Chris Newport wrote:

> On Thursday 08 July 2004 1:43 am in comp.sys.sun.hardware Michael Dombrowski
> wrote:
>
>
>>Chris Newport wrote:
>>
>>>On Wednesday 07 July 2004 6:01 pm in comp.sys.sun.hardware Michael
>>>Dombrowski wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>Looks to me like it might have a Compact Flash socket on the board.
>>>>Maybe try putting some sort of OS on a CF card and try booting that? If
>>>>that works, you could develop a flash card, which when inserted and
>>>>booted, would upgrade the OF to enable them to be network computers.
>>>
>>>
>>>No, that will be a smartcard reader which is used for authentication like
>>>on the SunRay systems.
>>>No use for booting.
>>>
>>
>>
>>Please see:
>>http://www.hammycorp.com/images/suncf.jpg
>>
>>Now I may certainly be incorrect, but it seems to me that where I marked
>>1. is the smartcard reader on the front of the machine, it looks to
>>connect via a serial type port. Where I have marked 2. looks to be a
>>compact flash slot to me, although I may be mistaken. Do you have any
>>more information?
>
>
> Sorry, I have very little to go on except rumour - The picture is not very
> clear, but it looks like it might be a CF slot. It could also (without
> looking more closely) be a slot for laptop-type memory or even a laptop 2.5
> inch hard drive. A CF disk slot would be nice, but I still think you should
> explore the net booting option with PROLL.

I don't think it is either of those. Wrong connector for SODIMM or 44pin
IDE. I suggested it as a way of (relatively) (possibly) quickly loading
PROLL if no other methods work. Stick in CF card, boot, boom, done.
(maybe), (hopefully).

> If you need more hardware information you will probably have to try to track
> down someone in Sun who worked on the development.


Just as a note, I'm not the one with the machines.

Mike

Le Wed, 07 Jul 2004 22:27:19 +0100, Chris Newport a écrit*:

>
> Basically, yes.
> BUT you need an intermediate loader such as PROLL because you need to pass
> some parameters to the Linux kernel.
> You need at least: ip=dhcp root=nfs rw

Just thinking : maybe the ltsp.org (Linux terminal server) kernel will do
the trick? It's an x86 kernel, built to network boot a diskless client...

--
A thing of beauty is a joy forever.
J. Keats.

Ah! Singe débotté, hisse un jouet fort et vert!
Marcel Bénabou.

Andy Rabagliati <andyr@wizzy.com> writes:

> [ Tried posting just now - hope this isn't a dup ]

Bad luck ;-)

> PICTURES !!!
>
> http://franklin.tsf.org.za/dover/

Smart! Looks like it has an IDE connector , which ties up
with the rumours. The espresso has an IDE connector and
there is room in the case for a hard disk, but a hardware
mod is required. Dunno whether the Dovers are the same.

> The boxes currently attempt to download /something/ via tftp.
>
> Would that be a kernel ?

By default, Javastations will expect to find a binary
executable containing a version of JavaOS . For the earlier
sparc-based stuff you were supplied with a special version of
Solaris called Netra which contained all the necessary servers
and management interfaces , DHCP servers and JavaOS and flash
images for the javastations.

The slot that looks like a CF slot might be a replacement for
the flash RAM that the Krups javastations have - these were
used to store the previous version of JavaOS, so that the
Javastation would boot from the version held locally unless
it detected a newer version of the OS on the server. These
have to be removed if you want to get the Krups to net boot
(at least, I've never figured out a way of making use of them).

I reckon you might do worse than drop a note to Pete Zaitcev
at this point.

Regards,

Pete

--
__________________________________________________ __________________
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According to Emmanuel Florac <wazoox@free.fr>:
> Le Wed, 07 Jul 2004 22:27:19 +0100, Chris Newport a écrit*:
>
> > Basically, yes.
> > BUT you need an intermediate loader such as PROLL because you need to pass
> > some parameters to the Linux kernel.
> > You need at least: ip=dhcp root=nfs rw
>
> Just thinking : maybe the ltsp.org (Linux terminal server) kernel will do
> the trick? It's an x86 kernel, built to network boot a diskless client...

That is, naturally, our ultimate goal - A Linux thin client.

Let me extend my thanks to all who have helped - I am passing the info
back to the Shuttleworth Foundation (who have been offered these machines,
I think from some government institution).

South Africa tends to be a testing ground for a lot of technology -
fly the kite here, see if it crashes - if it does - ah well, at least
there is no European or American eggs on faces.

We have a very mature cellphone culture, so we get lots of fun stuff for
a while - then it goes away :-)

The Shuttleworth Foundation did approach the folks who did the "ROM"
on this (Dover) box, but they wanted the proverbial arm-n-leg to
do it again for Linux.

Per Chris Newport's excellent advice, I have recommended that a couple
of boxes be sent to "David who maintains PROLL" and hopefully fifty
or so schools can benefit from Sun's marketing experiment :-)

I am just excited that TSF is putting money behind Open Source in
South Africa, and I (wizzy) am assisting those schools getting Internet
access as well for an affordable price.

I will monitor this forum for a while, but you can email me as well,
(my address is on /all/ the lists already, so why bother obfuscating :-)
if anyone has further suggestions.

Cheers, Andy!

On Thursday 08 July 2004 3:46 pm in comp.sys.sun.hardware Andy Rabagliati
wrote:

> Per Chris Newport's excellent advice, I have recommended that a couple
> of boxes be sent to "David who maintains PROLL" and hopefully fifty
> or so schools can benefit from Sun's marketing experiment :-)

Ooops - wrong person - The maintainer of PROLL is Pete Zaitcev
his email is zaitcev(at)redhat.com

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