Upgrading NetBSD macppc 6.0 RC1 from NetBSD macpcc 5.1.2 on a Powerbook G3 Wallstreet PDQ

The boot up process for Open Firmware (OFW) is slightly different on on NetBSD 6.0 RC1 than booting NetBSD  5.1.2. The main difference is that to boot from OFW you have to type in the following code. Which is slightly different from the one posted for 5.1.2.

At the OFW, hold down COMMAND + OPTION (ALT) + O + F along with or before the boot chime to get into the Open Firmware. Next set auto-boot? to false by typing in the following command.

0> setenv auto-boot? false

Grab hold of a Mac OS X 10.2 Disk 1 and insert it into the CD-Drive. Now hold down Command-Option-O-F before the boot chime. This should get you into the open firmware. Type in the following commands:

  0> boot

 Now hit the return key. Right after hitting the return key hold down C. This will boot the Mac OS X 10.2 Disk 1. Initially a Mac Icon will appear with a smiling mac. Then you will hear the boot chime again and it will stop at the Open Firmware boot.

Now remove the Mac OS X 10.2 CD from the CD drive and insert the NetBSD 6.0 RC1 CD into the CD Drive and close the drive. Now type in the following command at the prompt.

0>setenv real-base F00000

 Next type in the following command exactly as typed.

0>boot ide1/@0:0,\OFWBOOT.XCF;1 NETBSD.MACPPC;1

Next you will be prompted with the NetBSD Open Firmware boot prompt. Type in the following command, once agian type exactly as typed.

Boot: netbsd

Now hit Return/Enter and voila! you are in the installation wizard. Follow the installation Wizard and you will have a crisp new installation of NetBSD 6.0 RC1

Internet on my NetBSD 5.2.1 macppc port

Hurrah! Am no longer having to switch computers to blog. I now have a fully functional web browser (though slightly antiquated), running on my NetBSD 5.2.1. macppc port. The machine I must say is a tad bit slow at downloading the pages, but other than that works perfectly well.  Next I have decided to install emacs and start coding on the machine. firefox does not compile but firefox36 does. That's the port that I am running on NetBSD as of now. It took a good 10 hours to compile firefox on the machine. I really need to learn how to cross compile so that I can compile on my main laptop and then run the code on my Powerbook G3 Wallstreet PDQ. 

I also filed a send_pr about the bmac driver that does not seem to work on NetBSD. A few people have gotten back to me, but it does not look promising that the driver would be fixed. However, I am keeping my hopes up. The problem being that the people who do know how to write a kernel driver does not have access to the hardware. I would have probably done it had my coding skills been a tad bit more advanced but perhaps I would add that to my bucket list. 

I'm having a bit of trouble configuring GNUMail.app on my system. The configuration/preference panel is entirely blank. Probably a bug in the system so until that's fixed I will be hunting for a good email client. I might as well also just use the web browser to check email. 

X-Chat is a great irc program for keeping connected with the outside world and it compiles without any issues. So I'm using XChat to do some chatting and the occasional help request on the NetBSD channel on Freenode. 

I haven't installed Java or Flash on NetBSD. I probably won't be needing it either since I don't intend to use the machine for any youtube viewing or such things.

The System Upgrade

After running into some compile errors on the system (NetBSD 5.1.2), I have decided to upgrade the system from NetBSD 5.1.2 to NetBSD 6.0 RC1. I'm really hoping that the upgrade process goes smoothly and it solves the compile issues that I am having. I've also been debating whether to do a Canadian Cross Compile for the software with the issue but I'm not very skilled in that specific area and there is not much information out there on such a procedure. However I am not disheartened. I will keep researching and hopefully find a few answers somewhere. Until then the option left for me is to upgrade the system from 5.1.2 to 6.0RC1 and hope that the bugs have been fixed.

Updating the time via NTP

Keeping the time and date up-to-date on a system is quite crucial. To update the time via a NTP Server on NetBSD 5.2.1. MacPPC follow the following steps. 

Edit the file /etc/rc.conf and add the following line to it:

ntpdate=YES ntpdate_hosts="pool.ntp.org"

This will set the time sever to "pool.ntp.org". Next exit vi using :wq!
Nest create a symlink to your local time zone by typing the following command. This example will set the time for Eastern Time in Canada.

ln -fs /usr/share/zoneinfo/Canada/Eastern /etc/localtime

Next restart the NTP service by typing in the following command.

sh /etc/rc.d/rtclocaltime restart

This will cause the system to update the time when the system is connected to the internet. If you want to manually update the time type in the following command and it will update the time.

/usr/sbin/ntpdate -s -b pool.ntp.org

Now type in the date command to see if it has updated the system.

Virtual Console on NetBSD MacPPC

One of the most amazing features, atleast in my humble opinion, about Unix based systems is their ability to support virtual consoles. Now to enable this on a NetBSD system running NetBSD 5.2.1, since it is not enabled by default, follow the following steps.

First enable wscons. To do this open the file /etc/rc.conf using vi Editor by typing in the following command

vi /etc/rc.conf

Navigate to the bottom of the file and insert the following line

wscons=YES

Hit ESC and type in :w! and hit Enter/Return. Hit ESC again and type in :wq!
Now type in the following at the command prompt and hit enter

sh /etc/rc.d/wscons start

Next type in the following command

sh /etc/rc.d/ttys restart

Not to navigate between Virtual Consoles hot COMMAND + Fx replace x with number of console e.g. COMMAND + F2 to goto second virtual console.

 

Virtual Consoles on NetBSD

I was so frustrated with the NetBSD documentation. It said that to use virtual consoles on macppc was not possible. But that's not true. I'm using a virtual consoles right now. On my Powerbook G3. The way to do it is hit Command+Fx replace x with 1,2,3,4,5 etc. example: Command + F2 will give Virtual Console 2.

XFCE4 on NetBSD MacPPC

I'm running on a 300 Mhz PPC Powerbook G3 Wallstreet PDQ to be exact. After much thought I decided that I needed a desktop manager. So I setup xorg and I proceeded to install XFCE4. To install XFCE4 these are the steps I followed.

$ cd /usr/pkgsrc/meta-pkgs/xfce4/

$ make install clean clean-depends

That's it. It took a good 24 hours to compile so I left the machine on and went to bed. :)