Date: Tue, 9 Jan 2007 13:27:30 -0700 From: "Steve Franks" <stevefranks@ieee.org> To: "Ted Mittelstaedt" <tedm@toybox.placo.com>, "FreeBSD Users Questions" <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Contributing to FreeBSD documentation (was: Re: no ath0 on newsystem with good card) Message-ID: <539c60b90701091227k718896f0yebd62d8e153e0c9f@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <003301c733ba$61b3dea0$3c01a8c0@coolf89ea26645> References: <539c60b90701060908o460d1d98wab2f2514a3a9d1e2@mail.gmail.com> <20070106202147.GB2532@kobe.laptop> <539c60b90701061849u35ddc61ch16a49484bd3baf12@mail.gmail.com> <20070107031750.GA5828@kobe.laptop> <539c60b90701070754r33ba9ae8q6b22f96be0ab6ea0@mail.gmail.com> <20070107162537.GB2261@kobe.laptop> <003301c733ba$61b3dea0$3c01a8c0@coolf89ea26645>
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Yes, and in today's world, it is likely to be some young sub-saharan african pup who can't just go down to the local retailer and drop $400 on a new system if his won't install... Steve On 1/8/07, Ted Mittelstaedt <tedm@toybox.placo.com> wrote: > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Giorgos Keramidas" <keramida@ceid.upatras.gr> > To: "Steve Franks" <stevefranks@ieee.org> > Cc: <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> > Sent: Sunday, January 07, 2007 8:25 AM > Subject: Contributing to FreeBSD documentation (was: Re: no ath0 on > newsystem with good card) > > > > On 2007-01-07 08:54, Steve Franks <stevefranks@ieee.org> wrote: > > > Apologies on not hitting the list. Alyays forget to reply-all. > > > > No problem. I just didn't copy the list because I wasn't sure I should. > > > > > So, I figured I'd try to fix the safe-mode end of things on my own, > > > and I found a post several years old (looked like it even could have > > > been yours) about safemode, which doesn't show up anywhere on the > > > freebsd site. So I did what it said and grep'd boot/beastie.4th for > > > safemode, which came up with this suprisingly total solution: > > > > > > add apic.0.disabled="1" to boot/device.hints. Not only does my system > > > come up in regular boot mode, but, as you suspected, the pccard works > > > too, so all appears well. > > > > Excellent news! Thanks for sharing the answer :) > > > > > So my final question, what in all the land is an "apic", > > > > "Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller". This is the part of your > > system which assigns priorities to interrupt lines of a device. The > > full details are probably too technical for some percentage of our user > > base, but more details can be found at the following pages: > > > > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Programmable_Interrupt_Controller > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programmable_Interrupt_Controller > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_8259 > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_APIC_Architecture > > > > > and why isn't apic or safemode mentioned in the handbook, manpages, or > > > even on the freebsd site? > > > > IIRC it is mentioned in the Developer's Handbook, but you are right that > > it should be in the main Handbook too. > > > > > Further, I'd like to write a handbook page on "freebsd and laptops", > > > because we're on my third one here now, and I'm starting to get the > > > drift of what could usefully be added to the handbook, namely a > > > thourough discussion of booting and device.hints. > > > > That would be great! If you can help writing such a section for the > > Handbook, a lot of users will be highly indebted to you, for sure :) > > > > I'll throw my $0.02 in here on this. > > Years ago on the CD distributions there was a file in the root of the > distro > labeled "hints" or some such. It was also on the website. It contained > all > the little workarounds for SPECIFIC pieces of hardware. I know as I wrote > several entries for it. That apic problem was listed in there as were > several > others, I know some for laptops specifically. > > Sometime during the FreeBSD 4.X series one of the developers got a bug > up their ass that somehow this was the wrong place for problems to be > listed. Something along the lines of these problems aren't FreeBSD > problems > they are sucky hardware problems and it makes FreeBSD look bad to have > the workarounds even listed at all, and we have the bug database and these > icky ugly things really ought to go into the bug database. So this file > disappeared. > As did every other easily recognizable place for submitting hints. As did > the > specific e-mail address for hints to go to. > > These installation problems IMHO PROPERLY belong in the README for the > distribution. That is the FIRST place that someone BRAND NEW to FreeBSD > is going to look for them. No FreeBSD newbie who has oddball hardware > that has bugs in it, is going to take the time spending hours reading the > Handbook > or searching the questions mailing list archives for tidbits, or querying > the bug > database for PR's for their gear. Any newbie to FreeBSD > is going to do the same thing that they do to any other OS, they are going > to stick > the CD in their oddball hardware and boot it, and if it doesen't come up > they > will look at the README file that came with the ISO image they downloaded, > and if the hardware-specific workarounds for their machine aren't there, > they will > discard the ISO cd and move on to some other Open Source OS. > > For all the huffing-and-puffing on peer-review for the Handbook, well > that is fine for that. But an install hints file's very usefulness is > junk > if a > committee is reviewing it. > > Hardware-specific install hints are, by their very nature, NOT guarenteed > to work. They may even make things worse. All they are is user-developed > workarounds that may or may not be The FreeBSD Way of doing things. > The only thing that can be said about them is that at one time, one year, > with > one particular piece of gear, someone tried some off-the-wall thing and > it worked. It might not ever work again in any future version of FreeBSD. > There might be manufacture-specific BIOS updates that fix things. There > might be a driver update in a later FreeBSD version that fixed that > specific > thing. But, it is a last-ditch suggestion to try when the 'normal' way of > installing > something doesen't work. > > I don't see much support for recreating the install hints file, so I > really > feel little incentive to contribute workarounds at this point, even though > I > have a whole collection of them for the specific systems I've installed > FreeBSD > on over the years. Submitting them to the PR database is worse then > useless, > because they invariably involve 2-3 year old hardware (or older) and the > developers have ZERO incentive to work on them. So the PR's just get > stale and then do-gooders come along 2-3 years later asking the original > poster to verify if the problem still exists in current FreeBSD, and when > the OP says how the hell do I know, they get closed. > > Sure, it might look strange to have a hint about installing on an old HP > Netserver to make an EISA change, in this day and age, in an install hints > file. But, goddammit, where the hell else are you going to see that? And > you just know that somewhere, there's some young pup that has dragged > one of those out of a Dumpster somewhere and is going to try loading > FreeBSD > on it. > > Ted > > _______________________________________________ > freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list > http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions > To unsubscribe, send any mail to " > freebsd-questions-unsubscribe@freebsd.org" > -- Steve Franks, KE7BTE Staff Engineer La Palma Devices, LLC http://www.lapalmadevices.com (520) 312-0089
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