Re: Third and Fourth IDE controllers and GNU/Hurd GNUMach

[Christian Holm Christensen]

Tjena Niels et al, 

[Tjena is "hi" in Swedish]

On 17 Jan 2002 13:51:40 +0100
nisse@lysator.liu.se (Niels Möller) wrote
concerning "Re: Third and Fourth IDE controllers and GNU/Hurd GNUMach":
> Christian Holm Christensen <cholm@hehi03.nbi.dk> writes:
> 
> > main disk on a UDMA ATA/66 disk controller, which happens to be the
> > third IDE controller (hde in Linux _ I guess  hd4 in GNU/Hurd).
> > However, if I boot GNU/Hurd via grub like 
> > 
> >   root (hd0, 1)
> >   kernel /boot/gnumach.gz root=/dev/hd4s1 
> >   module /boot/serverboot.gz 
> > 
> > the kernel complains about non-exisiting device /dev/hd4s1.  Hoever, I
> > have created that device on the partition (via VMWare).
> 
> Hmm, you're aware that devices inside vmware are quite independent of
> your real hardware? If you create a single vmware disk device, that
> ought to end up as /dev/hda, /dev/hd1 or C: to the "guest" OS, no
> matter if it's a real partition on some real device, or just an
> ordinary file on the "host" system?

Yes, I know about that VmWare does that.  Maybe I wasn't clear
enough.  

  * My main disk is sitting on the third IDE controller.  
  * I have Progeny Debian GNU/Linux installled on that disk. 
  * I boot Linux with parameter ide=reverse root=/dev/hda3 
    (without ide=reverse it would be root=/dev/hde3)
  * From Linux, I started a VmWare machine with access to the
    partition /dev/hda1. That is, a partition on the disk that sits on
    the tird IDE controller. 
  * VmWare reports /dev/hda (on the third IDE controller) as hda
    to Linux on the Debian GNU/Hurd cdroms.  
  * I installed GNU/Hurd base system from within the VmWare virtual
    machine,  as well as doing the 2 native_install steps and so on. 
    (This may seem odd, but my problem is that my cdrom drive have a
    hard time booting some cdroms.  Also, the Linux kernel on the
    cdroms does not support  ide2 and ide3 controllers). 
  * Just before finally leaving GNU/Hurd in the end, I change the
    fstab so that that the swap paritition is set to /dev/hd4s4, 
    and cd to /dev and do MAKEDEV hd4s1 hd4s2 hd4s3 hd4s4.  
  * Now I rebooted the machine (the real one, not VmWare), and on the
    Grub commandline I gave the following commands 

       grub> root(hd0,0)       # ide2 is the first seen controller
       grub> kernel /boot/gnumach.gz -s root=/dev/hd4s1 
       grub> module /boot/serverboot.gz 
       grub> boot 

   This works fine, until the GNUMach wants to load the serverboot.
   Then it complains about missing device /dev/hd4s1.  Trying to give
   a different partition (like /dev/hd0s1) does not work either. 

So, the question is:
   
   Does GNU/Hurd support IDE controllers ide2 and ide3? 

I looked through the code tree via the CVS web interface, and it seems
to me, that the max number of hard disks (not controllers) is set by
the macro NHD.  That macro seems to be set to 4, which would mean 2
IDE controllers are supported.  Can it be set to 8, meaning that ide2
and ide3 would be supported? 

> Perhaps you should first try to install some more familiar operating
> system in the vmware machine, or boot from an ordinary linux rescue
> floppy. So that you can look around inside the emulated environment
> before you try installing the Hurd?

I've installed Debian GNU/Linux, Red Hat Linux, Windoze NT4, OpenDOS,
and AtheOS on VmWare machines, so I'm quite aware of the issues you
mention.  

> PS. Questions about vmware (or any other proprietary software) is
> inappropriate on GNU mailing lists. But I believe the device naming
> issues are similar if you use plex86 instead.

My question wasn't really about VmWare, as I hope you can see from the
above.   My question is "Does GNU/Hurd support IDE controllers ide2
and ide3?".  It's my mistake that you didn't get that, because I
wasn't clear enough in the first mail.  My appologies. 

Thank you for any help. 

Yours, 

Christian Holm Christensen -------------------------------------------
Address: Sankt Hansgade 23, 1. th.           Phone:  (+45) 35 35 96 91 
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