SRM Firmware Howto
David Mosberger <mailto:davidm@azstarnet.com> and Rich Payne
<mailto:rdp@alphalinux.org>
v0.5.2, 5 December 1999
This document describes how to boot Linux/Alpha using the SRM
firmware, which is the firmware normally used to boot DEC Unix (also
known as OSF/1 and Tru64Unix) and OpenVMS. Sometimes, it is prefer-
able to use MILO instead of aboot since MILO is perfectly adapted to
the needs of Linux. However, MILO is not always available for a par-
ticular system, MILO does not presently have the ability to boot over
the network (without patches) and little development work is now being
done on MILO (for more information on MILO refer to the MILO Howto,
available from http://www.alphalinux.org/faq/milo.html
<http://www.alphalinux.org/faq/milo.html>). In any case, using the
SRM console may be the right solution.
______________________________________________________________________
Table of Contents
1. What is SRM?
1.1 How Does SRM Boot an OS?
1.2 Loading The Secondary Bootstrap Loader
2. The Raw Loader
3. The aboot Loader
3.1 Getting and Building aboot
3.2 Floppy Installation
3.3 Harddisk Installation
3.4 CD-ROM Installation
3.5 Building the Linux Kernel
3.6 Booting Linux
3.6.1 Device Naming
3.6.2 Boot Filename
3.6.3 Boot Flags
3.6.3.1 Selecting the Partition of /etc/aboot.conf
3.7 Installation Linux Distributions
3.7.1 Installation from the Red Hat 6.0 CD
3.7.2 Installation from the SuSE 6.1 CD
3.8 Booting Over the Network
3.9 Partitioning Disks
3.9.1 What is a disklabel?
3.9.2 Partitioning the Easy Way: a DOS Disklabel
3.9.3 Partitioning with a BSD Disklabel
4. Sharing a Disk With DEC Unix
4.1 Partitioning the disk
4.2 Installing
5. Document History
______________________________________________________________________
Unless you're interested in technical details, you may want to skip
right to Section ``''.
11.. WWhhaatt iiss SSRRMM??
SRM console is used by Alpha systems as Unix-style boot firmware.
Tru64 Unix and OpenVMS depend on it and Linux can boot from it. You
can recognize SRM console as a blue screen with a prompt that is
presented to you on power-up. If your Alpha system starts up with
AlphaBIOS, or some other firmware, then this document is not for you.
11..11.. HHooww DDooeess SSRRMM BBoooott aann OOSS??
All versions of SRM can boot from SCSI disks and the versions for
recent platforms, such as the Noname or AlphaStations can boot from
floppy disks as well. Network booting via bootp is supported. Note
that older SRM versions (notably the one for the Jensen) cannot boot
from floppy disks. Booting from IDE devices is supported on newer
platforms (DS20, DS10, DP264, UP2000 etc..).
Booting Linux with SRM is a two step process: first, SRM loads and
transfers control to the secondary bootstrap loader. Then the
secondary bootstrap loader sets up the environment for Linux, reads
the kernel image from a disk filesystem and finally transfers control
to Linux.
Currently, there are two secondary bootstrap loaders for Linux: the
_r_a_w loader that comes with the Linux kernel and aboot which is
distributed separately. These two loaders are described in more
detail below.
11..22.. LLooaaddiinngg TThhee SSeeccoonnddaarryy BBoooottssttrraapp LLooaaddeerr
SRM knows nothing about filesystems or disk-partitions. It simply
expects that the secondary bootstrap loader occupies a consecutive
range of physical disk sector, starting from a given offset. The
information on the size of the secondary bootstrap loader and the
offset of its first disk sector is stored in the first 512 byte
sector. Specifically, the long integer at offset 480 stores the _s_i_z_e
of the secondary bootstrap loader (in 512-byte blocks) and the long at
offset 488 gives the _s_e_c_t_o_r _n_u_m_b_e_r at which the secondary bootstrap
loader starts. The first sector also stores a flag-word at offset 496
which is always 0 and a checksum at offset 504. The checksum is
simply the sum of the first 63 long integers in the first sector.
If the checksum in the first sector is correct, SRM goes ahead and
reads the _s_i_z_e sectors starting from the sector given in the _s_e_c_t_o_r
_n_u_m_b_e_r field and places them in _v_i_r_t_u_a_l memory at address 0x20000000.
If the reading completes successfully, SRM performs a jump to address
0x20000000.
22.. TThhee RRaaww LLooaaddeerr
The sources for this loader can be found in directory
linux/arch/alpha/boot
of the Linux kernel source distribution. It loads the Linux kernel by
reading START_SIZE bytes starting at disk offset BOOT_SIZE+512 (also
in bytes). The constants START_SIZE and BOOT_SIZE are defined in
linux/include/asm-alpha/system.h. START_SIZE must be at least as big
as the kernel image (i.e., the size of the .text, .data, and .bss
segments). Similarly, BOOT_SIZE must be at least as big as the image
of the raw bootstrap loader. Both constants should be an integer
multiple of the sector size, which is 512 bytes. The default values
are currently 2MB for START_SIZE and 16KB for BOOT_SIZE. Note that if
you want to boot from a 1.44MB floppy disk, you have to reduce
START_SIZE to 1400KB and make sure that the kernel you want to boot is
no bigger than that.
To build a raw loader, simply type make rawboot in /usr/src/linux.
This should produce the following files in arch/alpha/boot:
tools/lxboot:
The first sector on the disk. It contains the offset and size
of the next file in the format described above.
tools/bootlx:
The raw boot loader that will load the file below.
vmlinux.nh:
The raw kernel image consisting of the .text, .data, and .bss
segments of the object file in /usr/src/linux/vmlinux. The
extension .nh indicates that this file has no object-file
header.
The concatenation of these three files should be written to the disk
from which you want to boot. For example, to boot from a floppy,
insert an empty floppy disk in, say, /dev/fd0 and then type:
cat tools/lxboot tools/bootlx vmlinux >/dev/fd0
You can then shutdown the system and boot from the floppy by issuing
the command boot dva0.
33.. TThhee aabboooott LLooaaddeerr
When using the SRM firmware, aboot is the preferred way of booting
Linux. It supports:
+o direct booting from various filesystems (ext2, ISO9660, and UFS,
the DEC Unix filesystem)
+o booting of executable object files (both ELF and ECOFF)
+o booting compressed kernels
+o network booting (using bootp)
+o partition tables in DEC Unix format (which is compatible with BSD
Unix partition tables)
+o interactive booting and default configurations for SRM consoles
that cannot pass long option strings
33..11.. GGeettttiinngg aanndd BBuuiillddiinngg aabboooott
The latest sources for aboot are available in this ftp directory
<ftp://ftp.alphalinux.org.com/aboot>. The description in this manual
applies to aboot version 0.5 or newer. Please note that many
distributions ship aboot with them so downloading aboot from this
directory is probably unnessesary.
Once you downloaded and extracted the latest tar file, take a look at
the README and INSTALL files for installation hints. In particular,
be sure to adjust the variables in Makefile and in include/config.h to
match your environment. Normally, you won't need to change anything
when building under Linux, but it is always a good idea to double
check. If you're satisfied with the configuration, simply type make
to build it (if you're not building under Linux, be advised that aboot
requires GNU make).
After running make, the aboot directory should contain the following
files:
aabboooott
This is the actual aboot executable (either an ECOFF or ELF
object file).
bboooottllxx
Same as above, but it contains only the text, data and bss
segments---that is, this file is not an object file.
ssddiisskkllaabbeell//wwrriitteebboooott
Utility to install aboot on a hard disk.
ttoooollss//ee22wwrriitteebboooott
Utility to install aboot on an ext2 filesystem (usually used for
floppies only).
ttoooollss//iissoommaarrkkbboooott
Utility to install aboot on a iso9660 filesystem (used by CD-ROM
distributors).
ttoooollss//aabboooottccoonnff
Utility to configure an installed aboot.
33..22.. FFllooppppyy IInnssttaallllaattiioonn
The bootloader can be installed on a floppy using the e2writeboot
command (note: this can't be done on a Jensen since its firmware does
_n_o_t support booting from floppy). This command requires that the disk
is not overly fragmented as it needs to find enough contiguous file
blocks to store the entire aboot image (currently about 90KB). If
e2writeboot fails because of this, reformat the floppy and try again
(e.g., with fdformat(1)). For example, the following steps install
aboot on floppy disk assuming the floppy is in drive /dev/fd0:
fdformat /dev/fd0
mke2fs /dev/fd0
e2writeboot /dev/fd0 bootlx
33..33.. HHaarrddddiisskk IInnssttaallllaattiioonn
Since the e2writeboot command may fail on highly fragmented disks and
since reformatting a harddisk is not without pain, it is generally
safer to install aboot on a harddisk using the swriteboot command.
swriteboot requires that the first few sectors are reserved for
booting purposes. We suggest that the disk be partitioned such that
the first partition starts at an offset of 2048 sectors. This leaves
1MB of space for storing aboot. On a properly partitioned disk, it is
then possible to install aboot as follows (assuming the disk is
/dev/sda):
swriteboot /dev/sda bootlx
On systems where partition c in the entire disk it will be neccesary
to 'force' the write of aboot. In this case use the -f flag followed
by the partition number (in the case of parition c this is 3).
swriteboot /dev/sda bootlx -f3
On a Jensen, you will want to leave some more space, since you need to
write a kernel to this place, too---2MB should be sufficient when
using compressed kernels. Use swriteboot as described in Section ``''
to write bootlx together with the Linux kernel.
33..44.. CCDD--RROOMM IInnssttaallllaattiioonn
To make a CD-ROM bootable by SRM, simply build aboot as described
above. Then, make sure that the bootlx file is present on the iso9660
filesystem (e.g., copy bootlx to the directory that is the filesystem
master, then run mkisofs on that directory). After that, all that
remains to be done is to mark the filesystem as SRM bootable. This is
achieved with a command of the form:
isomarkboot filesystem bootlx
The command above assumes that filesystem is a file containing the
iso9660 filesystem and that bootlx has been copied into the root
directory of that filesystem. That's it!
33..55.. BBuuiillddiinngg tthhee LLiinnuuxx KKeerrnneell
A bootable Linux kernel can be built with the following steps. During
the make config, be sure to answer "yes" to the question whether you
want to boot the kernel via SRM (for certain platforms this is
automatically selected).
cd /usr/src/linux
make config
make dep
make boot
make modules (if applicable)
make modules_install (if applicable)
The last command will build the file arch/alpha/boot/vmlinux.gz which
can then be copied to the disk from which you want to boot from. In
our floppy disk example above, this would entail:
mount /dev/fd0 /mnt
cp arch/alpha/boot/vmlinux.gz /mnt
umount /mnt
33..66.. BBoooottiinngg LLiinnuuxx
With the SRM firmware and aboot installed, Linux is generally booted
with a command of the form:
boot _d_e_v_i_c_e_n_a_m_e -fi _f_i_l_e_n_a_m_e -fl _f_l_a_g_s
The _f_i_l_e_n_a_m_e and _f_l_a_g_s arguments are optional. If they are not
specified, SRM uses the default values stored in environment variables
BOOTDEF_DEV , BOOT_OSFILE and BOOT_OSFLAGS. The syntax and meaning
of these two arguments is described in more detail below. To list the
current values of these variables type show boot* at the SRM command
prompt. This will also show a boot_dev variable (among others), this
variable is read only and needs to be changed via the bootdef_dev
variable.
33..66..11.. DDeevviiccee NNaammiinngg
This corresponds to the device from which SRM will attempt to boot.
Examples include:
dva0 -First floppy drive, /dev/fd0 under Linux
dqa0 -Primary IDE cdrom as Master, /dev/hda under Linux
dqa1 -Primary IDE cdrom as Slave, /dev/hdb under Linux
dqa0* -Primary IDE hard disk as Master, first partition, /dev/hda1
under Linux
dqa1* -Primary IDE hard disk as Slave, third partition, /dev/hdb3
under Linux
dka0* -SCSI disk on first bus, Device 0 partition 2, /dev/sda2 under
Linux
ewa0** -First Ethernet Device, /dev/eth0 under Linux
* - partition numbers are given as a prefix to the filename when
booting via SRM, for example 2/boot/vmlinux.gz
** - SRM console can network boot via recognized Ethernet devices.
For example to boot from the disk at SCSI id 6, you would enter:
boot dka600
To list the devices currently installed in the system type show dev at
the SRM command line.
33..66..22.. BBoooott FFiilleennaammee
The filename argument takes the form:
[_n/]_f_i_l_e_n_a_m_e
_n is a single digit in the range 1..8 that gives the partition number
from which to boot from. _f_i_l_e_n_a_m_e is the path of the file you want
boot. For example to boot a kernel named vmlinux.gz from the second
partition of SCSI device 6, you would enter:
boot dka600 -file 2/vmlinux.gz
Or to boot from floppy drive 0, you'd enter:
boot dva0 -file vmlinux.gz
If a disk has no partition table , aboot pretends the disk contains
one ext2 partition starting at the first diskblock. This allows
booting from floppy disks.
As a special case, partition number 0 is used to request booting from
a disk that does not (yet) contain a file system. When specifying
"partition" number 0, aboot assumes that the Linux kernel is stored
right behind the aboot image. Such a layout can be achieved with the
swriteboot command. For example, to setup a filesystem-less boot from
/dev/sda, one could use the command:
swriteboot /dev/sda bootlx vmlinux.gz
Booting a system in this way is not normally necessary. The reason
this feature exists is to make it possible to get Linux installed on a
systems that can't boot from a floppy disk (e.g., the Jensen).
33..66..33.. BBoooott FFllaaggss
A number of bootflags can be specified. The syntax is:
-flags "options..."
Where "options..." is any combination the following options (separated
by blanks). There are many more bootoptions, depending on what
drivers your kernel has installed. The options listed below are
therefore just examples to illustrate the general idea:
llooaadd__rraammddiisskk==11
Copy root file system from a (floppy) disk to the RAM disk
before starting the system. The RAM disk will be used in lieu
of the root device. This is useful to bootstrap Linux on a
system with only one floppy drive.
ffllooppppyy==_s_t_r
Sets floppy configuration to _s_t_r.
rroooott==_d_e_v
Select device _d_e_v as the root-file system. The device can be
specified as a major/minor hex number (e.g., 0x802 for
/dev/sda2) or one of a few canonical names (e.g., /dev/fd0,
/dev/sda2).
ssiinnggllee
Boot system in single user mode.
kkggddbb
Enable kernel-gdb (works only if CONFIG_KGDB is enabled; a
second Alpha system needs to be connected over the serial port
in order to make this work)
Some SRM implementations (e.g., the one for the Jensen) are
handicapped and allow only short option strings (e.g., at most 8
characters). In such a case, aboot can be booted with the single-
character boot flag "i". With this flag, aboot will prompt the user
to interacively enter a boot option string of up to 256 characters.
For example:
boot dka0 -fl i
aboot> 3/vmlinux.gz root=/dev/sda3 single
Since booting in that manner quickly becomes tedious, aboot allows to
define short-hands for frequently used commandlines. In particular, a
single digit option (0-9) requests that aboot uses the corresponding
option string stored in file /etc/aboot.conf. A sample aboot.conf is
shown below:
#
# aboot default configurations
#
0:3/vmlinux.gz root=/dev/sda3
1:3/vmlinux.gz root=/dev/sda3 single
2:3/vmlinux.new.gz root=/dev/sda3
3:3/vmlinux root=/dev/sda3
8:- root=/dev/sda3 # fs-less boot of raw kernel
9:0/vmlinux.gz root=/dev/sda3 # fs-less boot of (compressed) ECOFF kernel
-
With this configuration file, the command
boot dka0 -fl 1
corresponds exactly to the boot command shown above. It is quite easy
to forget what number corresponds to what option string. To alleviate
this problem, boot with option "h" and aboot will print the contents
of /etc/aboot.conf before issuing the prompt for the full option
string.
Finally, whenever aboot prompts for an option string, it is possible
to enter one of the single character flags ("i", "h", or "0"-"9") to
get the same effect as if that flag had been specified in the boot
command line. For example, you could boot with flag "i" and then type
"h" (followed by return) to remind yourself of the contents of
/etc/aboot.conf
33..66..33..11.. SSeelleeccttiinngg tthhee PPaarrttiittiioonn ooff //eettcc//aabboooott..ccoonnff
When installed on a harddisk, aboot needs to know what partition to
search for the /etc/aboot.conf file. A newly compiled aboot will
search the _s_e_c_o_n_d partition (e.g., /dev/sda2). Since it would be
inconvenient to have to recompile aboot just to change the partition
number, abootconf allows to directly modify an installed aboot.
Specifically, if you want to change aboot to use the _t_h_i_r_d partition
on disk /dev/sda, you'd use the command:
abootconf /dev/sda 3
You can verify the current setting by simply omitting the partition
number. That is: abootconf /dev/sda will print the currently selected
partition number. Note that aboot does have to be installed already
for this command to succeed. Also, when installing a new aboot, the
partition number will fall back to the default (i.e., it will be
necessary to rerun abootconf).
Since aboot version 0.5, it is also possible to select the aboot.conf
partition via the boot command line. This can be done with a command
line of the form _a:_b where _a is the partition that holds
/etc/aboot.conf and _b is a single-letter option as described above
(0-9, i, or h). For example, if you type boot -fl "3:h" dka100 the
system boots from SCSI ID 1, loads /etc/aboot.conf from the third
partition, prints its contents on the screen and waits for you to
enter the boot options.
33..77.. IInnssttaallllaattiioonn LLiinnuuxx DDiissttrriibbuuttiioonnss
33..77..11.. IInnssttaallllaattiioonn ffrroomm tthhee RReedd HHaatt 66..00 CCDD
Red Hat have made their distribution CD bootable from SRM console *.
To start an installation, put the CD in and type the following:
boot srm-device -file kernels/generic.gz -flags root=linux-device
In the above, the SRM device name and Linux device name for your CD-
ROM drive are needed. For Example if the machine had an IDE cdrom
installed as primary master the command would look like this:
boot dqa0 -file kernels/generic.gz -flags "root=/dev/hda"
See the section on ``'' conventions if you don't know what these are.
* - Please note that through the official RedHat CD-ROM is SRM
bootable, copies made by various other companies may not be bootable.
33..77..22.. IInnssttaallllaattiioonn ffrroomm tthhee SSuuSSEE 66..11 CCDD
The SuSE 6.1 CD is not bootable from SRM console. SuSE have an
alternative approach which involves creating two boot floppies, the
images of which are included on the CD. The boot disks can be created
in various ways, depending on the systems you have available
Writing the boot disks from a linux system The command to use is dd.
From the mount-point of SuSE CD 1, the commands are:
dd if=disks/aboot of=/dev/fd0
dd if=disks/install of=/dev/fd0
Writing the boot disks from a windows system The command to use is
rawrite. It is available on the CD.
rawrite
The program then prompts for input disk image and output disk drive.
Run this command once for each of the disk images as shown above.
Starting the SuSE installer from the boot disks With the floppy disk
made from the aboot image in place, type:
boot dva0 -file vmlinux.gz -flags "root=/dev/fd0 load_ramdisk=1"
This will start the kernel, prompt you for the second boot disk, and
start the installer
33..88.. BBoooottiinngg OOvveerr tthhee NNeettwwoorrkk
Two preliminary steps are necessary before Linux can be booted via a
network. First, you need to set the SRM environment variables to
enable booting via the bootp protocol and second you need to setup
another machine as the your boot server. Please refer to the SRM
documentation that came with your machine for information on how to
enable bootp. Setting up the boot server is obviously dependent on
what operating system that machine is running, but typically it
involves starting the program bootpd in the background after
configuring the /etc/bootptab file. The bootptab file has one entry
describing each client that is allowed to boot from the server. For
example, if you want to boot the machine myhost.cs.arizona.edu, then
an entry of the following form would be needed:
myhost.cs.arizona.edu:\
:hd=/remote/:bf=vmlinux.bootp:\
:ht=ethernet:ha=08012B1C51F8:hn:vm=rfc1048:\
:ip=192.12.69.254:bs=auto:
This entry assumes that the machine's Ethernet address is 08012B1C51F8
and that its IP address is 192.12.69.254. The Ethernet address can be
found with the show device command of the SRM console or, if Linux is
running, with the ifconfig command. The entry also defines that if
the client does not specify otherwise, the file that will be booted is
vmlinux.bootp in directory /remote. For more information on
configuring bootpd, please refer to its man page.
Next, build aboot with with the command make netboot. Make sure the
kernel that you want to boot has been built already. By default, the
aboot Makefile uses the kernel in
/usr/src/linux/arch/alpha/boot/vmlinux.gz (edit the Makefile if you
want to use a different path). The result of make netboot is a file
called vmlinux.bootp which contains aboot _a_n_d the Linux kernel, ready
for network booting.
Finally, copy vmlinux.bootp to the bootsever's directory. In the
example above, you'd copy it into /remote/vmlinux.bootp. Next, power
up the client machine and boot it, specifying the Ethernet adapter as
the boot device. Typically, SRM calls the first Ethernet adapter
ewa0, so to boot from that device, you'd use the command:
boot ewa0
The -fi and -fl options can be used as usual. In particular, you can
ask aboot to prompt for Linux kernel arguments by specifying the
option -fl i.
33..99.. PPaarrttiittiioonniinngg DDiisskkss
33..99..11.. WWhhaatt iiss aa ddiisskkllaabbeell??
A disk label is a partition table. Unfortunately, there are several
formats the partition table can take, depending on the operating
system.
DOS partition tables are the standard used by Linux and Windows.
AlphaBIOS systems and every Linux kernel can read DOS partition
tables. Unfortunately, SRM console can't.
BSD disklabels are used by several variants of Unix, including Tru64.
SRM console can read BSD disklabels, and so can Linux kernels (with
BSD disklabel support built in). To make the partitions of a
disk visible to SRM console, a BSD disklabel is needed.
To boot from a disk using SRM, a BSD disklabel is required. If the
disk is not a boot disk, the BSD disklabel is not required. A BSD
disklabel can be created using fdisk, the standard Linux disk
partitioning tool.
33..99..22.. PPaarrttiittiioonniinngg tthhee EEaassyy WWaayy:: aa DDOOSS DDiisskkllaabbeell
The simplest way to partition your disk is to let your Linux installer
do it for you, for example by using Red Hat's disk druid or fdisk.
This will produce a DOS disklabel. It will be readable by Linux, but
you will not be able to boot from it via SRM.
33..99..33.. PPaarrttiittiioonniinngg wwiitthh aa BBSSDD DDiisskkllaabbeell
1. Start fdisk on the disk you're configuring
2. Choose to make a BSD disklabel - option 'b'
3. You'll notice some things: Partitions are letters instead of
numbers, from a-h Partition 'c' covers the whole of the disk. This
is the convention, don't touch it. While you can see it, note down
the disk parameters as you'll use them more often than with the
DOS-disklabel approach
4. Creating a new partition uses the same procedure as the DOS-
disklabel approach, except that the partitions are referred to by
letter instead of number. That is, followed by the partition letter
followed by the starting block followed by the end block
5. Setting partition type is slightly different, because the numbering
scheme is different (1 is swap, 8 is ext2).
6. When you are finished, write ('w') and quit ('q') as normal.
There are some important catches that you must be aware of when
partitioning using a BSD disklabel
+o Partition 'a' should start about 2M into the disk: don't start it
at sector 1, try starting at sector 10 (for example). This leaves
plenty of space for writing the boot block (see below)
+o There is a bug in some versions of fdisk which makes the disk look
one sector bigger than it actually is. The listing when you create
the BSD disklabel is correct. The last sector of partition 'c' is
correct. The default last sector when creating a new partition is
1 sector too big
+o Always adjust for this extra sector. This bug exists in the version
of fdisk shipped with Red Hat 6.0. Not making an adjustment for
this problem almost always leads to "Access beyond end of device"
errors from the Linux kernel.
Once you have made a BSD disklabel, continue the installation. After
installation, you can write a boot block to your disk to make it
bootable from SRM.
44.. SShhaarriinngg aa DDiisskk WWiitthh DDEECC UUnniixx
Unfortunately, DEC Unix doesn't know anything about Linux, so sharing
a single disk between the two OSes is not entirely trivial. However,
it is not a difficult task if you heed the tips in this section. The
section assumes you are using aboot version 0.5 or newer.
44..11.. PPaarrttiittiioonniinngg tthhee ddiisskk
First and foremost: _n_e_v_e_r use any of the Linux partitioning programs
(minlabel or fdisk) on a disk that is also used by DEC Unix. The
Linux minlabel program uses the same partition table format as DEC
Unix disklabel, but there are some incompatibilities in the data that
minlabel fills in, so DEC Unix will simply refuse to accept a
partition table generated by minlabel. To setup a Linux ext2
partition under DEC Unix, you'll have to change the disktab entry for
your disk. For the purpose of this discussion, let's assume that you
have an rz26 disk (a common 1GB drive) on which you want to install
Linux. The disktab entry under DEC Unix v3.2 looks like this (see
file /etc/disktab):
rz26|RZ26|DEC RZ26 Winchester:\
:ty=winchester:dt=SCSI:ns#57:nt#14:nc#2570:\
:oa#0:pa#131072:ba#8192:fa#1024:\
:ob#131072:pb#262144:bb#8192:fb#1024:\
:oc#0:pc#2050860:bc#8192:fc#1024:\
:od#393216:pd#552548:bd#8192:fd#1024:\
:oe#945764:pe#552548:be#8192:fe#1024:\
:of#1498312:pf#552548:bf#8192:ff#1024:\
:og#393216:pg#819200:bg#8192:fg#1024:\
:oh#1212416:ph#838444:bh#8192:fh#1024:
The interesting fields here are o_?, and p_?, where _? is a letter in the
range a-h (first through 8-th partition). The o value gives the
starting offset of the partition (in sectors) and the p value gives
the size of the partition (also in sectors). See disktab(4) for more
info. Note that DEC Unix likes to define overlapping partitions. For
the entry above, the partition layout looks like this (you can verify
this by adding up the various o and p values):
a b d e f
|---|-------|-----------|-----------|-----------|
c
|-----------------------------------------------|
g h
|-----------------|-----------------|
DEC Unix insists that partition a starts at offset 0 and that
partition c spans the entire disk. Other than that, you can setup the
partition table any way you like.
Let's suppose you have DEC Unix using partition g and want to install
Linux on partition h with partition b being a (largish) swap
partition. To get this layout without destroying the existing DEC
Unix partition, you need to set the partition types explicitly. You
can do this by adding a t field for each partition. In our case, we
add the following line to the above disktab entry.
:ta=unused:tb=swap:tg=4.2BSD:th=resrvd8:
Now why do we mark partition h as "reservd8" instead of "ext2"? Well,
DEC Unix doesn't know about Linux. It so happens that partition type
"ext2" corresponds to a numeric value of 8, and DEC Unix uses the
string "reservd8" for that value. Thus, in DEC Unix speak, "reservd8"
means "ext2". OK, this was the hard part. Now we just need to
install the updated disktab entry on the disk. Let's assume the disk
has SCSI id 5. In this case, we'd do:
disklabel -rw /dev/rrz5c rz26
You can verify that everything is all right by reading back the
disklabel with disklabel -r /dev/rrz5c. At this point, you may want
to reboot DEC Unix and make sure the existing DEC Unix partition is
still alive and well. If that is the case, you can shut down the
machine and start with the Linux installation. Be sure to skip the
disk partitioning step during the install. Since we already installed
a good partition table, you should be able to proceed and select the
8th partition as the Linux root partition and the 2nd partition as the
swap partition. If the disk is, say, the second SCSI disk in the
machine, then the device name for these partitions would be /dev/sdb8
and /dev/sdb2, respectively (note that Linux uses letters to name the
drives and numbers to name the partitions, which is exactly reversed
from what DEC Unix does; the Linux scheme makes more sense, of course
;-).
44..22.. IInnssttaalllliinngg aabboooott
_F_i_r_s_t _b_i_g _c_a_v_e_a_t: with the SRM firmware, you can boot one and only one
operating system per disk. For this reason, it is generally best to
have at least two SCSI disks in a machine that you want to dualboot
between Linux and DEC Unix. Of course, you could also boot Linux from
a floppy if speed doesn't matter or over the network, if you have a
bootp-capable server. But in this section we assume you want to boot
Linux from a disk that contains one or more DEC Unix partitions.
_S_e_c_o_n_d _b_i_g _c_a_v_e_a_t: installing aboot on a disk shared with DEC Unix
renders the first and third partition unusable (since those _m_u_s_t have
a starting offset of 0). For this reason, we recommend that you
change the size of partition a to something that is just big enough to
hold aboot (1MB should be plenty).
Once these two caveats are taken care of, installing aboot is almost
as easy as usual: since partition a and c will overlap with aboot, we
need to tell swriteboot that this is indeed OK. We can do this under
Linux with a command line of the following form (again, assuming we're
trying to install aboot on the second SCSI disk):
swriteboot -f1 -f3 /dev/sdb bootlx
The -f1 means that we want to force writing bootlx even though it
overlaps with partition 1. The corresponding applies for partition 3.
This is it. You should now be able to shutdown the system and boot
Linux from the harddisk. In our example, the SRM command line to do
this would be:
boot dka5 -fi 8/vmlinux.gz -fl root=/dev/sdb8
55.. DDooccuummeenntt HHiissttoorryy
v0.5.2 5 December 1999 Added comments and information from Stig Telfer
(stig @ alpha-processor.com).
+o Added chart on SRM to Linux name mappings
+o Added RedHat 6.0 and SuSE 6.1 installation information
+o Added Disk Partitioning Information
v0.5.1 (Not Released) 13 November 1999 Took the original 0.5 document
and updated several parts:
+o Update information on SRM booting from IDE devices
+o Fixed URL to aboot source
+o Update toc page to reflect MILO's future
+o Included information on bootdef_dev and boot_dev to chapter 3
+o Added this section
v0.5 17 August 1996 - Original Document by David Mosberger-Tang