Good installation documentation (not notes) would help me and it apears
quite a few other people.  The more people that are successfull in running
NetBSD the better for all of us!  I cannot think of a better place to help
achieve this goal than with good install docs. 

>Boris Gjenero wrote:
>Today I finally got to install NetBSD on my VAXstation 2000.  It wasn't
>an entirely pleasant experience.  I really have to complain about the
>documentation that's available.  IT JUST PLAIN SUCKS!!!!!!

I would agree that the documentation is what I would call "thin".  I am
currently trying to install NetBSD on a uVax 3600 and it is taking some
work, patience, time and a great deal of help and cooperation with some
really great souls who frequent this list!  

>The disktab for the RD53 also confused me.  There are so many
>overlapping seemingly pointless partitions.  Furthermore, the number of
>cylinders seemed wrong.  It was 963 instead of 1024.  Sectors per track
>should also have been 17 instead of 18.  Fortunately NetBSD itself was a
>bit smarter, so it detected and corrected the errors.
>
The disktab also is currently perplexing me, even with Ragge's suggestion to
look at the following file :

  /pub/netbsd/netbsd-current/src/etc/etc.vax/disktab

  at: ftp.netbsd.org

I finally used the following and it worked for me (of course the disk drive
is a RA82 and the computer is a 3600:

Partition: 
           size        offset
        a: 20000       0
        b: 66880       20000
        c: 1216664     0
        e: 1129000     86880

Any of this look like the disktab that was at
/pub/netbsd/netbsd-current/src/etc/etc?
Well maybe in a few spots, I think what I would like to show here is you
have to experiment a little.

There is some good information about installation at:

  http://www.bitcon.no/~gunnar/vaxbsd/FAQ.html

This was a help to me also.

>Anyways, now I'm reformatting the RD53 so that I have a fresh format to
>work with (because I've heard they tend to lose the low level format
>every couple of years).  After that, it's time to copy again.  Hopefully
>I'll get a usable system someday.

I would like to propose to all who read this consider contributing to a
formal installation documentation set.  Allot of information currently
exists on the web and would be a great asset to all if it was collected and
assembled into a format that is more universally acceptable.  I would
suggest here ISO 9000 format. If we all agree to use a format like this one
everyone who revises the documentation would have a guide line to follow and
successive postings would fit together seamlessly. I don't know if there is
someone assigned to work on this, if there is would someone please offer up
there name and address so we may contact him/her.

Rick Copeland
Information Systems Manager
Intermag, Inc.
rickgc@intermag-inc.com