Problems that I'm having...

[G. David Butler gdb@dbSystems.com]

Hello All,

I have not gotten any response to my previous message, so I'm just wondering
if my questions are too general for this list or if I'm just such a novice
that everybody else knows everything about getting Plan 9 up that they
would rather not bother with my newbie questions.

The Installation instructions hint to some of the things I'm trying to do,
(like getting a auth server going, getting bootp going, getting an cpu/auth
server to boot from a local disk, etc.) but provide no help or pointers to
further information.

Also, how do you get a simple vga card and monitor to work.  I have a simple
Paradise VGA controller connected to a simple VGA monitor (color) that "vga"
doesn't recognize.  I have no idea what "chipset" it uses or that there is
a "clock" on the board.  I tell every other piece of software in the world
that it is a color VGA card/monitor and it works!

Please help if you can or tell me where to go to get my questions answered.

Here is the previous message.

=============================================

Hello fellow Plan 9 fans,

I have read and read and read and read and read (you get the idea...)
but have a few questions for those who have experienced.

I have a Plan 9 PC file server up (named p9fs) and have installed the
CD-ROM to it in "allow" mode.  I then made a PC into a cpu/auth
server (called p9auth) and rebooted it.  After getting through the
0.0.0.0 auth server problem, I used ed on p9auth to edit the
/lib/ndb/local file to set up my network.  (It is weird that
/lib/ndb/auth has hostid=authid instead of hostid=p9auth, but that is
what the installation did, so...)  I also tarred /usr/tor to /usr/none.
I then reboot p9fs and let it come up from the "nvram" without "allow"
and reboot p9auth.

First question, how does a cpu/auth server running 9pccpu get to the
disk to read/write the nvram partition?  Should I run 9pccpudisk, and
if so, how do I get that on the boot partition with a kernel that
doesn't talk to the disk?

Now I run newuser on p9fs and auth/changeuser on p9auth to add the the
auth userid and myself.  I get errors that /adm/keys and /adm/keys.who
can't be written.  (But the entries are put in /mnt/keys.) Sure enough,
the owner of the files is adm and the authid can't write it.  So, should
I change the owner of the files on p9fs or should I wait to get p9auth to
boot from the local disk and bind a local directory over /adm with -c?

At this point I start up my terminal (called p9term, real original :-))
with the boot disk modified to bootfile=manual and at the boot: prompt
I type e!0, and it finds p9auth and p9fs (from bootp running on p9auth)
and I give it my userid and passord.  I then do the /sys/lib/newuser and
up comes 8 1/2!  I then echo -n p9auth >/env/cpu and type "cpu" (or
cpu -h p9auth) and get:

	cpu: can't authenicate: p9auth: AS protocol botch

So I reboot the terminal and login as none and get 8 1/2 and get the same
response to cpu or cpu -h p9auth!  Not a authenication problem, I guess?
(Just to make sure, I again went in as me with an incorrect password and
it would not let me attach.)

Going a little further, I telnet to p9auth (from a UNIX machine) and if I
type none to the user: prompt, I get "cpu%"!  But if I type my userid I get,
about 15 seconds later, "authenication failure".  Is this related to the
"cpu" problem?

I did see the comment someone made about the network section of
/lib/ndb/local having an ip ending with 0, and mine does (class C.)

And who or what is bootes?  (I really don't know.  Is this id somehow
special?)

About the diffs in errata and the update directory.  Which should
we use?  How do we know if there are new ones?

What is a boddle and what is it good for?

I have not used any of the "cool" tools that everybody is talking about
yet, I decided to wait till I had a "full" configuration up to both
play and get a feel for the responsiveness of the system.  I am looking
forward to the experience!

For the curious, this is a *home* network.  P9fs is a NICE EISA
motherboard 486dx/50 16Mb RAM with an Adaptec 1742 in standard mode
with a 1 Gig drive and a WD8013.  P9auth is a AMI EISA motherboard
486dx2/66 16Mb RAM with an Adaptec 1740 in standard mode with a little
40meg drive and a WD8003.  P9term is a Tandy 4000 386dx/20 & '387 8Mb ram
a WD8003 and a Logitech 3 button mouse.  (No hard drive to test a floppy
booted term.)  A fourth machine runs NetBSD and watches over the PPP link.

Thanks for any help.

David Butler
gdb@dbSystems.com