Hello,

> > All you need (including X) is in -current now, no need to use the old stuff
> > from ftp - just grab a recent snapshot from releng and build your own kernel,
> > I'm pretty sure your opinion about usefulness of certain drivers differs from
> > mine ;)
> 
> Never tracked -current before, nor have I built anything more than the
> (release) kernel or pkgsrc, this will be a whole new adventure. =)

Building a -current kernel isn's any different from building a release kernel ;)

> >> Here's where things get a little goofy, I can boot it up fine, log in
> >> once, but when I log out and back in, I get:
> >>
> >> "getty respawning too quickly on /dev/console, sleeping"
> >
> > You need to change /etc/ttys a bit - put gettys on /dev/ttyE*, don't put one
> > on /dev/console if you're using a wscons kernel ( which is what you want after
> > all )
> > Make sure the ttyE* entries exist. 
> >
> > Something like this:
> > #console        "/usr/libexec/getty suncons"    sun-ss5 on secure
> > ttyE0   "/usr/libexec/getty std.9600"   xterm-color     on  secure
> > ttyE1   "/usr/libexec/getty std.9600"   xterm-color     on  secure
> > ttyE2   "/usr/libexec/getty std.9600"   xterm-color     on  secure
> > ttyE3   "/usr/libexec/getty std.9600"   xterm-color     on  secure
> >
> > And set wscons=yes in your rc.conf to get a handful virtual consoles
> > ( switch with Alt-F1...Fn )
> > In case you're wondering about the terminal type - vt220 would be right
> > but it implies 80x24 while the sparcbook console may be bigger which may
> > give funny effects ( like programs not using the full screen when they 
> > should ) - xterm-color can cope with that.
> 
> Done.  And it still does the same thing.  I can continue to log in over
> ssh, but from the ttys, I get locked out after I log out after the first
> (only) time.  I see the gettys on the other wscons, but after I put in
> my username, I get kicked back to the login prompt.

Weird. Did you unpack base.tgz by hand and forgot the p flag?
I have no idea how 3.0 or earlier will do with a -current kernel these days.
What kind of userland do you run? 2.1?

> Might be bugs with the build I'm running, time to start fetching stuff.

Yeah, looks like a hosed installation to me.

have fun
Michael