From owner-freebsd-alpha Wed Sep 12 14:37:38 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-alpha@freebsd.org Received: from netau1.alcanet.com.au (ntp.alcanet.com.au [203.62.196.27]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id DCB0C37B408 for ; Wed, 12 Sep 2001 14:37:29 -0700 (PDT) Received: from mfg1.cim.alcatel.com.au (mfg1.cim.alcatel.com.au [139.188.23.1]) by netau1.alcanet.com.au (8.9.3 (PHNE_22672)/8.9.3) with ESMTP id HAA14573; Thu, 13 Sep 2001 07:37:27 +1000 (EST) Received: from gsmx07.alcatel.com.au by cim.alcatel.com.au (PMDF V5.2-32 #37645) with ESMTP id <01K8A3TM10XC0SQMSN@cim.alcatel.com.au>; Thu, 13 Sep 2001 07:37:23 +1000 Received: (from jeremyp@localhost) by gsmx07.alcatel.com.au (8.11.1/8.11.1) id f8CLbOO71801; Thu, 13 Sep 2001 07:37:24 +1000 (EST envelope-from jeremyp) Content-return: prohibited Date: Thu, 13 Sep 2001 07:37:24 +1000 From: Peter Jeremy Subject: Re: Handbook installation chapter for Alpha architecture In-reply-to: <5.1.0.14.2.20010913064612.00a6eda0@pop.ozemail.com.au>; from rbyrnes@ozemail.com.au on Thu, Sep 13, 2001 at 06:47:37AM +1000 To: Rob B Cc: freebsd-alpha@freebsd.org Mail-Followup-To: Rob B , freebsd-alpha@freebsd.org Message-id: <20010913073724.J48793@gsmx07.alcatel.com.au> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-disposition: inline User-Agent: Mutt/1.2.5i References: <20010912085018.X48793@gsmx07.alcatel.com.au> <20010913064252.G48793@gsmx07.alcatel.com.au> <5.1.0.14.2.20010913064612.00a6eda0@pop.ozemail.com.au> Sender: owner-freebsd-alpha@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.org On 2001-Sep-13 06:47:37 +1000, Rob B wrote: >At 06:42 13/09/2001, Peter Jeremy wrote: >>On 2001-Sep-12 10:02:32 -0700, John Baldwin wrote: >> > >> >On 11-Sep-01 Peter Jeremy wrote: >> >> One comment: >> >> Unlike the i386, Alpha boot flags must be specified via the SRM - eg it >> >> isn't possible[1] to boot single user by issuing 'boot -s' to the >> >> FreeBSD boot-loader, you have to use 'boot -fl s' at the SRM. >> >> >> >> [1] At least it wasn't a couple of months ago when I last updated my >> >> system. >> > >> >Erm, I've used 'boot -s' from the loader many, many, many times on my >> >alpha test systems. >> >> >>Interesting, I've never had it work on my Multia. It hasn't annoyed >>me enough (and is useful on occasion) to chase it up. I guess I'll >>have to dig into the Alpha boot process a bit deeper and find out why >>it doesn't work for me. > >You'll probably find it's a "feature" of SRM. The Multia SRM is really >really old, and doesn't do a lot of the things the newer SRM version can do. My assumption (usual caveats) is that the boot loader reads the SRM boot flags, over-rides them with flags specified on the 'boot' line in the boot loader and then passed the result directly to the kernel. SRM mis-features shouldn't stop the boot loader over-riding user- specified flags. Having poked through the code a bit, this is the way things should behave (see /sys/boot/alpha/libalpha/elf_freebsd.c:elf_exec() ). It's possible that the Multia's prom_getenv() is returning an incorrect value - preventing elf_exec() from appending the user flags. I shall have to investigate... Peter To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-alpha" in the body of the message