[9fans] Sheevaplug

[9fans] Sheevaplug

[lucio]

I have received mine in the past hour or so.

Are there instructions anywhere on how to turn it into a CPU server?

Thanks.

++L

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[ron minnich]

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 5:06 AM,  <lucio@proxima.alt.za> wrote:
> I have received mine in the past hour or so.
>
> Are there instructions anywhere on how to turn it into a CPU server?

it was pretty easy.

get the sys/src/9 tree
cd sheevaplug, make the kernel, put it in the usual plan 9 tftpboot
site. Set up dhcp. Boot the plug.

I'll try to get better instructions tonight when I boot it again.
These are a start.

You'll need an 'nvram' file in the kernel source; I don't use it, as I
want to get u-boot environment variables working as my nvram (since
they *ARE* in fact in an nvram :-=)

No usb yet, I believe. No plan 9 serial port usb working for it;
you'll need something else for now.

ron

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[lucio]

> I'll try to get better instructions tonight when I boot it again.
> These are a start.

Geoff actually published the details when he announced the port,
booting(8) has been updated to match.  I had forgotten.  Of course,
it's never this simple, but it sure isn't hard.  Haven't tried it all
yet, I'm still looking for the right place to shove the tftp image,
it's been a long time since I last saw that.

I wonder why neither U-boot nor PMON do PXE.  PMON being senile has an
excuse, U-boot doesn't.  Or I need an excuse for not understanding :-)

USB is more daunting than it should be, Nemo is in the best position
to deal with porting the 386 efforts to the ARM.  Portability is
crucial to the MIPS (yeeloong) port too.

++L

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[ron minnich]

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 9:44 AM,  <lucio@proxima.alt.za> wrote:

> I wonder why neither U-boot nor PMON do PXE.  PMON being senile has an
> excuse, U-boot doesn't.  Or I need an excuse for not understanding :-)

Why bring such an awful standard anywhere you don't have to. I think they
made a good call :-)


ron

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[erik quanstrom]

> > I wonder why neither U-boot nor PMON do PXE.  PMON being senile has an
> > excuse, U-boot doesn't.  Or I need an excuse for not understanding :-)
>
> Why bring such an awful standard anywhere you don't have to. I think they
> made a good call :-)

two standards are always better than one.
never got that logic.  but it seems to be
the conventional wisdom.

what's the replacement for pxe?

- erik

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[ron minnich]

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 10:12 AM, erik quanstrom <quanstro@coraid.com> wrote:

> what's the replacement for pxe?

Why not 9p?

ron

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[David Leimbach]

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On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 10:33 AM, ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 10:12 AM, erik quanstrom <quanstro@coraid.com>
> wrote:
>
> > what's the replacement for pxe?
>
> Why not 9p?
>

BOOTP + 9p?


>
> ron
>
>

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Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[ron minnich]

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 10:37 AM, David Leimbach <leimy2k@gmail.com> wrote:

> BOOTP + 9p?

Sure. Theres' lots of good candidates out there. It's just that PXE is
not one of them. PXE was designed for a world of binary formats and
tiny, incapable network bootstraps, and it was obsolete when it was
designed over a decade ago.

ron

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[lucio]

> Sure. Theres' lots of good candidates out there. It's just that PXE is
> not one of them. PXE was designed for a world of binary formats and
> tiny, incapable network bootstraps, and it was obsolete when it was
> designed over a decade ago.

This reminds of a similar situation many years ago: it doesn't help to
criticise when a concrete alternative isn't being offered.  PXE works,
even Plan 9 knows how to deal with it.  If there is even one better
alternative out there, there sure isn't much support for it.  Maybe
the wrong metric, but it is a metric that the marketplace understands.

Were I as skilled as some of the people on this list, I'd build me a
bootstrapping paravirtualiser modelled on the Plan 9 kernel, then
provide a device interface just like Plan 9's that all kernels could
tie easily into.  I'd even dare call it a microkernel if no one can
provide a better candidate for that label.  Sadly, I doubt I'll ever
come even close to what may turn out to be merely a pipe dream.

Just some musings while I ponder what to make of the sheevaplug, now
that it seems to work...  Good work to all who contributed.

++L

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[erik quanstrom]

> Sure. Theres' lots of good candidates out there. It's just that PXE is
> not one of them. PXE was designed for a world of binary formats and
> tiny, incapable network bootstraps, and it was obsolete when it was
> designed over a decade ago.

nonetheless, it's what vendors support.  fighting
them on this is not going to be productive.

- erik

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[Francisco J Ballesteros]

Ours is finally in Spain, at customs.

Knowing our bureaucracy, it may still take a week or two to get my hands on it.

When it comes I'll take a look to usb there.

In someone can't wait before we try, I think it's a matter of getting
the controller
initialized properly (and the ports reset). Looking what linux or any other does
to initialize it may give some clue.
Once that is done, it's likely the code from 386
would just work.

But we'll try to help there as soon as we can.

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 6:44 PM,  <lucio@proxima.alt.za> wrote:
>> I'll try to get better instructions tonight when I boot it again.
>> These are a start.
>
> Geoff actually published the details when he announced the port,
> booting(8) has been updated to match.  I had forgotten.  Of course,
> it's never this simple, but it sure isn't hard.  Haven't tried it all
> yet, I'm still looking for the right place to shove the tftp image,
> it's been a long time since I last saw that.
>
> I wonder why neither U-boot nor PMON do PXE.  PMON being senile has an
> excuse, U-boot doesn't.  Or I need an excuse for not understanding :-)
>
> USB is more daunting than it should be, Nemo is in the best position
> to deal with porting the 386 efforts to the ARM.  Portability is
> crucial to the MIPS (yeeloong) port too.
>
> ++L
>
>
>

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[Gorka Guardiola]

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 9:39 PM, Francisco J Ballesteros <nemo@lsub.org> wrote:
> Ours is finally in Spain, at customs.
>
> Knowing our bureaucracy, it may still take a week or two to get my hands on it.
>

There is also a half written untried driver for the serial usb waiting
for it to arrive
to be finished.



--
- curiosity sKilled the cat

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[lucio]

> There is also a half written untried driver for the serial usb waiting
> for it to arrive
> to be finished.

Which is the serial USB?  The console on my plug works perfectly well,
I thought that was the purpose?

++L

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[Gorka Guardiola]

On Tue, Dec 15, 2009 at 4:15 AM,  <lucio@proxima.alt.za> wrote:
>> There is also a half written untried driver for the serial usb waiting
>> for it to arrive
>> to be finished.
>
> Which is the serial USB?  The console on my plug works perfectly well,
> I thought that was the purpose?
>
>
>
>

Does it?. I mean the PC from which you connect to the device.
The sheeva has an integrated usb to serial cable so that from inside
the sheeva you see a serial (that works) but from the host you see
a usb serial device (ftdi sio) which is the driver I was talking about.

-- 
- curiosity sKilled the cat

Re: [9fans] Sheevaplug

[lucio]

> But we'll try to help there as soon as we can.

I have absolutely no doubt that you will :-)

Unfortunately, as Geoff points out, USB is difficult.  No chance that
you could write a commentary on USB that is as good as your efforts on
3rd Edition Plan 9?

++L

Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[geoff]

I ordered an openrd-client from globalscale and it arrived within
a few days.  It's the same SoC (Kirkwood) as the Sheevaplug, but more
(perhaps all) of the connectors are made available, plus vga output for $250.
Looking at mine, I see connectors for 7 usb 2 ports, 2 Gb ethernets,
esata, SMbus, system debug, sd card, rs485, rs232, audio speaker & mic,
and vga output.  So far, I have both ethernet ports working.  The VGA
is Volari Z11, which is apparently undocumented except for Linux drivers.

Note that the Kirkwood SoC does not include hardware floating-point, so
the kernel emulates floating-point instructions, which is slow, though
acceptable for uses such as awk.

[9fans] SheevaPlug

[Don Bailey]

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So, what is everyone's preferred plug vendor? Out of the three, is there a
preference for people out there hacking on the Sheeva?

Thanks,
D

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Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[Francisco J Ballesteros]

ours is still on its way, from globalscale tech.
They took at least 3 weeks to ship our order.
Finally they did, but as I said, still on the way, despite
choosing a good delivery. But that may be only when
you buy from europe.

On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 7:29 AM, Don Bailey <don.bailey@gmail.com> wrote:
> So, what is everyone's preferred plug vendor? Out of the three, is there a
> preference for people out there hacking on the Sheeva?
> Thanks,
> D
>
>

Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[Lluís Batlle]

Mine I bougth some months ago, also from globalscale. They took more
than one month to ship it, but after their notice about the shipment,
it came in two days. It came in a nice packaging box, with all the
cables, and a CD with the source code.

2009/12/5 Francisco J Ballesteros <nemo@lsub.org>:
> ours is still on its way, from globalscale tech.
> They took at least 3 weeks to ship our order.
> Finally they did, but as I said, still on the way, despite
> choosing a good delivery. But that may be only when
> you buy from europe.
>
> On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 7:29 AM, Don Bailey <don.bailey@gmail.com> wrote:
>> So, what is everyone's preferred plug vendor? Out of the three, is there a
>> preference for people out there hacking on the Sheeva?
>> Thanks,
>> D
>>
>>
>
>

Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[David Leimbach]

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i wonder if there's a complicated volume pricing thing going on where these
companies take orders, accumulating volume so they increase their margins
before they ship.  I can't imagine why else they'd drag their feet on it
except that they want to get a good price as a reseller, and don't want to
be sitting on a lot of inventory.

Dave

On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 4:17 AM, Lluís Batlle <viriketo@gmail.com> wrote:

> Mine I bougth some months ago, also from globalscale. They took more
> than one month to ship it, but after their notice about the shipment,
> it came in two days. It came in a nice packaging box, with all the
> cables, and a CD with the source code.
>
> 2009/12/5 Francisco J Ballesteros <nemo@lsub.org>:
> > ours is still on its way, from globalscale tech.
> > They took at least 3 weeks to ship our order.
> > Finally they did, but as I said, still on the way, despite
> > choosing a good delivery. But that may be only when
> > you buy from europe.
> >
> > On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 7:29 AM, Don Bailey <don.bailey@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> So, what is everyone's preferred plug vendor? Out of the three, is there
> a
> >> preference for people out there hacking on the Sheeva?
> >> Thanks,
> >> D
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
>
>

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Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[Bill Hacker]

David Leimbach wrote:
> i wonder if there's a complicated volume pricing thing going on where
> these companies take orders, accumulating volume so they increase their
> margins before they ship.  I can't imagine why else they'd drag their
> feet on it except that they want to get a good price as a reseller, and
> don't want to be sitting on a lot of inventory.
>
> Dave
>
It isn't just volume *pricing*. Common situation among even the most
'mainstream' and expensive of industrial SBC's for example.

All this stuff is manufactured in 'batch' mode, often not even monthly,
but only once or twice a *year*. No one can afford to configure the pcb
manufacturing, component tapes for the stuffing machinery, wave
soldering, testing et al for just a few units, and the small
surface-mount components used today are nearly impossible to
hand-assemble with any acceptable combination of affordable labor cost
and failure rate.

Anything else, and we'd be paying 'prototype' prices. Not a happy
ground, that one.

And there is why folks jump onto Gameboys, X-boxen, Set-Top-Boxes,
programmable firewall/routers and NAS storage boxen to make ARM'ish and
other 'computers'. Or buy a whole box of the VIA MB INTENDED for
el-cheapo Walmart Linboxen to make 1U servers that don't heat up the
rack or give a Massatwoshits if a fan fails.

High volume == affordable, even if not optimal.

The SheevaPlug is just not quite into that range....

Bill


> On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 4:17 AM, Lluís Batlle <viriketo@gmail.com
> <mailto:viriketo@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>     Mine I bougth some months ago, also from globalscale. They took more
>     than one month to ship it, but after their notice about the shipment,
>     it came in two days. It came in a nice packaging box, with all the
>     cables, and a CD with the source code.
>
>     2009/12/5 Francisco J Ballesteros <nemo@lsub.org
>     <mailto:nemo@lsub.org>>:
>      > ours is still on its way, from globalscale tech.
>      > They took at least 3 weeks to ship our order.
>      > Finally they did, but as I said, still on the way, despite
>      > choosing a good delivery. But that may be only when
>      > you buy from europe.
>      >
>      > On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 7:29 AM, Don Bailey <don.bailey@gmail.com
>     <mailto:don.bailey@gmail.com>> wrote:
>      >> So, what is everyone's preferred plug vendor? Out of the three,
>     is there a
>      >> preference for people out there hacking on the Sheeva?
>      >> Thanks,
>      >> D
>      >>
>      >>
>      >
>      >
>
>

Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[Skip Tavakkolian]

> High volume == affordable, even if not optimal.
>
> The SheevaPlug is just not quite into that range....

the volume demand is coming from companies that bundle it with their
home automation, entertainment center and other products.  it seems
there's at least one company trying out every suggestion in this
article:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=hackers-weigh-in-mini-server

Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[ron minnich]

On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 10:29 PM, Don Bailey <don.bailey@gmail.com> wrote:
> So, what is everyone's preferred plug vendor? Out of the three, is there a
> preference for people out there hacking on the Sheeva?
> Thanks,

I'm sticking with globalscale because they deliver the daughter board
too, and you have to have that board for debug.

ron

Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[ron minnich]

On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 8:26 AM, ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> wrote:

> I'm sticking with globalscale because they deliver the daughter board
> too, and you have to have that board for debug.

Although, once this all works, I want to by a bunch, rip the board out
of the plug module, stack them up (they have four nice pre-drilled
holes for stacking) and have a little Plan 9 cluster. Not as nice as
Lucho's gumstix cluster but gumstix are so small I can't see them, so
I like the sheeva better.

I'll need a nice 5V power supply that can drive a whopping 5W per
sheeva, should be doable -- 16A for 16 nodes.

ron

Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[Don Bailey]

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So, I honestly haven't been paying enough attention to Sheeva and Gumstix.
What does everyone think about hacking on both of these? Which one is the
easier platform to develop on/for? While Sheeva is substantially faster,
Gumstix has more interesting expansion cards. I'd love to hear some
opinions.

Thanks,
D

On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 8:26 AM, ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I'm sticking with globalscale because they deliver the daughter board
> > too, and you have to have that board for debug.
>
> Although, once this all works, I want to by a bunch, rip the board out
> of the plug module, stack them up (they have four nice pre-drilled
> holes for stacking) and have a little Plan 9 cluster. Not as nice as
> Lucho's gumstix cluster but gumstix are so small I can't see them, so
> I like the sheeva better.
>
> I'll need a nice 5V power supply that can drive a whopping 5W per
> sheeva, should be doable -- 16A for 16 nodes.
>
> ron
>
>

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Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[Skip Tavakkolian]

> So, what is everyone's preferred plug vendor? Out of the three, is there a
> preference for people out there hacking on the Sheeva?

i ordered through globalscale; 2-3 weeks to ship and a few more days
for delivery.  week 2 of waiting.

Re: [9fans] SheevaPlug

[ron minnich]

On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 9:09 AM, Skip Tavakkolian <9nut@9netics.com> wrote:
>> So, what is everyone's preferred plug vendor? Out of the three, is there a
>> preference for people out there hacking on the Sheeva?
>
> i ordered through globalscale; 2-3 weeks to ship and a few more days
> for delivery.  week 2 of waiting.

Their shipping promises are in a different coordinate system -- I
suspect there is an imaginary component. You may have to call them and
put pressure on them if your plug is late ... that's what I had to do.

ron