Gerryt (gerryt) wrote:
> I've been through several hundred mailing list archives trying to
> find info on bringing up a serial console bsd box using
> 1.3 BETA for an i386. I have this feeling that the info doesnt apply to
> 1.3 anymore.

I deleted the context, but you were right in guessing that you had to rebuild
the boot blocks.  Here's the README I made after I got this working a while 
back under OpenBSD2.1 (which was still similiar enough to NetBSD in terms of 
its boot blocks, I believe, so that this might work -- the only part I'm 
unsure about in NetBSD terms is the ``disklabel -B'' bit).  

This kind of stuff is important enough that it ought to be in an FAQ somewhere
(or installation instructions); I spent a full morning figuring it out, and 
kept this info around so that I wouldn't have to go through that again.

Of course, it's entirely possible that with NetBSD1.3 all of this information
is useless, just like it appears to be with OpenBSD2.2 now.

                                        /
                                     o-/---
                                      o
=================================== cut here =================================

Making OpenBSD use a serial port as the console:

	- add the following line to your kernel config:
		option	COMCONSOLE	# Serial console

	- turn off the "getty" running on ttyC0 in /etc/ttys

	- do the changes for either tty00 or tty01 (below)

	- reconfigure and recompile your kernel; copy the new kernel to /bsd

	- go to /usr/src/sys/arch/i386/boot and modify the Makefile there,
	  taking out the comment that is annotated "Uncomment this to make 
	  the boot block talk to a serial port"  -- namely, make sure that
	  the following line is in the Makefile:

		CPPFLAGS+=-DSERIAL -DCOMCONSOLE=0x3F8 -DCONSPEED=9600

	  Note that this appears to be for tty00.  For tty01, it would be
	  0x2f8, not 0x3f8.

	- do a "make" and "make install".  This installs the new bootloader
	  in /usr/mdec and makes links, if necessary.

	- do a "disklabel -B <device>" for the harddisk which is the boot
	  disk.  This installs the bootloader from /usr/mdec.

	- reboot

==============================================================================

for tty00:
	- turn ON the "getty" running on tty00 (you'll want to make it 
	"secure" too, so that root can log in)  (/etc/ttys)

	- add the following lines to your kernel config:
		option	CONADDR=0x3f8
		option	CONUNIT=0

for tty01:
	- turn ON the "getty" running on tty01 (you'll want to make it 
	"secure" too, so that root can log in)  (/etc/ttys)
		option	CONADDR=0x2f8
		option	CONUNIT=1