Re: Booting netbsd-GENERIC_MD on iMac G3 using ofwboot.xcf + genfb woes

[Tom Lane <tgl%sss.pgh.pa.us@localhost>]

Sam van Kampen <sam+netbsd%tehsvk.net@localhost> writes:
> I am not sure what the best way forward is here. We can bump RELOC, I
> imagine, but that would exclude systems with <=16MB of memory, and
> there are lots of kernel configurations which are small enough to
> boot. Perhaps that is acceptable (I imagine there are very few macppc
> systems that are useful _and_ that low on memory), or otherwise the
> GENERIC_MD kernel can be shrunk a bit?

I have some practical experience with that.  I've run reasonably
recent NetBSD (9.3 and later) on three different PPC Macs; the one
that I still have is still on active duty with NetBSD 11.0.  On
none of them has it been possible to boot the regular installer
netbsd-GENERIC_MD.gz kernel --- I guess the RAM disk included in that
pushes it over the limit.  The trick I've used, which Martin Husemann
taught me, is to set up a minimal install on an NFS mount, boot from
that as if diskless, and then invoke sysinst manually to install on
local disk.  After that, the standard GENERIC_MD kernel works.
But I've been wondering how long that'd keep being true, so I'd
be for increasing RELOC or whatever is needed to have some more
daylight for kernel growth, and maybe even re-enable the normal
install/upgrade process.  All of those machines had at least 128MB
when purchased, and eventually got upgraded to a lot more RAM, so
I'm not too concerned about a little bit of wastage.

			regards, tom lane