[Fwd: Re: DiskOnChip Questions]

Hendricks David W. dwh at lanl.gov
Fri Jun 25 11:55:01 CEST 2004 

LinuxBIOS does not have its own kernel. The way it usually works is either 
LinuxBIOS boots a kernel from flash or LinuxBIOS boots a payload (eg FILO 
or Etherboot) which then boots a kernel. LinuxBIOS is its own entity in 
either case.

If you have an IDE hard disk, you can use LinuxBIOS and FILO to boot your 
kernel off that hard disk and its existing filesystem as you would with 
LILO or GRUB. FILO can be downloaded here: 
http://te.to/~ts1/filo/ .

Basically this is what I would do with your hardware:
1. Download FILO, edit the Config file.
	Change the AUTOBOOT_FILE line to let FILO know where your kernel 
is located and also pass any extra kernel parameters. Example:
hda2:/boot/x86_64 root=/dev/hda2 console=ttyS0,115200 console=tty0 vga=792 
video=atyfb:mode:1024x768
	Look under "# Filesystems" and enable whichever filesystem(s) you 
require to read your kernel.
	Run "make" to generate filo.elf

2. Open your freebios2/targets/via/epia-m/Config.lb file and edit the 
"payload" lines. There should be two of them, one under romimage "normal" 
and one under romimage "fallback". Change them to point to filo.elf. For 
example:
	payload /usr/src/filo-0.4.2/filo.elf

3. cd to freebios2/targets and run "./buildtarget via/epia-m/"
4. cd to via/epia-m/epia-m and run "make"
5. If all goes well, you should now have linuxbios.rom. Burn it on a spare 
flash part (You can try the flash_rom utility in 
freebios2/util/flash_and_burn), hook up a serial connection to another 
computer, power cycle and see what happens.

On Fri, 25 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote:

> David,
> 
> LinuxBIOS has its own kernel correct?  Or is LinuxBIOS not really a 
> Linux kernel, but boots a Linux kernel that can be stored on the 
> DiskOnChip or HDD?  I just want to verify how it works because I've 
> heard so many references to multiple kernels that I'm not sure exactly 
> how the whole process works.  In response to your last question I'd like 
> to boot my distro off of hard disk if I'm thinking correctly.
> 
> Thanks,
> Michael Robinson
> mrobinson at fuzzymuzzle.com
> www.fuzzymuzzle.com
> 
> Hendricks David W. wrote:
> 
> >You can do it that way, too. The method suggested earlier was to use the 
> >distribution kernel on the compact flash device. If you want a stripped 
> >kernel to fit alongside LinuxBIOS on your BIOS ROM, you can do that as 
> >well (Look at targets/arima/hdama/Config.kernelimage.lb for an example). 
> >You could then use Kexec or Two Kernel Monte (kmonte) to boot 
> >another kernel.
> >
> >So I guess what we need to figure out is how you want to boot your kernel. 
> >Do you want it to be booted off an IDE device or the same flash part 
> >alongside your BIOS?
> >
> >On Fri, 25 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote:
> >
> >  
> >
> >>So in my case FILO is booting the actual Linux kernel that you will be 
> >>using when you perform tasks on the computer?  So if you were using a 
> >>DiskOnChip your Linux distribution kernel would be on the actual 
> >>DiskOnChip?  I was under the impression that the LinuxBIOS kernel was on 
> >>the DiskOnChip and the distribution kernel was on a hard drive.  Could 
> >>you please clarify.
> >>
> >>Thanks,
> >>Michael Robinson
> >>mrobinson at fuzzymuzzle.com
> >>www.fuzzymuzzle.com
> >>
> >>Hendricks David W. wrote:
> >>
> >>    
> >>
> >>>Sounds about right. Put your kernel on an IDE device with a filesystem 
> >>>(FILO supports EXT2/3, Reiser, XFS, etc) and use FILO as your LinuxBIOS 
> >>>payload (payload /where/filo/is/located/filo.elf in your 
> >>>targets/via/epia-m/Config.lb file). You also need to tell FILO where 
> >>>yoru kernel is located and give it any options you want passed to the 
> >>>kernel in the "AUTOBOOT_FILE" line, which should look something like 
> >>>a LILO prompt: hda1:/kernel root/dev/hda3 console=ttyS0,115200 
> >>>
> >>>Boot image generally implies kernel. 
> >>>
> >>>On Fri, 25 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote:
> >>>
> >>> 
> >>>
> >>>      
> >>>
> >>>>---The trend seems to be NOT to use DiskOnChip but rather a CF <> IDE 
> >>>>adapter. Using FILO you can boot from the CF.---
> >>>>
> >>>>So I'd flash FILO to the BIOS, then it would load the LinuxBIOS kernel 
> >>>>image, and then the kernel image would do whatever you want LinuxBIOS to 
> >>>>do, right? Or am I wrong... It says FILO loads a "boot image", whats the 
> >>>>definition of a "boot image", is it just the kernel?
> >>>>
> >>>>Thanks,
> >>>>Michael Robinson
> >>>>mrobinson at fuzzymuzzle.com
> >>>>www.fuzzymuzzle.com
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>Larry Matter wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>   
> >>>>
> >>>>        
> >>>>
> >>>>>>what
> >>>>>>does the DiskOnChip provide to the LinuxBIOs project that the standard
> >>>>>>flash chip can't?
> >>>>>>  
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>       
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>            
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>More than 2 megabits of storage.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>     
> >>>>>
> >>>>>          
> >>>>>
> >>>>>>My second is that I'm going to be using the VIA EPIA
> >>>>>>MII motherboard which has a PLCC BIOS, as far as I can tell PLCC
> >>>>>>DiskOnChips aren't very readily available.  Should I use a DIP to PLCC
> >>>>>>adapter; how did the other people who used this board do it?
> >>>>>>  
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>       
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>            
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>The trend seems to be NOT to use DiskOnChip but rather a CF <> IDE
> >>>>>adapter.  Using FILO you can boot from the CF.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>     
> >>>>>
> >>>>>          
> >>>>>
> >>>>>>My final
> >>>>>>question is how do I pick the size of the DiskOnChip.
> >>>>>>  
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>       
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>            
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>So if you're going to go for the CF <> IDE, then it just needs to be as
> >>>>>big as your root partition (or even just an initrd).   There are many
> >>>>>other alternatives depending on network, disk, etc.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>And if you've been following this list for a bit you'll know that you
> >>>>>can't (yet) boot off of the CF adapter on the EPIA MII.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>One last word of advice, get a bios savior.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>Larry
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>     
> >>>>>
> >>>>>          
> >>>>>
> >>>>_______________________________________________
> >>>>Linuxbios mailing list
> >>>>Linuxbios at clustermatic.org
> >>>>http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
> >>>>
> >>>>   
> >>>>
> >>>>        
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> 
> >>>
> >>>      
> >>>
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >  
> >
>

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