* [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". @ 2010-12-09 22:53 Lloyd Caldwell 2010-12-09 23:01 ` erik quanstrom ` (4 more replies) 0 siblings, 5 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Lloyd Caldwell @ 2010-12-09 22:53 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs Synopsis: do I give up trying to make a distributed plan 9 home network? Is plan 9 worth the struggle? The concepts are clearly superior, is it the implementation, is it the lack of coherent/correct (imho) documentation? Longer background: I noticed that the installation notes now has the statement: "If you find yourself reinstalling Plan 9 frequently, something is wrong. This should not be necessary. In particular, there is no need to give each Plan 9 system its own file system. " This is speaking directly to me. I have been trying to implement plan 9 in a distributed manner for a long time (since r4 went open source). I have plan 9 installed on many computers but none of them allow me to share resource between boxes. network booting doesn't work (9pxeload aborts with exception on all pc's, but I do see the plan 9 pxe banner). the instructions for setting up cpu server don't work for me (i.e.: cpu -h cpuhost -u user yields errors that I can not decode, can't even tell which "program" is issuing them). the wiki documents seem to jump from extremely complicated to extremely trivial. I have read the recommended reading list documents multiple times. I have read a few plan 9 getting started web documents but they all end abruptly. The man pages say different things then the 9fans list people say and the code is written by really smart people who use (to me) un-informative variable names (please don't flame me for that statement, you folks are the pro's and I defer to your taste in naming, I just can't figure out what you're doing from reading the code). I'm not a computer scientist but in past jobs have installed/managed many large unix, windoz, distributed systems, including source only systems. Should I abandon attempting to build a plan 9 distributed system? I just want to setup an isolated (no internet connection) home environment. I have written drivers for my custom devices, ported the kernel to some arm boards, written some csg code but am tired of sneaker net file transfer when this beast (plan9) is supposed to be all network all the time. Note all of my installs are on bare hardware (i.e.: no vm stuff under linux, mac, windoz). Where might I go for a walk thru in setting up a simple plan9 installation, one cpu/auth/fs and one terminal? sorry for the extent of this message, frustrated and the learning curve seems to have infinite slope. regards Lloyd Caldwell lmc@xmission.com ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-09 22:53 [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share" Lloyd Caldwell @ 2010-12-09 23:01 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-09 23:06 ` John Floren ` (3 subsequent siblings) 4 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: erik quanstrom @ 2010-12-09 23:01 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans On Thu Dec 9 17:56:39 EST 2010, lmc@xmission.com wrote: > Synopsis: > do I give up trying to make a distributed plan 9 home network? > Is plan 9 worth the struggle? > The concepts are clearly superior, is it the implementation, is it > the lack of coherent/correct (imho) documentation? computers are annoying. if you have a specific question or a specific failure case, i'm sure the list will try to address it. - erik ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-09 22:53 [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share" Lloyd Caldwell 2010-12-09 23:01 ` erik quanstrom @ 2010-12-09 23:06 ` John Floren 2010-12-10 0:39 ` Lloyd Caldwell 2010-12-09 23:26 ` Steve Simon ` (2 subsequent siblings) 4 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread From: John Floren @ 2010-12-09 23:06 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs On Thu, Dec 9, 2010 at 5:53 PM, Lloyd Caldwell <lmc@xmission.com> wrote: > Synopsis: > do I give up trying to make a distributed plan 9 home network? > Is plan 9 worth the struggle? > The concepts are clearly superior, is it the implementation, is it > the lack of coherent/correct (imho) documentation? > > Longer background: > > I noticed that the installation notes now has the statement: > > "If you find yourself reinstalling Plan 9 frequently, something is > wrong. This should not be necessary. In particular, there is no need to give > each Plan 9 system its own file system. " > > This is speaking directly to me. > > I have been trying to implement plan 9 in a distributed manner for a long > time (since r4 went open source). I have plan 9 installed on many computers > but none of them allow me to share resource between boxes. network booting > doesn't work (9pxeload aborts with exception on all pc's, but I do see the > plan 9 pxe banner). the instructions for setting up cpu server don't work > for me (i.e.: cpu -h cpuhost -u user yields errors that I can not decode, > can't even tell which "program" is issuing them). the wiki documents seem > to jump from extremely complicated to extremely trivial. I have read the > recommended reading list documents multiple times. > > I have read a few plan 9 getting started web documents but they all end > abruptly. The man pages say different things then the 9fans list people say > and the code is written by really smart people who use (to me) > un-informative variable names (please don't flame me for that statement, you > folks are the pro's and I defer to your taste in naming, I just can't figure > out what you're doing from reading the code). > > I'm not a computer scientist but in past jobs have installed/managed many > large unix, windoz, distributed systems, including source only systems. > > Should I abandon attempting to build a plan 9 distributed system? I just > want to setup an isolated (no internet connection) home environment. I have > written drivers for my custom devices, ported the kernel to some arm boards, > written some csg code but am tired of sneaker net file transfer when this > beast (plan9) is supposed to be all network all the time. > > Note all of my installs are on bare hardware (i.e.: no vm stuff under linux, > mac, windoz). > > Where might I go for a walk thru in setting up a simple plan9 installation, > one cpu/auth/fs and one terminal? > > sorry for the extent of this message, frustrated and the learning curve > seems to have infinite slope. > > regards > Lloyd Caldwell > lmc@xmission.com If you follow the standalone CPU installation instructions on the wiki to the letter, you will have a cpu/auth/file server. It's then easy to export fossil to clients, just set up the configuration to listen on the appropriate port (the document you want is linked from the standalone instructions). Then, once you've got that set up, you install a terminal on another machine. When it asks for a root, say "tcp" then give it the IP for your standalone server when it asks. Boom, your terminal now has remote root. You'll probably want to configure /lib/ndb/local to keep track of all your systems... Configuring PXE isn't that tricky but I don't want to run through the setup process right now, let me know if you need a rundown. Basically, "> Where might I go for a walk thru in setting up a simple plan9 installation one cpu/auth/fs and one terminal?" is answered by "Use the standalone install instructions... and that's basically it." If you'd give us the errors you're seeing from cpu, we might be able to help. "Weird errors" isn't very informative! If it comes down to it, I can exchange some of my config files with you. I have a standalone cpu server running, with PXE boot working. John ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-09 23:06 ` John Floren @ 2010-12-10 0:39 ` Lloyd Caldwell 2010-12-10 0:50 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-10 0:54 ` John Floren 0 siblings, 2 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Lloyd Caldwell @ 2010-12-10 0:39 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs John, thanks, > > If you follow the standalone CPU installation instructions on the wiki > to the letter, you will have a cpu/auth/file server. It's then easy to > export fossil to clients, just set up the configuration to listen on > the appropriate port (the document you want is linked from the > standalone instructions). I followed it to the letter. It has mistakes or inconsistencies (i think?). for example it says: proto=il - recommended (isn't this obsolete?) bootf=/386/9pc (It should be bootf=/386/9pxeload) the bind loop doesn't work with 9pccpuf kernel from install cdrom (circa dec 2009): for (i in m i S t) bind -a '#'^$i /dev >/dev/null >[2=1] fails, complains of no frame buffer (this is from the installation kernel /386/9pccpuf). This means no rio on server console so fixing things requires rebooting into a terminal kernel (I actually know sed quite well but one gets tired of sed 's/foo/bar/' filename >j ; mv j filename :-). there is no file /rc/bin/service/tcp567 (install image from dec 2009) The example of a combined cpu/auth server, is not consistent, it actually is not combined, unless I'm reading it wrong auth is different then cpu. An excerpt from the 'Configuring a standalone CPU server' wiki page (cut and pasted at 5:17pm mst today): A simple example for a combined cpu/auth server, the 192.168.1.100 machine, could be: ipnet=mynet ip=192.168.1.0 ipmask=255.255.255.0 auth=bouncer cpu=cycles dns=lookup dnsdom=9fans.net authdom=9fans.net auth=bouncer ip=192.168.1.100 sys=bouncer dom=bouncer.9fans.net ip=192.168.1.101 sys=cycles dom=cycles.9fans.net ip=192.168.1.102 sys=lookup dom=lookup.9fans.net > > Then, once you've got that set up, you install a terminal on another > machine. When it asks for a root, say "tcp" then give it the IP for > your standalone server when it asks. Boom, your terminal now has > remote root. You'll probably want to configure /lib/ndb/local to keep > track of all your systems... > > Configuring PXE isn't that tricky but I don't want to run through the > setup process right now, let me know if you need a rundown. If I boot this box from install cdrom and it can obtain ip address from dhcpd server running on cpu/auth/fs box and see that fs and auth are setup correctly. If I attempt to use cpu command from cdrom booted terminal I get the following error when attempting to connect to 10.0.1.6 (my combined cpu/auth/fs server). term% cpu -h 10.0.1.6 -u lmc cpu: can't authenticate: 10.0.1.6: auth_proxy rpc write: p9sk1@p9- net: auth_getkey: no /factotum or /boot/factotum: didn't get key ! password? dom=p9-net proto=p9s the cpu/auth/fs server /lib/ndb/local file is: #--- start of /lib/ndb/local ip=127.0.0.1 sys=localhost dom=localhost ipnet=p9-net ip=10.0.1.0 ipmask=255.255.255.0 auth=xeon0.p9.net cpu=xeon0.p9.net fs=xeon0.p9.net authdom=p9-net auth=xeon0.p9.net ip=10.0.1.6 sys=xeon0 dom=xeon0.p9.net ether=0007e933c735 ip=10.0.1.7 sys=xeon1 dom=xeon1.p9.net ether=0007e933ca35 bootf=/386/9pxeload #--- end of /lib/ndb/local the plan9.ini file for xeon1 is in /cfg/pxe/0007e933ca35 and contains: #--- start of xeon1 plan9.ini diskless boot config nobootprompt=ether0!/386/9pc mouseport=ps2intellimouse monitor=xga vgasize=1024x768x16 #-- end of /cfg/pxe/0007e933ca35 > > Basically, "> Where might I go for a walk thru in setting up a simple > plan9 installation one cpu/auth/fs and one terminal?" is answered by > "Use the standalone install instructions... and that's basically it." > > If you'd give us the errors you're seeing from cpu, we might be able > to help. "Weird errors" isn't very informative! > --> Error message from net booting. Intel(R) Boot Agent FE v4.1.16 Copyright (C) 1997-2004, Intel Corporation CLIENT MAC ADDR: 00 07 E9 33 CA 35 GUID: 18B58355 0CDA DA11 0080 35CA33E90700 CLIENT IP: 10.0.1.7 MASK: 255.255.255.0 DHCP IP: 10.0.1.6 Plan 9 from Bell Labs by PXE ELCR: 0E20 pcirouting: 8086/2483 at pin 2 irq 9 FLAGS=10292 TRAP=e ECODE=0 PC=8000a9b3 AX f000eef3 BX 00000200 CX 00000000 DX 80802798 SI 80057e3c DI 00000000 BP 00000000 CS 0010 DS 0008 ES 0008 FS 0008 GS 0008 CR0 80000011 CR2 f000eefb CR3 00094000 panic: exception/interrupt 14 Press almost any key to reset.._ <-- End error message from net booting. I can successfully net boot, linux, freebsd and msdos on this box. I get roughly the same errors (different register values) on other boxes. I have via epia-m boxes, intel dual xeon boxes, amd64 dual processor boxes and older pentium 4 boxes. 9pxeload fails similarly on all of them. I swapped out the network switch and also tried a "dumb" hub. I tried net loading 9pxeloaddebug but the box hangs after getting it's ip address, i.e. no 'Plan 9 from Bell Labs by PXE' banner. > If it comes down to it, I can exchange some of my config files with > you. I have a standalone cpu server running, with PXE boot working Maybe instead of focusing on net booting. Are there instructions on how to connect from one standalone system to another? cpu doesn't seem to work. If I knew I could actually login to a remote box that would probably help? Maybe not? I'm probably thinking about plan 9 all wrong. anyway thanks. Regards Lloyd > > John > ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-10 0:39 ` Lloyd Caldwell @ 2010-12-10 0:50 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-10 0:54 ` John Floren 1 sibling, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: erik quanstrom @ 2010-12-10 0:50 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans > Intel(R) Boot Agent FE v4.1.16 > Copyright (C) 1997-2004, Intel Corporation > > CLIENT MAC ADDR: 00 07 E9 33 CA 35 GUID: 18B58355 0CDA DA11 0080 > 35CA33E90700 > CLIENT IP: 10.0.1.7 MASK: 255.255.255.0 DHCP IP: 10.0.1.6 > > Plan 9 from Bell Labs by PXE > ELCR: 0E20 > pcirouting: 8086/2483 at pin 2 irq 9 > FLAGS=10292 TRAP=e ECODE=0 PC=8000a9b3 > AX f000eef3 BX 00000200 CX 00000000 DX 80802798 > SI 80057e3c DI 00000000 BP 00000000 > CS 0010 DS 0008 ES 0008 FS 0008 GS 0008 > CR0 80000011 CR2 f000eefb CR3 00094000 > panic: exception/interrupt 14 > > Press almost any key to reset.._ try ftp://ftp.quanstro.net/other/9pxeload if you continue to have this problem, i'll at least know where to start debugging. - erik ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-10 0:39 ` Lloyd Caldwell 2010-12-10 0:50 ` erik quanstrom @ 2010-12-10 0:54 ` John Floren 1 sibling, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: John Floren @ 2010-12-10 0:54 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs On Thu, Dec 9, 2010 at 7:39 PM, Lloyd Caldwell <lmc@xmission.com> wrote: > > John, thanks, > >> >> If you follow the standalone CPU installation instructions on the wiki >> to the letter, you will have a cpu/auth/file server. It's then easy to >> export fossil to clients, just set up the configuration to listen on >> the appropriate port (the document you want is linked from the >> standalone instructions). > > I followed it to the letter. It has mistakes or inconsistencies (i think?). > for example it says: > proto=il - recommended (isn't this obsolete?) > bootf=/386/9pc (It should be bootf=/386/9pxeload) il is obsoleted, although a few people do still use it. I have never used the proto= attribute, don't think you need it. You want to set bootf=/386/9pxeload for the systems that you want to netboot, for the others you don't have to set the attribute. > the bind loop doesn't work with 9pccpuf kernel from install cdrom (circa dec > 2009): > for (i in m i S t) > bind -a '#'^$i /dev >/dev/null >[2=1] > fails, complains of no frame buffer (this is from the installation kernel > /386/9pccpuf). This means no rio on server console so fixing things > requires rebooting into a terminal kernel (I actually know sed quite well > but one gets tired of sed 's/foo/bar/' filename >j ; mv j filename :-). > I put this in the wiki a bit ago: "In this case we have m (mouse), i (draw), S (sd - disk), and t (uart - serial); if you get errors about /dev/realmode, include P in this list". If you're not getting /dev/realmode complaints, I guess it must be something else. > there is no file /rc/bin/service/tcp567 (install image from dec 2009) If it's not there, don't worry about it! I think this might be a double-check thing, or it might just be an old instruction. > The example of a combined cpu/auth server, is not consistent, it actually is > not combined, unless I'm reading it wrong auth is different then cpu. An > excerpt from the 'Configuring a standalone CPU server' wiki page (cut and > pasted at 5:17pm mst today): > > A simple example for a combined cpu/auth server, the 192.168.1.100 machine, > could be: > > ipnet=mynet ip=192.168.1.0 ipmask=255.255.255.0 > auth=bouncer > cpu=cycles > dns=lookup > dnsdom=9fans.net > > authdom=9fans.net auth=bouncer > > ip=192.168.1.100 sys=bouncer dom=bouncer.9fans.net > ip=192.168.1.101 sys=cycles dom=cycles.9fans.net > ip=192.168.1.102 sys=lookup dom=lookup.9fans.net > What that configuration says is that the *default* cpu server is cycles. That doesn't necessarily mean bouncer isn't a cpu server too. > >> >> Then, once you've got that set up, you install a terminal on another >> machine. When it asks for a root, say "tcp" then give it the IP for >> your standalone server when it asks. Boom, your terminal now has >> remote root. You'll probably want to configure /lib/ndb/local to keep >> track of all your systems... >> >> Configuring PXE isn't that tricky but I don't want to run through the >> setup process right now, let me know if you need a rundown. > > > If I boot this box from install cdrom and it can obtain ip address from > dhcpd server running on cpu/auth/fs box and see that fs and auth are setup > correctly. If I attempt to use cpu command from cdrom booted terminal I get > the following error when attempting to connect to 10.0.1.6 (my combined > cpu/auth/fs server). > > term% cpu -h 10.0.1.6 -u lmc > cpu: can't authenticate: 10.0.1.6: auth_proxy rpc write: p9sk1@p9-net: > auth_getkey: no /factotum or /boot/factotum: didn't get key !password? > dom=p9-net proto=p9s > > the cpu/auth/fs server /lib/ndb/local file is: > > #--- start of /lib/ndb/local > ip=127.0.0.1 sys=localhost dom=localhost > > ipnet=p9-net ip=10.0.1.0 ipmask=255.255.255.0 > auth=xeon0.p9.net > cpu=xeon0.p9.net > fs=xeon0.p9.net > > authdom=p9-net auth=xeon0.p9.net > > ip=10.0.1.6 sys=xeon0 dom=xeon0.p9.net ether=0007e933c735 > > ip=10.0.1.7 sys=xeon1 dom=xeon1.p9.net ether=0007e933ca35 > bootf=/386/9pxeload > > #--- end of /lib/ndb/local > > the plan9.ini file for xeon1 is in /cfg/pxe/0007e933ca35 and contains: > > #--- start of xeon1 plan9.ini diskless boot config > > nobootprompt=ether0!/386/9pc > mouseport=ps2intellimouse > monitor=xga > vgasize=1024x768x16 > > #-- end of /cfg/pxe/0007e933ca35 I'm not sure if this is going to work with the cdrom-booted machine. It isn't going to have the /lib/ndb/local file, right? So it doesn't know what the auth server is... I might be mis-reading the situation. > >> >> Basically, "> Where might I go for a walk thru in setting up a simple >> plan9 installation one cpu/auth/fs and one terminal?" is answered by >> "Use the standalone install instructions... and that's basically it." >> >> If you'd give us the errors you're seeing from cpu, we might be able >> to help. "Weird errors" isn't very informative! >> > --> Error message from net booting. > > Intel(R) Boot Agent FE v4.1.16 > Copyright (C) 1997-2004, Intel Corporation > > CLIENT MAC ADDR: 00 07 E9 33 CA 35 GUID: 18B58355 0CDA DA11 0080 > 35CA33E90700 > CLIENT IP: 10.0.1.7 MASK: 255.255.255.0 DHCP IP: 10.0.1.6 > > Plan 9 from Bell Labs by PXE > ELCR: 0E20 > pcirouting: 8086/2483 at pin 2 irq 9 > FLAGS=10292 TRAP=e ECODE=0 PC=8000a9b3 > AX f000eef3 BX 00000200 CX 00000000 DX 80802798 > SI 80057e3c DI 00000000 BP 00000000 > CS 0010 DS 0008 ES 0008 FS 0008 GS 0008 > CR0 80000011 CR2 f000eefb CR3 00094000 > panic: exception/interrupt 14 > > Press almost any key to reset.._ > > <-- End error message from net booting. > I can successfully net boot, linux, freebsd and msdos on this box. I get > roughly the same errors (different register values) on other boxes. I have > via epia-m boxes, intel dual xeon boxes, amd64 dual processor boxes and > older pentium 4 boxes. 9pxeload fails similarly on all of them. I swapped > out the network switch and also tried a "dumb" hub. > > I tried net loading 9pxeloaddebug but the box hangs after getting it's ip > address, i.e. no 'Plan 9 from Bell Labs by PXE' banner. > >> If it comes down to it, I can exchange some of my config files with >> you. I have a standalone cpu server running, with PXE boot working > > Maybe instead of focusing on net booting. Are there instructions on how to > connect from one standalone system to another? cpu doesn't seem to work. > If I knew I could actually login to a remote box that would probably help? > Maybe not? I'm probably thinking about plan 9 all wrong. > > anyway thanks. > Regards > Lloyd > >> >> John >> I'm not exactly sure what's going on with the netbooting problem. The other best solution is this: * Install Plan 9 on your terminal machine (to the hard drive) * When you boot, tell it to get root from TCP and give it the appropriate IPs (10.0.1.6 in your case) * Now you have a terminal sharing the root of the server. You can also cpu if you need, but it's not as big of a deal when you share a root. John ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-09 22:53 [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share" Lloyd Caldwell 2010-12-09 23:01 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-09 23:06 ` John Floren @ 2010-12-09 23:26 ` Steve Simon 2010-12-10 3:59 ` Corey 2010-12-10 14:13 ` John Stalker 4 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Steve Simon @ 2010-12-09 23:26 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans Its good top remember the learning curve, ir does feel steep, and then suddenly... How far have you got installing your plan9 file/cpu/auth server? I assume you have booted a terminal successfully? here are some rough steps: install a terminal edit /lib/ndb/local to set up networking partitioned the hard disk, adding an nvram partition. modify your plan9.ini - I suggest you add a boot menu to allow you to boot as a terminal or as server (different kernels). create /cfg/$sysname/cpurc, I have put mine from my server in http://www.quintile.net/doorstep/cpurc, I don't suggest you use this without working out what it all does but it should provide a useful template. create accounts in fossil for yourself and bootes. write the nvram partition using auth/wrkry - hostowner is, by convention, "bootes" the authdom is a name for your authentication domain, mine is home.quintile.net but your could be anything you like. edit /lib/ndb/auth to allow processes running as bootes to become other people. set passwords for bootes (same as you used in wrkey) and for yourself using auth/changeuser you will want to set up secstore but that is optional so leave it till later. there are some nice options to allow the boot sequence (defined in plan9.ini) to run unattended but these can wait. you might want to use mirrored drives for reliability, see fs(4). hope this helps. -Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-09 22:53 [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share" Lloyd Caldwell ` (2 preceding siblings ...) 2010-12-09 23:26 ` Steve Simon @ 2010-12-10 3:59 ` Corey 2010-12-10 14:13 ` John Stalker 4 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Corey @ 2010-12-10 3:59 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans On Thursday 09 December 2010 3:53:25 Lloyd Caldwell wrote: > Where might I go for a walk thru in setting up a simple plan9 > installation, one cpu/auth/fs and one terminal? > Try this: http://mirror.9grid.fr/mirror.9grid.fr/plan9-cpu-auth-server-howto.html Cheers ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-09 22:53 [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share" Lloyd Caldwell ` (3 preceding siblings ...) 2010-12-10 3:59 ` Corey @ 2010-12-10 14:13 ` John Stalker 2010-12-10 15:34 ` Steve Simon 4 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread From: John Stalker @ 2010-12-10 14:13 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs > Synopsis: > do I give up trying to make a distributed plan 9 home network? > Is plan 9 worth the struggle? > The concepts are clearly superior, is it the implementation, is it > the lack of coherent/correct (imho) documentation? > > Longer background: ...skipping... > Where might I go for a walk thru in setting up a simple plan9 > installation, one cpu/auth/fs and one terminal? > > sorry for the extent of this message, frustrated and the learning > curve seems to have infinite slope. I tried setting up plan9 networks once or twice a long time ago, and gave up fairly quickly, partly for the sorts of reasons you are talking about, but mostly because I don't need a plan9 network. A standalone system is more than sufficient for what I want. So none of what I'm going to say below will actually help you in any way. But,... As far as the quality of the available information goes, I think you are largely correct, but the problem isn't really specific to plan9. The situation for BSD is similar, and for most OS's is worse. I have doubts about the whole "how to" genre. For anything at all complicated you run into at least three problems: - Actually mistakes. The code in Kernighan & Richie was copied from things that had been compiled and run. So you knew there were no typos. People who write things for the web still seem to think you can reliably give instructions from memory of things you last did several years ago. Without proofreading. - Version skew. A well known problem, and the reason I'm using MH to send this message. I like things that don't change, but just slowly become obsolete. - Different situations. I find I never have the exact same setup as the person who wrote whatever I am reading. And I'm never setting out to accomplish the exact same thing. I'm not really asking people to write better howtos. I think the idea is fundamentally broken. What we really need is some less narrative and more expository. I'm not sure what that would look like, or I would write one. -- John Stalker School of Mathematics Trinity College Dublin tel +353 1 896 1983 fax +353 1 896 2282 ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-10 14:13 ` John Stalker @ 2010-12-10 15:34 ` Steve Simon 2010-12-10 15:42 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-10 15:42 ` John Floren 0 siblings, 2 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Steve Simon @ 2010-12-10 15:34 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans > I'm not really asking people to write better howtos. I think > the idea is fundamentally broken. What we really need is some > less narrative and more expository. I agree completely with this, my opinion is we need somthing that explains the concepts of what has to be done and why, and provides pointers to where to get the detailed information. I find once I understand what somthing is trying to do and why, debugging the details is easy. For what its worth the biggest problem I ever had setting up a plan9 network was failing to ensure bootes password was the same in the nvram as in keyfs. -Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-10 15:34 ` Steve Simon @ 2010-12-10 15:42 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-10 15:42 ` John Floren 1 sibling, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: erik quanstrom @ 2010-12-10 15:42 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans > I agree completely with this, my opinion is we need somthing that explains the > concepts of what has to be done and why, and provides pointers to where to get > the detailed information. unfortunately, it's hard to explain in a vaccuum. having a working system makes it much easier to come to grips with the concepts. but without understanding the system, it's hard to set one up. thus the logic of the how-to. my experience was that it was difficult to understand why plan 9 did many things before i had at least two machines in a plan 9 network. - erik ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-10 15:34 ` Steve Simon 2010-12-10 15:42 ` erik quanstrom @ 2010-12-10 15:42 ` John Floren 2010-12-10 16:31 ` ron minnich 1 sibling, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread From: John Floren @ 2010-12-10 15:42 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs On Fri, Dec 10, 2010 at 10:34 AM, Steve Simon <steve@quintile.net> wrote: >> I'm not really asking people to write better howtos. I think >> the idea is fundamentally broken. What we really need is some >> less narrative and more expository. > > I agree completely with this, my opinion is we need somthing that explains the > concepts of what has to be done and why, and provides pointers to where to get > the detailed information. > > I find once I understand what somthing is trying to do and why, debugging the > details is easy. > > For what its worth the biggest problem I ever had setting up a plan9 network > was failing to ensure bootes password was the same in the nvram as in keyfs. > > -Steve > My problem was always forgetting to uncomment the keyfs line in cpurc. I'd be able to log in as bootes but nothing else. I've done it often enough that I might be able to write a decent document about setting up a standalone server and some terminals with explanations of what needs to be done, followed by actual commands to do it... I think the existing standalone CPU howto document actually does a pretty good job with that, it's just a little hasty/haphazard sometimes. John ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share". 2010-12-10 15:42 ` John Floren @ 2010-12-10 16:31 ` ron minnich 0 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: ron minnich @ 2010-12-10 16:31 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs On Fri, Dec 10, 2010 at 7:42 AM, John Floren <slawmaster@gmail.com> wrote: > My problem was always forgetting to uncomment the keyfs line in cpurc. > I'd be able to log in as bootes but nothing else. Maybe the single most important document would be a set of key-value pairs: "I have this problem" "Then you need to this" ron ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~2010-12-10 16:31 UTC | newest] Thread overview: 13+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed) -- links below jump to the message on this page -- 2010-12-09 22:53 [9fans] have installed plan 9 on many hosts, can't get any of them to "share" Lloyd Caldwell 2010-12-09 23:01 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-09 23:06 ` John Floren 2010-12-10 0:39 ` Lloyd Caldwell 2010-12-10 0:50 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-10 0:54 ` John Floren 2010-12-09 23:26 ` Steve Simon 2010-12-10 3:59 ` Corey 2010-12-10 14:13 ` John Stalker 2010-12-10 15:34 ` Steve Simon 2010-12-10 15:42 ` erik quanstrom 2010-12-10 15:42 ` John Floren 2010-12-10 16:31 ` ron minnich
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