A was saying to a friend of mine about my dream of installing
Linux on more architectures that Intel based platforms. Guess
what? He came back to me with an idea like he has a Macintosh,
unused and dusty somewhere in his personal office. What if we'll
put Linux on it and make it an Internet gateway? Well, at a glance
everything was about to be "Hunky-Dory", after that
it turned into a nightmare... Why do you think? 'Cause first thing
first it's an old Mac, second not too many people are working
with these type of Macs and the most important is that I really
want to see how good we are (me and my friend) ... ö
... Bellow is the full story in technical terms (more or less)...
¬ Hardware Specs:
- Model: PowerMac
7100/80
- CPU: PowerPC
601
- Architecture: NuBus
- Installed RAM: 8MB
on-board 96MB on available slots (2×16MB and 2×32MB)
- Hdd: SCSI-1
600MB (original); replaced with 18.2GB SCSI-3 from IBM
- Optical: Internal
SCSI-1 CDROM
- Graphics: on-board
with 1MB VRAM + 1 board <name_to_come> reported
as "NuBus PowerMac frame buffer device /nubus/radius "
- Audio: <name_to_come>
- NIC: <name_to_come>
- Modem: external
serial from Global Village Communication: TelePort 56 fax/modem
w/h K56flex
- Other: <name_to_come>
For <name_to_come>
bits, I could not gather enough information. Once I'll have it,
I'll update this section
¬ First days in paradise...
A good place to start is always the Internet. Because I use RedHat
on my Intel based laptop, I thought that I can get the very same
distribution for this Mac. Wrong, if is one version of RedHat
for Mac I'd love to know, together with the link from where can
I download ISOs... Anyway, with Google
and a browser (Opera)
I start digging the Internet. The good news is that even old the
Mac is still there, the bad news not all the links are working.
¬ Details on how to make it work
First of all, this document is an extent if you want of plenty
of other documents that people wrote over the time and publish
them in the Internet. I tried to gather this valuable information
that I struggled to get into one place that is easy for me to
find (if you are here, I don't know how easy was for you and how
much is worthing). Good starts are for these OldWorld NuBus Macs:
- http://nubus-pmac.sourceforge.net/
- http://mach-linux.org/
- http://www.mklinux.org/
- http://lists.linuxppc.org/
- http://www.linux-mandrake.com/en/demos/PPC/FAQ/
- http://www.yellowdoglinux.com/support/solutions/ydl_general/nubus.shtml
¬ First steps before Linux
Well, life is not pink... as you already know. I found that I
don't have enough space on the original Hard disk. As I don't
have a supplier for old SCSI disks I start searching for some
other choices. The solution was a IBM SCSI-3 18.2GB with a converter
to SCSI-1. I reinstalled MacOS on this disk using the following
partition table:
Partition map (with
512 byte blocks) on '/dev/sda'
#: type name length base ( size )
1: Apple_partition_map Apple 63 @ 1
2: Apple_UNIX_SVR2 untitled 4096001 @ 4096704 ( 2.0G)
3: Apple_Driver43*Macintosh 74 @ 118
4: Apple_Patches Patch Partition 512 @ 192
5: Apple_HFS "MacOs" 4096000 @ 704 ( 2.0G)
6: Apple_UNIX_SVR2 untitled 4096001 @ 8192705 ( 2.0G)
7: Apple_UNIX_SVR2 untitled 8192001 @ 12288706 ( 3.9G)
8: Apple_Bootstrap untitled 20482 @ 20480707 ( 10.0M)
9: Apple_Free*Extra 54 @ 64
10: Apple_UNIX_SVR2 swap 409601 @ 20501189 (200.0M)
11: Apple_UNIX_SVR2 Buffer 14637530 @ 20910790 ( 7.0G)
Device block size=512, Number of Blocks=35548320 (17.0G)
The above partition table was obtained like this:
- during MacOS installation I reserved 2GB for (partition 5) and leave the rest
of space unpartitioned
- after MacOS installation, when I finally managed to put the right Linux kernel (see bellow), during Linux
install, I was able to generate the other partitions.
Now, you will ask why so many 2GB partitions? The answer is in
the following note:
MkLinux filesystem partitions are limited, at present, to
a maximum of just under two GB each. Therefore, if you want to
have an overall MkLinux filesystem that will hold more than 2
GB, you'll need to use multiple partitions. README - MkLinux
file on MkLinux CD
So, I had MacOS on 2GB partition and an big unpartitioned space.
¬ Choosing the right Linux distribution
It is a time when everybody has to make decisions. Lucky me that
I did not have too many options when I start searching for ISO
images for Linux distributions freely downloadable. I found out
that for this machine (NuBus architecture, OldWorld and all the
others) I can have MkLinux and YellowDog, any of them with more
or less different ways to be installed on my system. I start downloading
MkLinux and read through most of the available documentation for
this. Well, the docs are quite old and most of the links as I
said before broken.
For MkLinux one is able to
chose between DR1,
pre-R1
and DR3
(check the mirrors).
"DR" stands for Developer Release. The first and the
last are stable distros as people say. I have downloaded these
two and try to install them (the story is bellow)
For YellowDog
there are plenty of choices:
- Pomona
2.0
- Fuji
2.1
- Rome
2.2
- Dayton
2.3
As I said, I have started with MkLinux DR1. I did all it's written
in README-MkLinux file on MkLinux
CD, most of tasks in MacOS side (copying Extensions, Control Panel
and Preferences files and Hdd setup). After these preparations,
the reboot of the system in Linux install mode end-up with a big
disappointment: the kernel was booting as far as I'm concerned
perfectly, but when was time for init script to run anaconda,
"the beast" crashed in an unexpected mode with errors
about virtual memory :( I was searching for this error in the
Internet, but finally I gave up with DR1 and start with DR3.
After another ~600 megs downloaded (lucky me I was on a 2 meg
line), I was quite happy to see the installer starting (true is
that the screen was now in very pale shade of dark-gray). My good
mood was vanished quickly though: anaconda wouldn't want to start
the packages installation. Into another session (Ctrl+F5 I believe)
I was able to see that "the snake" was complaining about
the very same think like in DR1: virtual memory, while on the
first session it was stalling. Well, I was confused about my hardware
knowledge a bit: most of the people playing with these old machines
were reporting installations with 64 megs of physical RAM, 64
megs of swap and a starting ramdisk of 16 megs. My Mac (well is
not mine, but still) have 104 megs physical RAM, 200 megs swap
and I was starting with 16 megs of initial ramdisk. I had increased
the ramdisk and restart, but I had the same result. Last hope
was Yellow Dog.
So, back once again to the 2 meg line and download Pomona (Yellod
Dog 2.0). The installation went perfectly smooth. I wasn't very
demanding in terms of packages installation, just a basic proposed
type I thought will do for me (about 400 megs). As I said, perfect
install, after reboot, I had the surprise that my keystrokes were
not having the expected result on the screen. Gees... I took a
brake as I was totally disappointed. Few days latter, scavenging
in the mail lists for NuBus and Linux, I found a kernel which
was supposed to solve the problems with the typing: MachKernel-input-20010619.gz.
A big hurray and a very large smile on my face, that was the result
of booting the Mac in Linux with the new kernel.
Conclusions: The system (PowerMac 7100/80) finally
start in Linux using:
- Pomona (Yellow Dog 2.0) for source CD install (perfect install)
- MachKernel-YDL2.0-20010618.gz
to start the installation process
- MachKernel-input-20010619.gz to boot in a normal fashion (real
keystrokes support).
Footnote: Don't try the input kernel for install, it will
not work.
The input kernel (version 2.4.6-pre3) doesn't have the modules
library (everything is built-in), which sometimes it is not quite
good. The next logical step for me was to build my own kernel
with my desired shape.
¬ Kernel
§ First bits ...
At the time I was start playing with
this Mac, the latest stable kernel version was 2.4.20. As I prefer
to run Linux, always against the latest stable version of the
kernel (old habits never change), here I go: start gathering the
required packages to build this kernel (details in every kernel
tree) and to install them on this Mac.
Don't be surprised to find that to build the kernel for these
NuBus-es requires to apply some patches, kindly provided here
by Etsushi Kato (best regards from a linux nerd). And also, don't
be an adventurous (unless is really need it) and start with "make
nubus_config", then proceed with your customize.
§ Latest update ...
The stable kernel 2.4.20 with the patches from Etsushi, did not
work for me. Compilation (~ 3 hours) was fine, booting this kernel
was a disaster as it wasn't going far then switching to color
frame buffer, with no errors on the screen. I have even downgraded
to the "pre" versions of this kernel and apply the corresponding
patches, still no success and the same results after reboot. Without
frame buffer support the kernel stopped at "Starting kswapd".
As I was not having a serial cable with Mac terminator at one
side, to connect to serial port and try to get more information
about the errors and also to be able to gather all data from the
screen, I said to me enogh is enough, let's try another stable
kernel version.
It turned up in a real success with stable vanilla 2.4.19 and
the patch for 2.4.19-rc3 from Etsushi. Being to this point, I
will put as prerequisites for anybody interested in:
» vanilla 2.4.19 from www.kernel.org
» patch-2.4.19-rc3-020722.bz2
» start with "make nubus_config"
» personalise with "make menuconfig". Here
is my .config file
» compile as usual with "make dep clean bzImage modules modules_install"
» transfer the resulted bzImage file into Apple Mac partition under "System Folder/Extensions" as "Mach Kernel"
» enjoy the reboot
¬ Tips and tricks ...
Yes, you better believe it... Tips and tricks as usual after spending
hours with compilation on this old box. Sorry I did not put this
as a starter in the á la carté menu that you read.
Cross-compilation is big and endless subject to talk about. But
it will save our ar##s of getting fat in the chair, if we possess
a high performance box. My patience went to an end when I compiled
the kernel on this Mac few times (5-6 times with 2.4.20 and 1
time 2.4.19). Definetelly has to be an easier way to do it. I
had this laptop in front of
me, which is quite fast, and I was paying a lot of time with the
lazy Mac to compile a kernel or anything else. Two articles made
me smile a bit and hope a lot:
- lists.linuxppc.org/linuxppc-nubus/200103/msg00035.html
- penguinppc.org/embedded/cross-compiling/
Both of them very well detailed and very helpful. I am not a programmer,
but I like to fancy with compilers and scripts. I combined them
with another useful resource from LFS
(their manual) and I manged to compile my kernel for Mac in less
then ½ hour. Building the cross environment took me 2 days
to make it work, but it's worth trying. And besides, I took it
as a new challenge. Don't be scared, with the instructions bellow,
to build your own cross environment it will take you about 1-2
hours, depending on how fast is your system. So, don't give up
so easy. Step-by-step then:
§ Step
0
I will not recommend you this:
Take some valium, cross compiles
are hard...
as I have seen in a message about cross-building documentation.
Cross compiles are hard, indeed, but what's easy now?
§ Step
1
Back to business, prepare the cross environment, dedicating a
directory were you will run everything. It's like a chroot-ed
environment, but you'll never chroot in:
#### shell-env.sh
LFS=/LFS/mac/lfs
target=powerpc-linux
prefix=$LFS
libs=$prefix/lib
inc=$prefix/include
PATH=$PATH:$prefix/$target/bin:$prefix/bin
export LFS target prefix libs inc PATH
You can change LFS variable to anything you want, but keep in
mind it should be different than system directories (like /usr
or /etc) Create that directory and run
# .<PATH_TO_THIS_SCRIPT>/shell-env.sh
§ Step
2
Execute this script to create the directory structure (as LFS
documentation stats for creating the chroot-ed environment):
cd $LFS &&
mkdir -p bin boot dev/pts etc/opt home lib mnt proc root sbin
tmp var opt &&
for dirname in $LFS/usr $LFS/usr/local
do
mkdir $dirname
cd $dirname
mkdir bin etc include lib sbin share src var
ln -s share/man man
ln -s share/doc doc
ln -s share/info info
cd $dirname/share
mkdir dict doc info locale man nls misc terminfo zoneinfo
cd $dirname/share/man
mkdir man{1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8}
done
cd $LFS/var &&
mkdir -p lock log mail run spool tmp opt cache lib/misc local
&&
cd $LFS/opt &&
mkdir bin doc include info lib man &&
cd $LFS/usr &&
ln -s ../var/tmp tmp
§ Step
3
Extract files from RPMs for PPC into $LFS/sources:
# rpm2cpio glibc-2.2.4-19k.ppc.rpm | cpio
-id
# rpm2cpio glibc-devel-2.2.4-19k.ppc.rpm | cpio -id
Inside $LFS/sources run
# mv usr/include/ ..
# cp -a lib ../
# cp -a usr/lib/* ../lib
The RPMs are available on YellowDog CD that you already have (you
installed your Linux on Mac).
§ Step
4
Change directory into $LFS/lib and run:
# ls -al | grep "\.\.\/\.\.\/"
| \
awk '{target=substr($11,11); system("ln
-sf " target " " $9)}'
Why? Because there are broken links we have to fix.
§ Step
5
Chose the kernel version and copy:
<linux-ver>/include/linux/*
into $LFS/include/linux/.
<linux-ver>/include/asm-ppc/*
into $LFS/include/asm/.
§ Step
6
Make sure you are in $LFS directory and all LFS variables are
defined. This is achieved running
# .<PATH_TO_THIS_SCRIPT>/shell-env.sh
Any mistake in defining the variables it will result with a disaster
for you performant box!!!
§ Step
7
Download binutils-2.13.90.0.2.tar.gz
and unpack it under $LFS/usr/src
Change drectory into $LFS/usr/src/binutils-2.13.90.0.2
and run:
# ./configure --prefix=$prefix --target=$target
--disable-nls
# make
# make install
§ Step
8
Download gcc-2.95.3
and unpack it under $LFS/usr/src
Change directory into $LFS/usr/src/gcc-2.95.3 and run
# mkdir ../gcc-build && cd ../gcc-build
# ../gcc-2.95.3/configure --target=$target --prefix=$prefix \
--with-libs=$libs --with-headers=$inc --disable-shared \
--disable-threads --disable-nls
# make all-gcc
# make install
§ Step
9
Run this commands to create the appropriate links to specific
libraries and binaries:
# cd $LFS/bin &&
ls -1 | grep powerpc | awk -Fpowerpc\-linux\- '{system("ln -s
powerpc-linux-"$2" "$2)}' &&
cd $LFS/usr/lib &&
ls -1 $LFS/powerpc-linux/lib/ | awk '{system("ln -s $LFS/powerpc-linux/lib/"$1)}'
&&
cd $LFS/lib &&
ln -sf ../bin/cpp &&
cd $LFS/usr/lib &&
ln -sf ../../bin/cpp &&
cd $LFS/bin &&
ln -sf gcc cc
§ Step
10
Now, that you have created the cross compile environment it's
time to build the kernel. Presumming that you have already downloaded
the vanilla kernel, unpack it under $LFS/usr/src, apply the patch
for NuBus-es (see above in prerequisites) and make the following
changes in the Makefile under linux kernel tree:
- modify the line for architecture to read ARCH
:= ppc
- modify the line for cross-compile to read CROSS_COMPILE
= powerpc-linux- « Don't forget the last dash!
Proceed with kernel configuration and compilation like you would
be on your Mac, but don't leave the cross environment.
§ Step
11
Make a backup copy of you running kernel on Mac (the backup have
to be on Apple partition) and transfer the cross compiled one
from the performant box into Apple filesystem like you already
know. Reboot your Mac and pray to have a well compiled kernel,
otherwise the victim will crash. You still can revert to the stable
kernel because you did the backup. Isn't it?
Footnote: This cross compile thing is good when your performant
box is a different architecture than PPC. If your speedy box is
PPC, there you go, you can directly compile everything on it and
just transfer the resulted files onto the old Mac. Just make sure
that you comply with all requirements for compatible architectures.
¬ RPM rebuild
The whole story with cross compile, led me to think I can do even
RPM rebuilts in a cross build manner. Well, I was not that lucky
this time. As you can see in the message "Re: cross-build
documentation?" from Jeff Jonson on Google
groups, there are not too many people who succeed to do this.
So, I had to do this on Mac. I knew from the very beggining that
will take me days, but I start doing it, even I still don't know
why. Details on how to do this in one step with appropriate scripts
is still to come on this page. The idea is basicaly:
- to install all *.src.rpm files
- to have plenty of disk space
- to understand the rules that govern RPMs building without braking
their dependencies (this is a nightmare)
- to be in a good mood to do it (it will take a lot of time -
as I said, days, because my Mac is very old)
So, keep in touch with this page section.
¬ End conclusion...
Once again, Linux as an OpenSource operating system, proved that
has less boundaries (virtually none) than any other proprietary
system. It is able to run on old boxes and very diverse architectures.
You already heard this, but having an old box in a corner of your
house, it's not so hopeless to make it run and to reuse it even
for test purposes. The aim with this box was to make it work with
Linux as will be used as an Internet gateway for home. It has
plenty of disk space with the new Hdd, so can be a backup host
(running Samba on it was not such a bad idea). Besides, it has
a powerfull firewall built into kernel. This iptables doesn't
stop to impress me every day. It's good, reliable, secure and
free. Thanks again to all OpenSource developers.
So, I had Linux running on a NuBus Macintosh. The next move is
to built a RS/6000 with Linux and IF... I'll have a chance on
a SPARC box (especially those Sun Enterprise running Solaris 2.6
for people that don't understand how good is an OS upgrade).
¬ Useful links - to be updated
- all the links above and bellow
- www.kernel.org
for the latest kernel source
- www.cs.ubc.ca/cgi-bin/ftp/linux/yellowdoglinux/iso/type/
for YellowDog ISOs (which worked for me)
