Re: 5.3-Beta7: diskless boot up does not show boot messages on screen.

> >>>>I am now successfully booting a diskless PC with 5.3-Beta7,
> >>>>using an etherboot floppy. I can see the initial boot up
> >>>
> >>>>from floppy, followed by the downloading of the kernel
> >>>
> >>>>("..................done"). But after that no more messages
> >>>>on the screen anymore, until after a while the login prompt
> >>>>appears.
> >>>>
> >>>>The diskless PC does produce a legitimate /var/run/dmesg.boot.
> >>>>So I can inspect the bootup process after a successful boot.
> >>>>
> >>>>However, if there's a boot problem, I do not at all get a
> >>>>clue what's going wrong. A verbose boot up on the screen
> >>>>is then of vital importance.
> >>>>
> >>>>So why do i not get any verbose boot up of the kernel
> >>>>messages with the diskless boot?
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>Uncomment the hints line in your kernel config file or a hints line
> >>>looking at the example in the GENERIC config and rebuild your kernel.
> >>
> >>I'm not sure I get your point. Just double check for me:
> >>
> >>Currently I have in my DISKLESS kernel configuration file these lines
> >>
> >>#To statically compile in device wiring instead of /boot/device.hints
> >>#hints          "GENERIC.hints"         # Default places to look for 
> >>devices.
> >>
> >>
> >>Are you suggesting that I have to comment out the hints line here
> >>to get the kernel messages and bootup sequence printed on my screen?
> >
> >
> >You have to uncomment that hints line, remove the # in front of the
> >line. Normally the loader will load the hints file for you, but
> >etherboot doesn't do that for you.
> >
> >
> >>Do I have to manually copy /usr/src/sys/i386/conf/GENERIC.hints to
> >>/boot, or will that be done automatically?
> >
> >If you use pxe to netboot, pxeloader will load the hints file for you
> >but etherboot isn't clever enough to do it, so you have to compile it
> >into your kernel.
> 
> OK, that works indeed, but only for the screen.
> 
> I have created an etherboot floppy, that puts its messages on the
> serial console. So on the serial port, I get:
> 
>    master# cu -l /dev/cuaa0
>    Connected.
>    ROM segment 0x0000 length 0x0000 reloc 0x00020000
>    Etherboot 5.2.4 (GPL) http://etherboot.org Tagged ELF (FreeBSD) a.out 
>    for [RTL8139]
>    Relocating _text from: [00010070,00023200) to [01eece70,01f00000)
>    Boot from (N)etwork or (Q)uit?
>    Probing pci nic...
>    [rtl8139] - ioaddr 0X6000, addr 00:A0:B0:0E:3A:95 100Mbps full-duplex
>    Searching for server (DHCP)...
>    ..Me: 192.168.123.1, Server: 192.168.123.254, Gateway 192.168.123.254
>    Loading 192.168.123.254:boot/diskless/kernel ..(ELF/FreeBSD)... .....
>    .....................................................................
>    .....................................................................
>    .......................................................done
> 
> And then nothing. The root of the diskless PC has the file boot.config,
> which contains just "-P". This should force the kernel boot messages
> to the serial port when the keyboard is not connected. However, this
> does not work; kernel boot messages always go to the video console.
> 
> This seems to be a bug, but where? In the kernel, in etherboot, or
> elsewhere?

If you use etherboot, there is nothing that will read boot.config. You
can tell the kernel you want the console on the serial port by changing
hint.sio.0.flags to 0x030 in your hints file and reconfiguring and
recompiling the kernel. (The hints file that your kernel config include,
not the one in /boot.)

John
-- 
John Hay -- John.Hay_at_icomtek.csir.co.za / jhay_at_FreeBSD.org