Brian Buhrow <buhrow@lothlorien.nfbcal.org> wrote:

> 	Hello.  This may seem like a silly question, but 
> I see there's support for RAID controllers like the Escalade card in
> NetBSD-current.  While I've read about the twe(4) and ld(4) drivers, I
> don't see any reference to programs like raidctl which are used to define
> raid sets, raid levels, and disk recovery operations on these cards.  How
> are folks setting up raids on these cards, and is the plan to use something
> non-obvious that lets you control the card before you start putting
> filesystems on it?

All of these boards have a configuration tool as part of the BIOS or
accompanying software that runs under DOS (or alone in some cases). There
isn't a good way to abstract all the configuration tasks to the point of
having a single utility that lets you manage all boards.

The situation is like this:

- mlxctl(8) will let you do some things. It's not complete (i.e., you can't
  create arrays or do much at all with v2.x firmware), but with a little
  documentation and effort it could be made fully functional.

- Intel (and possibly some newer AMI boards) can be managed in full on
  NetBSD using a web browser, because the I2O executive speaks HTML. See:

	http://www.netbsd.org/~ad/i2ocfg/

- cac, mly: the structures and command formats are out there on the 'net, so
  with a little experimentation it shouldn't be too difficult to put
  something together, especially if you've got documentation.

- dpt, iop (with DPT/Adaptec boards): I'm working with Adaptec on this, and
  with any luck their management software will run natively some time in the
  future.

- twe: they have a FreeBSD binary that lets you configure the board using a
  web browser. It didn't run correctly the last time I tried - more
  investigation required.

Andrew