On Fri, 26 Mar 1999 15:30:53 +1100 
 Simon Burge <simonb@netbsd.org> wrote:

 > I'm looking for guinea pigs to test other models.  These bootblocks can
 > boot a.out, ECOFF and ELF format kernels, with ELF being the preferred
 > format.  Symbol table loading for DDB is supported on all a.out kernels
 > and new (as of last night's sup) ELF kernels, but it's possible old

Awesome :-)

 > The tar file contains /boot, /usr/mdec/bootrz and /usr/mdec/rzboot.
 > Just grab the tar file, cd to / and extract it.  To build from source,
 > you'll need to uncomment the SRCS= line in .../stand/Makefile - there's
 > currently a problem with making symlinks during a "make depend" I
 > haven't got nutted out yet.  The just "make install".
 > 
 > Once you have done either of the above steps, install the new first
 > stage boot into the disk you want to test with (it must a valid root
 > filesystem!)
 > 
 > 	disklabel -B rzX

BTW, it's probably an immensely good idea to write an installboot program
so that you don't have to use disklabel to install the boot block.

I plan on doing this for NetBSD/hp300, as well...

 > where X is the SCSI id of the disk, and copy the /boot file to the root
 > partition on that disk.  You DO NOT need to use an installboot-style
 > program with those bootblocks - indeed, there isn't one.  Then boot of
 > the test disk.  You should see something like:

I like this approach... but I think that "installboot" should install the
first stage (not necessarily patch block #'s into it tho :-)

 > 
 > 	>>boot                        
 > 	>> NetBSD/pmax Secondary Boot, Revision 1.0
 > 	>> (simonb@mona, Fri Mar 26 12:14:28 EST 1999)
 > 	Boot: 3/rz0/netbsd
 > 	1317176+57264+225092 [89+63536+51822]=0x1a3d6c
 > 	Starting at 0x80030000
 > 
 > 	[ preserving 116024 bytes of netbsd ELF symbol table ]
 > 	mcclock: iters 24627 computed MHz 60, instrs per usec=27
 > 	Copyright (c) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999
 > 	    The NetBSD Foundation, Inc.  All rights reserved.
 > 	Copyright (c) 1982, 1986, 1989, 1991, 1993
 > 	    The Regents of the University of California.  All rights reserved.
 > 	...
 > 
 > Older kernels will have different "preserving ... table" lines.
 > 
 > 
 > Any questions, please send mail to my simonb@netbsd.org address - my
 > normal email address seems _very_ slow at the moment...
 > 
 > Simon.

        -- Jason R. Thorpe <thorpej@nas.nasa.gov>