[9fans] ppxeload nix

[9fans] ppxeload nix

[Benjamin Huntsman]

I've downloaded the nix bits from http://code.google.com/p/nix-os/ and compiled it under 9vx on OSX, but I'm having some trouble getting the resultant kernel to boot.  My target for now is a VMware Fusion VM, which I've got set up to PXE boot via nix's ppxeload.  It downloads and runs ppxeload just fine, but there appears to be no ether0.  Here's the output on the screen:

Network boot from Intel E1000
Copyright (C) 2003-2008 VMware, Inc.
Copyright (C) 1997-2000 Intel Corporation

CLIENT MAC ADDR: 00 0C 29 D2 AC AC  GUID: 564DA193-9D84-E902-D0E8-F20CCBD2ACAC
CLIENT IP: 10.0.0.133  MASK: 255.255.255.0  DHCP IP: 10.0.0.101
GATEWAY IP: 10.0.0.1
Protected-mode bootstrap...
ELCR: 0E00
cpuidentify: cpuidax 0x306a9 cpuiddx 0xfabfbff
apm ax=f000 cx=f000 dx=40 di=ffff ebx=5770 esi=-1
Boot devices: fd0
boot from: 


I'd think that at this point, I should just be able to type "ether0!/amd64/9k8cpu", but alas that just gets me another "boot from:" prompt.  One gotcha that I can think of is that my TFTP server is not the same as my DHCP server.  Is there a way to specify the TFTP server?  Or am I missing something really stupidly simple like ppxeload not supporting the E1000 that VMware Fusion emulates, or that my ppxeload binary may need to be recompiled?

Many thanks in advance!

-Ben

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[David du Colombier]

NIX's ppxeload is pretty old and probably doesn't support
your network controller.

You should use Plan 9's (new) 9load which supports the
same devices as the Plan 9 kernel and is able to boot
from both the 386 and amd64 kernels.

--
David du Colombier

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[Benjamin Huntsman]

>You should use Plan 9's (new) 9load ...

Does that go for 9pxeload as well?
Is there a way to specify the TFTP server address if it's different than the DHCP server?

Thanks!

-Ben

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[David du Colombier]

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Yes , but "9pxeload" is now called "9boot".

You can usually specify a TFTP server in your DHCP configuration (for
example, using "next-server" in ISC DHCPd).

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Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[erik quanstrom]

On Thu Feb  7 01:35:45 EST 2013, BHuntsman@mail2.cu-portland.edu wrote:
> I've downloaded the nix bits from http://code.google.com/p/nix-os/ and

i think this is active any longer.  however the 9atom cd
has an active copy of nix.  i know that ian ennis booted
/amd64/9term into a vmware fusion virtual machine all
the way up to rio.

this version has been in production for a year.

On Thu Feb  7 03:10:32 EST 2013, 0intro@gmail.com wrote:

> Yes , but "9pxeload" is now called "9boot".

9boot is quite different.  it uses the regular pc drivers
and is in /sys/src/9/pcboot.

also (this is unfortunate),
i don't think 9boot will boot nix on the 9atom disk
without a bit of help.  nix expects the e820 map in
the configuration variable "*e820".  one could
generate this variable and put it in the plan9.ini.
barring other problems, that might just work.

(http://www.quanstro.net/magic/man2html/8/plan9.ini)

nix from 9atom will boot from 9load, or
iplpxe (and likely ipliso, but i haven't tried) from 9atom.
iplpxe uses the undi drivers so will support any hardware
that has pxe rom, not just cards that we have drivers for.

9atom no longer incudes ppxeload.

- erik

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[Benjamin Huntsman]

>i think this is active any longer

So what is the current "official" location to obtain the amd64 Plan 9?

Pardon the question, but I've been sort-of absent lately and haven't been keeping as close of tabs on Plan 9 developments as I used to...

Many thanks!

-Ben

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[erik quanstrom]

On Thu Feb  7 16:36:23 EST 2013, BHuntsman@mail2.cu-portland.edu wrote:
> >i think this is active any longer
>
> So what is the current "official" location to obtain the amd64 Plan 9?

i would say 9atom.  to the best of my knowledge that's what lsub, coraid
& i are using for day-to-day cpu servers and terminals.

- erik

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[John Floren]

On Thu, Feb 7, 2013 at 1:35 PM, Benjamin Huntsman
<BHuntsman@mail2.cu-portland.edu> wrote:
>>i think this is active any longer
>
> So what is the current "official" location to obtain the amd64 Plan 9?
>

Depends who you ask. When the google code repo dropped out of use,
http://lsub.org/ls/nix.html became a good place to get the source.
There are other forks too, such as Erik's 9atom which distributes
basically the same source as you can find on lsub.org (because he
wrote a lot of the patches for the lsub fork)


john

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[David du Colombier]

> Erik's 9atom which distributes basically the same source as you can
> find on lsub.org (because he wrote a lot of the patches for the lsub
> fork)

Erik's NIX is quite different from the current code at Lsub
and there are a number of additions, mostly related to terminals.

In particular, as Erik said earlier (and I just confirmed it),
the e820 change made it incompatible with the current 9boot
from Bell Labs as is (which works fine with googlecode/lsub code).

--
David du Colombier

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[Francisco J Ballesteros]

Nevertheless, if someone wants a 64bit kernel that could be used as a terminal, I'd say
Erik's copy would be fine for that.


On Feb 7, 2013, at 11:42 PM, David du Colombier <0intro@gmail.com> wrote:

>> Erik's 9atom which distributes basically the same source as you can
>> find on lsub.org (because he wrote a lot of the patches for the lsub
>> fork)
> 
> Erik's NIX is quite different from the current code at Lsub
> and there are a number of additions, mostly related to terminals.
> 
> In particular, as Erik said earlier (and I just confirmed it),
> the e820 change made it incompatible with the current 9boot
> from Bell Labs as is (which works fine with googlecode/lsub code).
> 
> -- 
> David du Colombier

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[erik quanstrom]

> In particular, as Erik said earlier (and I just confirmed it),
> the e820 change made it incompatible with the current 9boot
> from Bell Labs as is (which works fine with googlecode/lsub code).

unfortunate, but requiring gnu multiboot?  that doesn't seem right.  :-)
it might be the wrong call, but please do look at the rather rude standard
and compare against the boot config strings before you make up your mind.

> http://www.9legacy.org/9legacy/patch/nix.diff
>
> The AHCI driver depends on Erik's libfis, which you can
> get from 9atom or this patch:
>
> http://www.9legacy.org/9legacy/patch/libfis.diff

cavet emptor:
the lsub stuff was its own distribution.  there are more
dependencies than that, and we didn't write them down.

- erik

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[Francisco J Ballesteros]

Just to let others know, Erik has everything the lsub nix had. If you want a terminal, you
might just pick that one.

We are in the process of removing features from the nix at lsub to make it become a more
researchy kernel; and we will focus on servers, not terminals. 
for terminals, there are nother nixies out there. Once we found nice things
to do to the kernel, we'll make the code available for others to import, as usual. 

btw, the stock distribution may include an amd64 kernel in the future. I'd also keep an eye
on that. I'm sure that would be a lot cleaner than what we now have.

hth

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[David du Colombier]

> So what is the current "official" location to obtain the amd64 Plan 9?

Just to sum things up a little, the NIX repositories are:

Noah's original NIX repository:
    https://bitbucket.org/npe/nix

Google Code repository:
    http://code.google.com/p/nix-os/

Lsub repository:
    http://lsub.org/ls/nix.html

Erik's repository, as part of 9atom:
    ftp://ftp.quanstro.net/other/9atom.iso.bz2

The last two are the most up-to-date and the most
active currently is probably Erik's.

To make things easier for Plan 9 users, I also maintain
a patch which includes all the necessary bits from the
Lsub repository to be installed on a current Plan 9:

http://www.9legacy.org/9legacy/patch/nix.diff

The AHCI driver depends on Erik's libfis, which you can
get from 9atom or this patch:

http://www.9legacy.org/9legacy/patch/libfis.diff

--
David du Colombier

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[David du Colombier]

> http://www.9legacy.org/9legacy/patch/nix.diff
>
> The AHCI driver depends on Erik's libfis, which you can
> get from 9atom or this patch:
>
> http://www.9legacy.org/9legacy/patch/libfis.diff

I forgot to mention it also depends on the following patch
to be able to compile the Plan 9 kernels using the
same libc (defining the NIX system calls):

http://www.9legacy.org/9legacy/patch/nix-sysnix.diff

--
David du Colombier

Re: [9fans] ppxeload nix

[John Floren]

On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 10:33 PM, Benjamin Huntsman
<BHuntsman@mail2.cu-portland.edu> wrote:
> Network boot from Intel E1000
> Copyright (C) 2003-2008 VMware, Inc.
> Copyright (C) 1997-2000 Intel Corporation
>
> CLIENT MAC ADDR: 00 0C 29 D2 AC AC  GUID: 564DA193-9D84-E902-D0E8-F20CCBD2ACAC
> CLIENT IP: 10.0.0.133  MASK: 255.255.255.0  DHCP IP: 10.0.0.101
> GATEWAY IP: 10.0.0.1
> Protected-mode bootstrap...
> ELCR: 0E00
> cpuidentify: cpuidax 0x306a9 cpuiddx 0xfabfbff
> apm ax=f000 cx=f000 dx=40 di=ffff ebx=5770 esi=-1
> Boot devices: fd0
> boot from:
>
>
> I'd think that at this point, I should just be able to type "ether0!/amd64/9k8cpu", but alas that just gets me another "boot from:" prompt.  One gotcha that I can think of is that my TFTP server is not the same as my DHCP server.  Is there a way to specify the TFTP server?  Or am I missing something really stupidly simple like ppxeload not supporting the E1000 that VMware Fusion emulates, or that my ppxeload binary may need to be recompiled?
>
> Many thanks in advance!
>
> -Ben
>

If ether0 isn't listed under "Boot devices", then the bootloader
wasn't able to detect it, so you can't load your kernel over ethernet.
Give it a shot with a different network card or try one of the other
methods suggested in this thread.

If you compile an ELF kernel it's also theoretically
multiboot-compatible, so you may be able to boot using something like
pxelinux instead of ppxeload. You can boot an amd64 kernel with GRUB,
but I had to change one line of 6l's ELF header construction code.

john