dc-burn-netbsd 1.3

[abs]

Let me know if this is off-topic enough to be inappropriate

I've been playing with writing a simple shell script to create bootable NetBSD CD-images, with ramdisk kernels or full root-on-iso9660 filesystem live CDs.

I've just pushed a new version of dc-burn-netbsd which has a number of potentially interesting changes:
- create a Dreamcast live CD image "dc-burn-netbsd -k GENERIC -r base"
- burn the image to CD, or run under the gxemul emulator (-e)

It requires some of Marcus Comstedt's tools, so it is best installed as part of the dctools pkgsrc package (1.3 or later). If you are not using pkgsrc then it just expects scramble and makeip in the path as dc-scramble and dc-makeip.

Note - if you are running NetBSD/dreamcast under gxemul you will probably want gxemul-0.6.0nb3 or later from pkgsrc, which has some fixes for creating the fake CD-Rom TOC or apply the following patch to gxemul-0.6.0

[VasiliyRS]

I still dont understand... is netbsd for dc working as standalone application like dc linux port and DreamShell or it has to be connected to pc in order to work?

[abs]

I still dont understand... is netbsd for dc working as standalone application like dc linux port and DreamShell or it has to be connected to pc in order to work?

Either

It can run as a completely standalone system, or use another machine for networked storage.

dc-burn-netbsd will burn a disk with either a ramdisk kernel (GENERIC_MD), or a kernel which will prompt for a root filesystem (gdrom0 for live disk, rtk0 to use an NFS exported filesystem like at http://netbsd0.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/r ... ished.html (note: we've just moved offices and I don't have two spare IPs yet to get wopr and orac back online)

Hopefully we get support for the serial-SD and serial-Ethernet soon to make it more useful...

[VasiliyRS]

Alright, can i run that script under Windows ?
What's advantages of netbsd ? What it can be used for on Dreamcast ?

[abs]

Alright, can i run that script under Windows ?
What's advantages of netbsd ? What it can be used for on Dreamcast ?

Running the script under Windows might be quite involved, but you could certainly burn a generated image using bootdreams.

I've put up just such an image at http://sync.absd.org/dreamcast/.

Currently the usagage has been "because its there" - while NetBSD/dreamcast can run a whole bunch of standard unix software (see http://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/pkgsrc/packag ... 012Q1/All/ ), not all of it makes sense on such a platform.

There is a README there (I'll quote it below)

netbsd-dreamcast-6_BETA2.iso.README
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Sample NetBSD/dreamcast live image (Generated by "dc-burn-netbsd -l -n"):

Requirements
- Dreamcast or gxemul emulator (*)
- If using a real Dreamcast, blank CD-R & Dreamcast keyboard
- Optional: Dreamcast BBA (broadband adaptor) for network access

Usage:
- Download netbsd-dreamcast-6_BETA2.iso.7z and uncompress to get .iso image
- To burn to CD for booting on Dreamcast:
- On Windows use http://code.google.com/p/bootdreams/downloads
- On NetBSD no need to download this, use http://pkgsrc.se/sysutils/dc-tools
and run 'dc-burn-netbsd -l' directly
- To boot in gxemul (*) run
"gxemul -XEdreamcast -d co23965696:netbsd-dreamcast-6_BETA2.iso"
- Once booted enter "gdrom0" and return three times when prompted
- Login as "root"

This is still a work in progess, in particular future goals for future versions
include:
- Including installed binary packages such as some from
http://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/pkgsrc/packag ... 012Q1/All/
- Switching to a shell with command line editing
- Support for Serial-SD and potentially Serial-Ethernet adaptors
- Better X support (currently insufficient memory to effectively run)

(*) Running under gxemul requires gxemul-0.6.0nb3 or later from pkgsrc, or the
patch-src_devices_dev__dreamcast__gdrom.cc patch applied to gxemul-0.6.0

[VasiliyRS]

Thanks for image.
Are you netbsd developer ?
Do netbsd dc port has any gui ?
Do it has any specific dreamcast features ?

- Support for Serial-SD and potentially Serial-Ethernet adaptors

What this feature will be used for ?
Does it going have any of these features ?

Linux DC is a port of the powerful Linux operating system to the Dreamcast. The newest versions have a GUI and can also be used by an average user. The Linux distribution for the Dreamcast includes XMAME and a port of prBoom (Doom) and can also be used to develop new applications for Dreamcast Linux.

P.S. yes, i have a lot of question but it seems like you are first person who knows answers.

[abs]

Thanks for image.

Glad to provide I've just updated it to run dhcpcd on the BBA if present

Are you netbsd developer ?

I am a NetBSD developer, but I've only recently acquired a Dreamcast and started playing with it.

Do netbsd dc port has any gui ?

NetBSD supports the standard xorg X server and apps.

Do it has any specific dreamcast features ?

I'm not sure what you mean by this?

- Support for Serial-SD and potentially Serial-Ethernet adaptors

What this feature will be used for ?

Well right now you can boot NetBSD and run with

• root-on-ramdisk (can remove/swap CD after boot)
• root-on-cd (with temporary writable files in ramdisk)
• root-on-nfs (uses BBA to talk to another machine for file store)

Obviously given the availability and relative cheapness ($20) of Serial-SDcard adaptors it would make a lot of sense for NetBSD to support them to enable you to run a 'full' read/write unix system from an SD card.

Does it going have any of these features ?

Linux DC is a port of the powerful Linux operating system to the Dreamcast. The newest versions have a GUI and can also be used by an average user. The Linux distribution for the Dreamcast includes XMAME and a port of prBoom (Doom) and can also be used to develop new applications for Dreamcast Linux.

16MB is quite tight to run a *nix system with X and all writable files in ramdisk, but it should be possible. I'll have a play when I'm back in the same place as my DC and see what it would take to generate an updated live image which starts an X session and maybe even includes a couple of X games

I think it would be much more comfortable if we could repurpose some of the video and audio memory (frankly when running X and something like MAME 8MB of VRAM is massive overkill, compared to 16MB of normal memory). Something to play with later...

P.S. yes, i have a lot of question but it seems like you are first person who knows answers.

"Some" answers

[alex]

Maybe you can answer on my question.

Did you know how to add HDD support to NetBSD/Dreamcast?

On this video it run NetBSD/dreamcast 5.1_RC2 (with local patch)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctxijoP2gqo

But where i can download this local patch and how to apply it to netBSD?

P.S. It needed to test this hardware http://www.dc-swat.ru/forum/thread-977- ... l#pid21854

[abs]

Maybe you can answer on my question.

Did you know how to add HDD support to NetBSD/Dreamcast?

On this video it run NetBSD/dreamcast 5.1_RC2 (with local patch)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctxijoP2gqo

But where i can download this local patch and how to apply it to netBSD?

P.S. It needed to test this hardware http://www.dc-swat.ru/forum/thread-977- ... l#pid21854

The patch against NetBSD 5 would be at: http://www.ceres.dti.ne.jp/tsutsui/netb ... t-5.0.diff

I've just updated it to apply against the HEAD of the NetBSD tree (-current) and the updated version is at: http://sync.absd.org/dreamcast/dcext-cu ... 07-29.diff

To apply against NetBSD and build on a POSIX host (NetBSD, Linux, etc)

• Download NetBSD source. Easiest would be tarfiles which include anoncvs setup
• Apply the patch "patch < dcext.patch"
• Build tools. Run "./build.sh -m dreamcast tools". This builds a complete cross compiler & any other tools needed to build NetBSD. The first 20 lines of output will list targets dirs
• Build kernel. Run "./build.sh -m dreamcast kernel=DCEXT"

I don't have a DCEXT board (would love one tho , but I've built a sample kernel is at: http://sync.absd.org/dreamcast/netbsd-DCEXT.bin.gz and a full iso image with root on gdrom is at http://sync.absd.org/dreamcast/netbsd-d ... EXT.iso.7z

Currently the code will unconditionally try to attach the dcext, so it at least makes it very obvious the driver is present

Booting without the hardware should give you output similar to:
(from gxemul in this case)

If you have a DCEXT board could you let me know how it boots?

Thanks

[sl1pkn07]

Hello, i have problem when try to port the scrip `dc-burn-netbsd` to linux

in the script have a command witch i have no F idea what do

Code: Select all

dist_details="$(ls -l $kernel $(echo $opt_sets | fmt 1 | sed "s:^:$distdir/sets/:"); echo extra_opts=$opt_live)"

the command is the `fmt 1`

in linux, https://linuxcommand.org/lc3_man_pages/fmt1.html, the command is different than netbsd counterpart, runing as-sis, get a error like:

Code: Select all

fmt: cannot open '1' for reading: No such file or directory

so i have no idea what is the real output of the `dist_details` variable

@abs can you post the contents of the file `.dist` created from `dist_details' variable?

also the `ftp -o` command also have problems in linux (`-o` is not valid). change to tnftp, wich comes from netbsd, refule the connection to all urls, so i've change to `curl -# -o` command

also have a little changes (quoted variables for fix paths with spaces) and other little things

can you help me? i see you stored the code in github and have the issue tracker , but i prefeer posted here because in the issue tracker is for netbsd things/issues/foo and not for general support

greetings