From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
From: vic <zandy@cs.wisc.edu>
Message-ID: <m3n10un27d.fsf@localhost.localdomain>
User-Agent: Gnus/5.090004 (Oort Gnus v0.04) Emacs/20.7
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Subject: [9fans] vmware
Date: Fri,  7 Dec 2001 15:35:18 -0600
Topicbox-Message-UUID: 313b3f0e-eaca-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025

More on vmware: I cannot get any plan 9 kernel to boot reliably under
vmware except for the one in 9disk.9fd from the distribution webpage.
This includes the kernel installed with the current distribution and
every kernel I build on my other plan 9 machine (sources are several
months old, no updates).

The boot hangs after these lines:
x free pages
y bytes
z swap

I've had no luck with suggestions made in previous 9fans reports of
similar behavior, including:

- disabling hardware specs (ether, vgasize, monitor, audio) in
  plan9.ini
- extra printing in /sys/src/9/pc/main.c before it calls the
  scheduler.  (north_'s recent solution to similar 486 hangs.)

Sometimes the boot is successful if I press keys while it is booting.
I have not mastered this monkey business.  Sometimes it makes vmware
crash.

I am slowly tracing the boot to the hang.  Processes with pids 1 and 2
are scheduled a couple times each (I think), and then nothing is
scheduled.  I think I have sysexec() rigged to print something on
entry, but I never see it -- is that not inconsistent with the
existence of pid 2?  (The sysexec printing appears when I boot these
kernels on actual computers, though I'm not sure when.)

Anyhoo, suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Vic