From owner-freebsd-arch@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Jan 4 08:16:23 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 08BCA106566B; Tue, 4 Jan 2011 08:16:23 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from coco@executive-computing.de) Received: from mail.moehre.org (mail.moehre.org [195.96.35.7]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 92FC48FC1C; Tue, 4 Jan 2011 08:16:22 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail.moehre.org (unknown [195.96.35.7]) by mail.moehre.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 650868B143B; Tue, 4 Jan 2011 08:58:28 +0100 (CET) X-Spam-Flag: NO X-Spam-Score: -100.965 X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-100.965 tagged_above=-999 required=5 tests=[ALL_TRUSTED=-1, AWL=0.035, USER_IN_WHITELIST=-100] autolearn=disabled Received: from mail.moehre.org ([195.96.35.7]) by mail.moehre.org (mail.moehre.org [195.96.35.7]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id 1-QMSzR7uf0m; Tue, 4 Jan 2011 08:58:26 +0100 (CET) Received: from [192.168.100.30] (p54B0DD94.dip.t-dialin.net [84.176.221.148]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) (Authenticated sender: coco@executive-computing.de) by mail.moehre.org (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 4EC188B141B; Tue, 4 Jan 2011 08:58:26 +0100 (CET) Message-ID: <4D22D30A.2050606@executive-computing.de> Date: Tue, 04 Jan 2011 08:58:02 +0100 From: Marco Steinbach User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.12 (Windows/20080213) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: John Hixson References: <4D20C8BF.701@freebsd.org> <29AA82C4-6301-4DCD-BC9D-423AD162998E@gmail.com> <4D20DDE4.8080306@freebsd.org> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: Garrett Cooper , Bruce Cran , Nathan Whitehorn , freebsd-arch@freebsd.org, matt@ixsystems.com, freebsd-sysinstall@freebsd.org Subject: Re: BSDInstall: I want the bikeshed painted plaid X-BeenThere: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Discussion related to FreeBSD architecture List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 04 Jan 2011 08:16:23 -0000 John Hixson wrote on 02.01.2011 22:51: > On Sun, Jan 2, 2011 at 12:19 PM, Nathan Whitehorn wrote: > >> I spent a bunch of time looking at pc-sysinstall before starting to work on >> this. The major problem for non-x86 systems is that it heavily assumes that >> your disks are either MBR+bsdlabel or GPT. If you have anything different >> (APM, VTOC8, or even a raw bsdlabel or MBR installation on x86), it breaks >> in strange and fascinating ways due to a random mixture of if (scheme == >> MBR) else and if (scheme == GPT) else in the backend. Some of these are >> easily fixed, but it looked quite difficult to root out all of the places >> this assumption is made, not to mention teaching it about various styles of >> boot code, that the same partitioning scheme may need to be set up different >> ways on different architectures, etc. txt-sysinstall also segfaults when you >> try to run it on powerpc at the moment, though that is likely a simple bug >> and I didn't look into it in detail. >> >> What I intended with bsdinstall is to have something simple, flexible, and >> easily maintained that works immediately on all platforms and will be ready >> for 9.0 for sure. If pc-sysinstall materializes before then, or after then, >> and people like it better, I'm more than happy to get out of the way; this >> is the reason the wiki page is titled "Stopgap Installer". In the interim, I >> hoped to at least start laying out the hammer and nails next to sysinstall's >> coffin. >> -Nathan >> >> > I would be more than happy to help out with making pc-sysinstall work on > non-x86 systems, however I don't have access to any. Do any of you have > hardware that could possibly be used by interested parties? I'm sure all the > work that's gone into bsdinstall could be used in pc-sysinstall or vice > versa. I have PowerMacs (G3/G4) and Netras/Ultras (T1 105, U10, U5) at my discretion. I've never installed FreeBSD on any of them, but would be willing to give it a shot. I can provide serial console access to the Sparcs, but the PowerMacs supposedly need "hands on", which I can also provide. If there's interest, I humbly suggest discussing further details on the course of action at sysinstall@, to which I just subscribed. MfG CoCo