.168.55.18", but it ifconfig's 192.168.55.255. Yes, I tried that
twice to make sure I didn't mistype the address :-)
~ # ifconfig
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:10:E0:00:30:F5
inet addr:192.168.55.255 Bcast:192.168.55.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:55 errors:1 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:22 errors:4 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:4
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:4221 (4.1 KiB) TX bytes:968 (968.0 B)
Interrupt:4
I went thru the process of configuring debian mirror and proxy,
"execute a shell" afterwards and ifconfig manually with the correct
values; exit from the shell, choose "Choose a mirror...", continue.
- The first time when asking for a debian mirror, it didn't ask if I
wanted http or ftp; the second time around, it does. Also, it
doesn't remember the country I selected first time around.
- it does configure /etc/resolv.conf with the nameservers I entered,
but it doesn't add "search domain.name" or "domain domain.name";
therefore I need to enter the FQDN of the proxy.
- select "unstable"
- in the "load installer components" screen, I selected "continue",
all of the offered modules were unselected by default and left that
way.
- partitioning: the disk already had partitions and file systems from
the last test; choose "partitioning method: erase entire disk".
- partitioning scheme: "all files in one partition"; looks OK:
| IDE1 master (hda) - 20.4 GB ST320423A # |
| > #1 primary 98.6 MB B f ext2r0 /boot # |
| > #2 primary 19.8 GB f ext3 / # |
| > #5 logical 518.1 MB f swap swap # |
[many hours later... boy, is that box sloooow!]
- reboot works well, machine comes up fine.
- in base-config, there's no visual indication of the active button --
both look exactely like this (i.e. no bold or inverse or stuff,
cursor is somewhere else):
. Is the hardware clock set to GMT? .
. .
. <Yes> <No> .
- selected list items _are_ visible, in bold.
- the timezone selector starts in the US submenu, instead of on the
top level.
- line editing characters (^U, ^A, ...) don't work in text entry fields.
- base-config asks for the system hostname; it should take the value
entered during the network configuration at the start of the
install; apt-source configuration is the same, I already have
entered the data before, it starts with default settings, except the
proxy.
- network config is broken, it doesn't even send out ARP packets when
trying to apt-get update; I select "edit sources.list by hand" and
leave it empty to get ahead.
after logging in, neither eth0 nor lo are configured/up,
/etc/network/interfaces has _only_ the following content:
--- cut ---
# Used by ifup(8) and ifdown(8). See the interfaces(5) manpage or
# /usr/share/doc/ifupdown/examples for more information.
--- cut ---
I'll be mighty busy the next two weeks, and maybe I'll not have a RAQ
available afterwards... maybe I could do another test install next
sunday.
ciao,
cm.
--
Wildcard NS records, while theoretically possible, have sufficiently
bizarre semantics that it is probably best to limit their use to
torture-tests of DNS software.
-- IAB Commentary: Architectural Concerns on the use of DNS Wildcards
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