Re: debian installer, uml, kernel 2.6

[Sven Luther <sven.luther@wanadoo.fr>]

On Sat, Dec 18, 2004 at 12:39:01AM -0500, Raylynn Knight wrote:
> On Thu, 2004-12-16 at 02:14, Sven Luther wrote:
> > On Wed, Dec 15, 2004 at 11:23:00PM -0500, Raylynn Knight wrote:
> > > On Tue, 2004-12-14 at 14:01, Sven Luther wrote:
> > > > 
> > > > Not installing the kernel is not currently supported. You could hack a
> > > > base-installer so that it don't installs a kernel though.
> > > > 
> > > This is why the new installer is broken for many users!!  I have an
> > > unsupported architecture (Nubus PPC).  I had no problem installing with
> > 
> > He, nice, i never heard of this actually working.
> 
> See http://nubus-pmac.sourceforge.net/

Well, i still never heard of supported nubus machines earlier.

> > > the woody installer, I just created a kernel with the ramdisk.image.gz
> > > from the woody CD, booted and installed.  I can attempt this with the
> > > new debian installer but the install fails because it can't load a
> > > kernel.  Loading the kernel will never do me any good, because the only
> > > way to boot a Nubus PPC box is via the MkLinux booter from a MacOs
> > > partition. So in order to use sarge I must first install woody and then
> > > do a dist-upgrade. Extra work just because the new installer insists on
> > > installing a kernel.
> > 
> 
> I spoke to soon.  After playing around with boot options I have a
> successful install on a PowerBook 1400. I found the option that allowed
> me to choose installing a 2.4.27 kernel, which is exactly the version
> I'm using.  I'll be installing on a Performa 6300 next and if all goes
> well my G3 upgraded 7100 would be next.  Install report to follow
> soon!!!

Mmm, which of these are nubus machines ? None of them i guess ?

> > Well, you are aware that the right thing would be to fix the kernel to work
> > for you. Are you aware of the differences between the nubus-kernel and the
> > main kernel ? Is it totally impossible to reunite them ? 
> > 
> Not sure why the patches have never been pushed upstream, as I got
> involved just over a year ago.  I try to maintain the Ethernet drivers
> for the m68k Macintosh, and discovered that they were using those
> drivers for the PPC NuBus port also.

Which makes sense since it is the same hardware.

> > Ideally, you would create a nubus patch, and then build your own kernel
> > package (a bit like the -apus kernels are done), and then we can fix
> > base-installer and archdetect to recognize the nubus pmacs, and install that
> > kernel, and specialize nobootloader so that it tells the user what to do to
> > get the kernel working.
> > 
> To get the kernel working it needs to be copied to the Extensions folder
> as 'Mach Kernel' on the HFS partition.  Booting is done with the MkLinux
> booter.  

So, you would either have a nubus-installer which did exactly that, or have a
nobootloader specialization which tells the user to do it manually.

> > I would gladly assist you in that task, but i need your help, since you are
> > the first one i ever knew which runs nubus hardware. What i need from you is : 
> > 
> >   1) The content of /proc/cpuinfo, in order to fix archdetect to recognize the
> >   nubus pmacs. If there is nothing about it in /proc/cpuinfo, then another way
> >   of recognizing the nubus pmacs.
> > 
> PowerBook 1400:
> 
> processor       : 0
> cpu             : 603e
> revision        : 4.0 (pvr 0006 0400)
> bogomips        : 88.67
> machine         : PowerMac,NuBus
> motherboard     : M2 MacRISC
> detected as     : 0 (<NULL>)
> pmac flags      : 00000000
> memory          : 64MB
> pmac-generation : NuBus
> 
> Performa 6300:
> 
> processor       : 0
> cpu             : 603e
> revision        : 1.4 (pvr 0006 0104)
> bogomips        : 66.56
> machine         : PowerMac,NuBus
> motherboard     : Performa MacRISC
> detected as     : 0 (<NULL>)
> pmac flags      : 00000000
> memory          : 64MB
> pmac-generation : NuBus

Cool, we will just test on "pmac-generation : NuBus" then.

> >   2) What kernel are you using, and what configuration file. I will try to
> >   make a kernel package of it. Ideal would be to either use a 2.4.27 or 2.6.8
> >   based kernel, but i have the suspision that the nubus pmacs only run with
> >   the mklinux kernels, right ? 
> > 
> Kernel is Linux version 2.4.27 (rayk@p6290.nubuslinux.org) (gcc version
> 3.3.4 (Debian 1:3.3.4-13)) #1 Sun Dec 5 04:54:40 EST 2004
> 
> Built from the bitkeeper repository at
> bk://nubus-pmac.bkbits.net/linuxppc-2.4-nubus
> 
> Config file is attached.

Ok, i will extract it and build a kernel. I would appreciate if you could
become co-maintainer of that kernel package or something, do you feel like it
? It will be kernel-image-2.4.27-nubus, i think. Damn, it is a bk stuff, could
you be so kind as to extract the diff against the debian 2.4.27 kernel-source,
and send me that ? I don't have bk installed here. If we do it right, i will
upload the package this WE, altough it will be in the NEW queue for now.

I will try to make you a custom d-i available also, for you to test.

How is the initrd situation for the mklinux bootloader, can it boot a vmlinux
+ initrd, or does it need some other special target.

> > Well, other stuff too, i guess, but let's start with that.
> > 
> > Obviously, the other way to work around this, is to create a dummy kernel
> > package that you can then chose to install, but let's do the right fix first.
> > 
> > Friendly,
> > 
> > Sven Luther
> > 
> I'd be happy to provide whatever assistance I can in making this easier
> for others.  I plan on starting work on porting the NuBus PPC stuff to
> 2.6 during my vacation later this month.

Ok, thanks, that would be great.

Friendly,

Sven Luther