write into OF tree like nvsetenv

write into OF tree like nvsetenv

[Olaf Hering]

Hi,

it is possible to write into the OF settings to adjust the boot
variables? nvsetenv do not work anymore on newer machines.

Is there any way to change variables like "boot-device"?
The idea is to automate the generation of yaboot.conf and booting via
the os-chooser script.


Gruss Olaf

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Re: write into OF tree like nvsetenv

[BenH]

On Sat, Jan 8, 2000, Olaf Hering <olh@suse.de> wrote:

>it is possible to write into the OF settings to adjust the boot
>variables? nvsetenv do not work anymore on newer machines.
>
>Is there any way to change variables like "boot-device"?
>The idea is to automate the generation of yaboot.conf and booting via
>the os-chooser script.

nvsetenv needs fixing. There's a tool that comes with poof that should
work until I fix nvsetenv. Also, mvram is not accessible at all yet on
UMA machines (I'm working on that but it will only work when booting from
OF, not with BootX).


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Re: write into OF tree like nvsetenv

[Olaf Hering]

On Sun, Jan 09, Martin Costabel wrote:

> 
> I am somewhat surprised that nobody mentions the "Christmas Present"
> boot script by BenH
> (http://lists.linuxppc.org/listarcs/linuxppc-dev/199912/msg00191.html).
> I installed this on several iMac DVs, and it works great. Now you don't
> have to fiddle with OF any more, and if you put a timeout into
> yaboot.conf, booting into Linux is completely automatic.

Yes, this script is just great.

> You only have to enter OF once, type
> setenv boot-device hd:10,yabootloader.script

I want exactly this automatic. This works fine on the current IDE Macs,
but with a B&W Scsi Mac a "typical" User has lost.
The path on my Mac is something like

/pci/pci-bridge/ADPT,2940U2B/@6:7,blah

Too complex.


Gruss Olaf

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Re: write into OF tree like nvsetenv

[Ethan Benson]

On 9/1/2000 Olaf Hering wrote:

>
>I want exactly this automatic. This works fine on the current IDE Macs,
>but with a B&W Scsi Mac a "typical" User has lost.
>The path on my Mac is something like
>
>/pci/pci-bridge/ADPT,2940U2B/@6:7,blah
>
>Too complex.

agreed, OF device paths are gross ;)

I have two comments on this, one this can be automatic if you make 
the bootstrap partition look like a MacOS bootdisk  (as my ybin 
scripts will do) and the mac-boot function `should' find it and see 
it as bootable and load the bootfile(*) automatically, however this 
is quite slow, it can take up to 2 to 5 MINUTES for this to occur (at 
least on my B&W with a adaptec 2930).

(*) bootfile as in the file in the blessed directory with a HFS file 
type of tbxi, my scripts will set the OF script to this if a OF 
script is used and if not the yaboot file gets it.

the other problem, is there is currently no way to determine the OF 
device path of a Linux device file, we cannot tell what /dev/sdb3's 
OF path is, BenH tells me to add this would require modification of 
every block device driver (which opens a big can of worms).

in short we have 2 problems right now: 1) we cannot write to OF nvram 
from linux at the moment and 2) we cannot figure out WHAT to write to 
it...


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Ethan Benson
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Re: write into OF tree like nvsetenv

[Olaf Hering]

On Mon, Jan 10, Ethan Benson wrote:

> 
> On 9/1/2000 Olaf Hering wrote:
> 
> >
> >I want exactly this automatic. This works fine on the current IDE Macs,
> >but with a B&W Scsi Mac a "typical" User has lost.
> >The path on my Mac is something like
> >
> >/pci/pci-bridge/ADPT,2940U2B/@6:7,blah
> >
> >Too complex.
> 
> agreed, OF device paths are gross ;)
...
> in short we have 2 problems right now: 1) we cannot write to OF nvram 
> from linux at the moment and 2) we cannot figure out WHAT to write to 
> it...

We will change this, at least the last. Who solve the first problem? :)


Gruss Olaf

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Re: write into OF tree like nvsetenv

[Ethan Benson]

On 11/1/2000 Olaf Hering wrote:

>  > in short we have 2 problems right now: 1) we cannot write to OF nvram
>  > from linux at the moment and 2) we cannot figure out WHAT to write to
>  > it...
>
>We will change this, at least the last. Who solve the first problem? :)

I think BenH said he was going to work on fixing nvsetenv so it will 
actually write the changes back (need to document the new nvram 
format).

how will you fix the latter problem?   from what Ben has told me its 
quite non trivial.


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Ethan Benson
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