INSTALLATION NOTES for OpenBSD/alpha 3.8 What is OpenBSD? ---------------- OpenBSD is a fully functional, multi-platform UN*X-like Operating System based on Berkeley Networking Release 2 (Net/2) and 4.4BSD-Lite. There are several operating systems in this family, but OpenBSD differentiates itself by putting security and correctness first. The OpenBSD team strives to achieve what is called a 'secure by default' status. This means that an OpenBSD user should feel safe that their newly installed machine will not be compromised. This 'secure by default' goal is achieved by taking a proactive stance on security. Since security flaws are essentially mistakes in design or implement- ation, the OpenBSD team puts as much importance on finding and fixing existing design flaws and implementation bugs as it does writing new code. This means that an OpenBSD system will not only be more secure, but it will be more stable. The source code for all critical system components has been checked for remote-access, local-access, denial- of-service, data destruction, and information-gathering problems. In addition to bug fixing, OpenBSD has integrated strong cryptography into the base system. A fully functional IPsec implementation is provided as well as support for common protocols such as SSL and SSH. Network filtering and monitoring tools such as packet filtering, NAT, and bridging are also standard, as well as several routing services, such as BGP and OSPF. For high performance demands, support for hardware cryptography has also been added to the base system. Because security is often seen as a tradeoff with usability, OpenBSD provides as many security options as possible to allow the user to enjoy secure computing without feeling burdened by it. To integrate more smoothly in other environments, OpenBSD 3.8 also provides, on some platforms, several binary emulation subsystems (which includes iBCS2, Linux, OSF/1, SunOS, SVR4, Solaris, and Ultrix compatibility), aiming at making the emulation as accurate as possible so that it is transparent to the user. Because OpenBSD is from Canada, the export of Cryptography pieces (such as OpenSSH, IPsec, and Kerberos) to the world is not restricted. (NOTE: OpenBSD can not be re-exported from the US once it has entered the US. Because of this, take care NOT to get the distribution from an FTP server in the US if you are outside of Canada and the US.) A comprehensive list of the improvements brought by the 3.8 release is available on the web at http://www.OpenBSD.org/38.html. OpenBSD/alpha runs on a broad range of Alpha processor-based machines, including workstations manufactured by Digital (now HP), as well as OEM motherboards designed by Alpha Processor, Inc. Sources of OpenBSD: ------------------- This is a list of currently known FTP servers at the time of the 3.8 release. For a more recent list, please refer to http://www.OpenBSD.org/ftp.html Main server in Canada: ftp://ftp.OpenBSD.org/pub/OpenBSD (Alberta) Argentina: ftp://ftp.openbsd.md5.com.ar/pub/OpenBSD (Buenos Aires) Australia: ftp://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/OpenBSD (Canberra, .au only) ftp://ftp.it.net.au/mirrors/OpenBSD (Perth) ftp://ftp.planetmirror.com/pub/OpenBSD (Sydney) ftp://mirror.pacific.net.au/OpenBSD (Sydney) ftp://openbsd.wiretapped.net/pub/OpenBSD (Sydney) Austria: ftp://gd.tuwien.ac.at/opsys/OpenBSD (Vienna) ftp://playboy.wu-wien.ac.at/pub/OpenBSD (Vienna) Belgium: ftp://ftp.scarlet.be/pub/openbsd ftp://ftp.belnet.be/packages/openbsd (Brussels) ftp://openbsd.rug.ac.be/pub/OpenBSD (Ghent) Brazil: ftp://ftp.openbsd.org.br/pub/OpenBSD (Curitiba) ftp://ftp.das.ufsc.br/pub/OpenBSD (Santa Catarina) Bulgaria: ftp://ftp.bg.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD (Plovdiv) Canada: ftp://ftp.ca.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD (Edmonton) China: ftp://ftp.shellhung.org/pub/OpenBSD (Hong Kong) Czech Republic: ftp://ftp.openbsd.cz/pub/OpenBSD (Prague) Denmark: ftp://mirrors.dotsrc.org/openbsd (Aalborg) Finland: ftp://ftp.fi.debian.org/pub/OpenBSD ftp://ftp.jyu.fi/pub/OpenBSD (Jyvaskyla) France: ftp://ftp.ac-creteil.fr/OpenBSD ftp://ftp.bsdfr.org/pub/OpenBSD (Paris) ftp://ftp.club-internet.fr/pub/OpenBSD (Paris) ftp://ftp.fr.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD (Paris) Germany: ftp://ftp.de.openbsd.org/unix/OpenBSD (Berlin) ftp://ftp.tu-clausthal.de/pub/OpenBSD (Clausthal) ftp://ftp.freenet.de/pub/ftp.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD (Duesseldorf) ftp://openbsd.informatik.uni-erlangen.de/pub/OpenBSD (Erlangen) ftp://ftp-stud.fht-esslingen.de/pub/OpenBSD (Esslingen) ftp://pandemonium.tiscali.de/pub/OpenBSD (Frankfurt) ftp://openbsd.bay13.net/pub/OpenBSD (Hamburg) ftp://ftp.leo.org/pub/OpenBSD (Muenchen) ftp://ftp.uni-stuttgart.de/pub/OpenBSD (Stuttgart) ftp://ftp.fh-wolfenbuettel.de/pub/os/openbsd (Wolfenbuettel) Greece: ftp://filoktitis.noc.uoa.gr/pub/OpenBSD (Athens) ftp://ftp.physics.auth.gr/pub/mirrors/OpenBSD/OpenBSD (Thessaloniki) ftp://ftp.duth.gr/pub/OpenBSD (Thrace) Hungary: ftp://ftp.fsn.hu/pub/OpenBSD Ireland: ftp://ftp.esat.net/pub/OpenBSD (Dublin) Italy: ftp://ftp.openbsd.it/pub/Unix/OpenBSD (Napoli) ftp://na.mirror.garr.it/mirrors/OpenBSD (Napoli) Japan: ftp://ftp.netlab.is.tsukuba.ac.jp/pub/os/OpenBSD (Ibaraki) ftp://ftp.iij.ad.jp/pub/OpenBSD (Tokyo) ftp://ftp.jp.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD (Tokyo) ftp://ftp.kddlabs.co.jp/OpenBSD (Tokyo) Latvia: ftp://ftp.bsd.lv/pub/OpenBSD Lithuania: ftp://ftp.openbsd.lt/pub/OpenBSD The Netherlands: ftp://ftp.nl.uu.net/pub/OpenBSD (Amsterdam) ftp://ftp.calyx.nl/pub/OpenBSD (Amsterdam) ftp://ftp.nluug.nl/pub/OpenBSD (Utrecht) Norway: ftp://ftp.inet.no/pub/OpenBSD (Oslo) ftp://ftp.uninett.no/pub/OpenBSD (Oslo) Poland: ftp://sunsite.icm.edu.pl/pub/OpenBSD ftp://ftp.man.szczecin.pl/pub/BSD/OpenBSD Portugal: ftp://ftp.fmed.uc.pt/pub/OpenBSD Romania: ftp://ftp.physics.uvt.ro/pub/OpenBSD (Timisoara) Russia: ftp://ftp.chg.ru/pub/OpenBSD (Chernogolovka-Moscow) ftp://ftp.gamma.ru/pub/OpenBSD (Moscow) ftp://ftp.radio-msu.net/pub/OpenBSD (Moscow) Saudi Arabia: ftp://ftp.isu.net.sa/pub/mirrors/ftp.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD Spain: ftp://ftp.rediris.es/mirror/OpenBSD (Madrid) Sweden: ftp://ftp.stacken.kth.se/pub/OpenBSD (Stockholm) ftp://ftp.sunet.se/pub/OpenBSD (Uppsala) Switzerland: ftp://ftp.solnet.ch/mirror/OpenBSD ftp://ftp.dragonbsd.swiss-anime.ch/pub/OpenBSD (Bern) ftp://sunsite.cnlab-switch.ch/pub/OpenBSD (Zurich) Taiwan: ftp://ftp2.openbsd.org.tw/pub/OpenBSD ftp://openbsd.nsysu.edu.tw/pub/BSD/OpenBSD ftp://ftp.twaren.net/BSD/OpenBSD Turkey: ftp://ftp.linux.org.tr/pub/OpenBSD Ukraine: ftp://ftp.openbsd.org.ua/pub/OpenBSD (Kiev) United Kingdom: ftp://ftp.plig.org/pub/OpenBSD (London) USA: ftp://ftp5.usa.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD (Redwood City, CA) ftp://ftp3.usa.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD (Boulder, CO) ftp.lug.udel.edu/pub/OpenBSD (Newark, DE) ftp://reflection.ncsa.uiuc.edu/pub/OpenBSD (Champaign, IL) ftp://mirror.sg.depaul.edu/pub/OpenBSD (Chicago, IL) ftp://rt.fm/pub/OpenBSD (Lake in the Hills, IL) ftp://ftp.groupbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD (Hillsborough, NC) ftp://ftp.cse.buffalo.edu/pub/OpenBSD (Buffalo, NY) ftp://ftp.crimelabs.net/pub/OpenBSD (New York, NY) ftp://openbsd.mirrors.pair.com (Pittsburgh, PA) ftp://carroll.cac.psu.edu/pub/OpenBSD (State College, PA) ftp://mirrors.rcn.net/pub/OpenBSD (Fairfax, VA) ftp://openbsd.secsup.org/pub/openbsd (Fairfax, VA) ftp://ftp.tux.org/bsd/openbsd (Springfield, VA) ftp://mirror.cs.wisc.edu/pub/mirrors/OpenBSD (Madison, WI) Additionally, the file ftp://ftp.OpenBSD.org/pub/OpenBSD/ftplist contains a list which is continually updated. If you wish to become a distribution site for OpenBSD, contact . OpenBSD 3.8 Release Contents: ----------------------------- The OpenBSD 3.8 release is organized in the following way. In the .../3.8 directory, for each of the architectures having an OpenBSD 3.8 binary distribution, there is a sub-directory. The alpha-specific portion of the OpenBSD 3.8 release is found in the "alpha" subdirectory of the distribution. That subdirectory is laid out as follows: .../3.8/alpha/ INSTALL.alpha Installation notes; this file. CKSUM, MD5 Output of the cksum(1) and md5(1) programs, usable for verification of the correctness of downloaded files. floppy38.fs The standard alpha boot and installation floppy; see below. This floppy image will boot on the following alpha models: - AlphaStation 200, 250, 255, 400 - AlphaStation 500, 600 - AlphaServer 800, 1000, 1000A - AXPpci33 based machines, including ``Noname'', UDB, Multia - EB164 based machines, including PC164, 164SX, and 164LX - Personal Workstation (Miata) floppyB38.fs Another alpha boot and installation floppy; see below. This floppy image will boot on the following alpha models: - Alpha Processor, Inc. UP1000 - XP900, XP1000, 264DP, DS10, DS20 *.tgz alpha binary distribution sets; see below. bsd A stock GENERIC alpha kernel which will be installed on your system during the install. bsd.rd A compressed RAMDISK kernel; the embedded filesystem contains the installation tools. Used for simple installation from a pre-existing system. cd38.iso A miniroot filesystem image suitable to be used as a bootable CD-ROM image; otherwise similar to the bsd.rd image above. Bootable installation/upgrade floppy images: The two floppy images can be copied to a floppy using rawrite.exe, ntrw.exe, or `dd', as described later in this document. Each floppy image is a bootable install floppy which can be used both to install and to upgrade OpenBSD to the current version. It is also useful for maintenance and disaster recovery. The OpenBSD/alpha binary distribution sets contain the binaries which comprise the OpenBSD 3.8 release for alpha systems. There are eleven binary distribution sets. The binary distribution sets can be found in the "alpha" subdirectory of the OpenBSD 3.8 distribution tree, and are as follows: base38 The OpenBSD/alpha 3.8 base binary distribution. You MUST install this distribution set. It contains the base OpenBSD utilities that are necessary for the system to run and be minimally functional. It includes shared library support, and excludes everything described below. [ 43.2 MB gzipped, 130.4 MB uncompressed ] comp38 The OpenBSD/alpha Compiler tools. All of the tools relating to C, C++, and fortran are supported. This set includes the system include files (/usr/include), the linker, the compiler tool chain, and the various system libraries (except the shared libraries, which are included as part of the base set). This set also includes the manual pages for all of the utilities it contains, as well as the system call and library manual pages. [ 23.9 MB gzipped, 95.1 MB uncompressed ] etc38 This distribution set contains the system configuration files that reside in /etc and in several other places. This set MUST be installed if you are installing the system from scratch, but should NOT be used if you are upgrading. (If you are upgrading, it's recommended that you get a copy of this set and CAREFULLY upgrade your configuration files by hand; see the section named "Upgrading a previously-installed OpenBSD System" below.) [ 1.0 MB gzipped, 3.6 MB uncompressed ] game38 This set includes the games and their manual pages. [ 2.6 MB gzipped, 6.3 MB uncompressed ] man38 This set includes all of the manual pages for the binaries and other software contained in the base set. Note that it does not include any of the manual pages that are included in the other sets. [ 6.7 MB gzipped, 24.3 MB uncompressed ] misc38 This set includes the system dictionaries (which are rather large), and the typesettable document set. [ 2.1 MB gzipped, 7.1 MB uncompressed ] xbase38 This set includes the base X distribution. This includes programs, headers and libraries. [ 12.7 MB gzipped, 44.1 MB uncompressed ] xetc38 This set includes the X window system configuration files that reside in /etc. It's the equivalent of etc38 for X. [ 83.9 KB gzipped, 314.1 KB uncompressed ] xfont38 This set includes all of the X fonts. [ 31.6 MB gzipped, 35.8 MB uncompressed ] xserv38 This set includes all of the X servers. [ 8.1 MB gzipped, 29.1 MB uncompressed ] xshare38 This set includes all text files equivalent between all architectures. [ 1.9 MB gzipped, 10.2 MB uncompressed ] OpenBSD System Requirements and Supported Devices: -------------------------------------------------- OpenBSD/alpha 3.8 is expected to run on the following hardware. If you have hardware that is listed here and are unable to run OpenBSD, or if you are able to run OpenBSD on hardware not listed here, please send mail to with as much information as possible. Supported hardware: XP900, XP1000, DS10, DS20, 264DP, and other EV6 machines using the Tsunami chipset (only one processor on the DS20 will be used) Supported devices: Built-in serial and parallel ports. Built-in DEC21143 Ethernet. Built-in ISP SCSI. Built-in IDE controller. Built-in USB should work, but has not been thoroughly tested. Most PCI devices (see below). Some ISA devices (see below). Unsupported devices: Floppy drive. ISA devices that require DMA operation. API UP1000 machines and other EV6 machines using the Irongate chipset Supported devices: Built-in serial and parallel ports. Built-in DEC21040 Ethernet. Built-in IDE controller works, though there may be stability issues. Unsupported devices: Floppy drive. ISA devices that require DMA operation. Digital Personal Workstation (Miata) Some of these machines are known not to function properly (random hangs or crashes). At the moment, there is no known method to detect which machines will run stably and which will not, apart from trying to install OpenBSD on them. Supported devices: Built-in serial and parallel ports. Built-in DEC21043 Ethernet. Built-in ISP SCSI, when present (i.e. on ``au'' models). Built-in IDE controller. Most PCI devices (see below). Some ISA devices (see below). Unsupported devices: Floppy drive. Built-in audio. ISA devices that require DMA operation. EB164 based machines (including PC164, 164SX, 164LX, but NOT the 164UX) Some of these machines are known not to function properly (random hangs or crashes). At the moment, there is no known method to detect which machines will run stably and which will not, apart from trying to install OpenBSD on them. Supported devices: Built-in serial and parallel ports. Built-in PCIIDE controller, when present. PCI graphics card (TGA or VGA compatible). Most PCI devices (see below). Some ISA devices (see below). Unsupported devices: Floppy drive. ISA IDE controller on the EB164. ISA devices that require DMA operation. AlphaServer 800, 1000 and 1000A Supported devices: Built-in serial and parallel ports. Built-in DEC21040 Ethernet. Built-in ISP SCSI. PCI graphics card (TGA or VGA compatible). Most PCI devices (see below). Some ISA and EISA devices (see below). Unsupported devices: Floppy drive. Built-in audio. ISA and EISA devices that require DMA operation. AlphaStation 500 and 600 Supported devices: Built-in serial and parallel ports. Built-in DEC21040 Ethernet. Built-in ISP SCSI. PCI graphics card (TGA or VGA compatible). Most PCI devices (see below). Some ISA and EISA devices (see below). Unsupported devices: Floppy drive. Built-in audio. ISA and EISA devices that require DMA operation. AlphaStation 200, 250, 255 and 400 Supported devices: Built-in serial and parallel ports. Built-in DEC21040 Ethernet. Built-in ISP SCSI. PCI graphics card (TGA or VGA compatible). Most PCI devices (see below). Some ISA devices (see below). Unsupported devices: Floppy drive. Built-in audio. ISA devices that require DMA operation. AXPpci based machines (including ``Noname'', UDB, Multia) Supported devices: Built-in serial and parallel ports. Built-in DEC21040 Ethernet. Built-in 53C810 SCSI (siop). Built-in IDE controller. (will not boot from IDE, though) PCI graphics card (TGA or VGA compatible). Most PCI devices (see below). Some ISA devices (see below). Unsupported devices: Floppy drive. ISA devices that require DMA operation. DEC 3000 models 300{,L,X,LX} Supported devices: Built-in serial ports. Built-in LANCE Ethernet. Built-in SCSI (53C94). TURBOchannel LANCE Ethernet cards (PMAD-A). TURBOchannel SCSI (53C94) (PMAZ-A). TURBOchannel DEFTA FDDI cards (PMAF-FA). Unsupported devices: Built-in ISDN/audio chip. Built-in framebuffer. Other TURBOchannel cards. DEC 3000 models 400,500,500X,600,700,800,900 Supported devices: Built-in serial ports. Built-in LANCE Ethernet. Built-in SCSI (53C94 or 53CF94-2). TURBOchannel LANCE Ethernet cards (PMAD-A). TURBOchannel SCSI (53C94) (PMAZ-A). TURBOchannel DEFTA FDDI cards (PMAF-FA). Unsupported devices: Built-in ISDN/audio chip. Built-in framebuffer (when applicable). Other TURBOchannel cards. At this time none of the following systems are supported: API UP2000, UP2000+ (mostly because we don't have any to test on) DECpc AXP150 (2000/300) systems (EISA-bus PC-like systems) AlphaServer systems, other than models 400 and 500, which seem to be disguised AlphaStation machines be disguised AlphaStation machines Alpha XL systems DEC 4000, 7000, and 10000 systems (FutureBus+ and XMIBus based) EB64+ based systems Samsung 164BX/UX (no SRM) Multiprocessor Alpha systems VME Alpha systems Supported Peripherals: PCI IDE Controllers (pciide) Acer Labs M5229 CMD Tech PCI0640, PCI0643, PCI0646, PCI0648, and PCI0649 Contaq Microsystems/Cypress CY82C693 Any other PCI IDE-compliant controller should work, but are untested at this point SCSI Host Adapters Adaptec AIC-7770, AIC-7850, AIC-7860, AIC-7870, AIC-7880, AIC-7890, AIC-7891, AIC-7892, AIC-7895, AIC-7896, AIC-7897 and AIC-7899 based host adapters (ahc) [*] including the Adaptec cards AHA-274X[W,T] AHA-284X AHA-2910, AHA-2915 AHA-2920 AHA-2930[C,U2] AHA-2940[J,N,U,AU,UW,UW Dual,UW Pro,U2W,U2B] AHA-2950[U2W,U2B] AHA-3940[U,AU,UW,AUW,U2W] AHA-3950U2 AHA-3960 AHA-3985 AHA-4944UW AHA-19160B AHA-29160[B,N] AHA-39160 QLogic PCI SCSI controllers (isp) Symbios Logic (NCR) 53C8xx, 53C1010 and 53C1510D-based PCI SCSI host adapters (including generic/no name cards, old ASUS cards, the DTC-3130 series, Diamond Fireport series, etc.) (siop) AMD Am53c974 PCscsi-PCI host adapters including the Tekram DC-390 (pcscp) [*] CD-ROM and DVD-ROM Drives [*] Most SCSI CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, and DVD drives Most ATAPI CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, and DVD drives Tape Drives [*] Most SCSI tape drives Most SCSI tape changers Serial Ports 8250/16450-based ports 16550-based ports ST16660-base ports Ethernet Adapters 3Com 3c9xx EtherLink XL adapters (xl), including: [*] 3Com 3c900/3c900B PCI adapters 3Com 3c905/3c905B/3c905C PCI adapters 3Com 3c980/3c980C server adapters 3Com 3cSOHO adapter 3Com 3c900B-FL and 3c900B-FL/FX fiber optic adapters 3Com 3c990 3XP Typhoon/Sidewinder PCI adapters (txp), including: [-] 3CR990-TX-95 3CR990-TX-97 3CR990-TX-SVR95 3CR990-TX-SVR97 ADMtek AL981 ("Comet") and AN983 ("Centaur-P") based PCI adapters (dc), including: [*] Accton EN2242 MiniPCI Linksys LNE100TX v4.x Mototech ME316 DEC EtherWORKS III adapters, including: [-] DEC DE203, DE204, DE205 Digital DC21x4x-based PCI adapters (de), including: Older SMC PCI EtherPower 10, 10/100 (models 8432, 9332, and 9334) Older LinkSys 10, 10/100 (newer models are supported by other drivers) Znyx ZX3xx Cogent EM100FX and EM440TX Digital PCI DE435, EISA DE425, DE450, DE500 Asante 21140A D-Link DFE-570TX Quad port Almost all other variants work. Intel i8255x-based (except the i82556) PCI adapters (fxp), including: Intel EtherExpress PRO/10+ Intel EtherExpress PRO/100, PRO/100B, and PRO/100+ Intel EtherExpress PRO/100+ "Management Adapter" Intel EtherExpress PRO/100 Dual Port Intel PRO/100 VE, PRO/100 VM, and PRO/100 S Intel 21145-based PCI adapters (dc) Novell NE1000, NE2000 (ISA and PCI variants thereof) (ne) [*] SMC 9432 (EtherPower II) EPIC 10/100 [*] RealTek 8129/8139-based adapters (rl), including: [*] Accton MPX 5030/5038 Allied Telesyn AT2550 D-Link DFE530TX+ D-Link DFE538TX Encore ENL832-TX 10/100 M PCI Genius GF100TXR KTX-9130TX 10/100 Fast Ethernet Longshine LCS-8038TX-R NDC NE100TX-E Netronix EA-1210 Net Ether 10/100 Nortel BayStack 21 OvisLink LEF-8129TX, LEF-8139TX SMC EZ Card 10/100 PCI 1211-TX VIA Rhine/RhineII/Rhine III Ethernet adapters (vr), including: [*] Addtron AEF-360TX Hawking PN102TX D-Link DFE530TX Gigabit Ethernet Adapters Intel i82540, i82541, i82542, i82543, i82544, i82545, i82546 and i82547 based adapters (em), including: [*] Intel PRO/1000 Gigabit Server Adapter (SX Fiber) (PWLA8490) Intel PRO/1000F Gigabit Server Adapter (SX Fiber) (PWLA8490SX) Intel PRO/1000T Server Adapter (PWLA8490T) Intel PRO/1000XT Server Adapter (PWLA8490XT) Intel PRO/1000XS Server Adapter (SX Fiber) (PWLA8490XF) Intel PRO/1000T Desktop Adapter (PWLA8390T) Intel PRO/1000XTL Lo Profile PCI Server (PWLA8490XTL) Intel PRO/1000MT Desktop Adapter (PWLA8390MT) Intel PRO/1000MT Server Adapter (PWLA8490MT) Intel PRO/1000MT Dual Port Server Adapter (PWLA8492MT) Intel PRO/1000MF Server Adapter (SX Fiber) (PWLA8490MF) Intel PRO/1000MF Dual Port Server Adapter (SX Fiber) (PWLA8492MF) Intel PRO/1000MF Server Adapter (LX Fiber) (PWLA8490LX) Intel PRO/1000MT Quad PCI-X Adapter (PWLA8494MT) Broadcom BCM570x (a.k.a. Tigon3) based PCI adapters (bge), including: [-] 3Com 3c996-T 3Com 3c996-SX 3Com 3c996B-T HP ProLiant NC7770 PCI-X Gigabit NIC Netgear GA302T SysKonnect SK-9D21 SysKonnect SK-9D41 Realtek 8169/8169S/8110S based PCI adapters, including: Buffalo LGY-PCI-GT (8169S) Corega CG-LAPCIGT (8169S) D-Link DGE-528T (8169S) Gigabyte 7N400 Pro2 Integrated Gigabit Ethernet (8110S) LevelOne GNC-0105T (8169S) Linksys EG1032v3 (8169S) Netgear GA511 PC Card (8169) PLANEX COMMUNICATIONS Inc. GN-1200TC (8169S) Surecom EP-320G-TX1 (8169S) US Robotics USR997902 (8169S) Xterasys XN-152 10/100/1000 NIC (8169) Sundance/Tamarack TC9021 based PCI adapters (stge), including: [-] D-Link DGE-550T (10/100/1000baseTX) Antares Microsystems Gigabit Ethernet board SysKonnect and Marvell based adapters (sk), including: SysKonnect SK-9821 (1000baseT) SysKonnect SK-9822 (dual 1000baseT) SysKonnect SK-9841 (1000baseLX) SysKonnect SK-9842 (dual 1000baseLX) SysKonnect SK-9843 (1000baseSX) SysKonnect SK-9844 (dual 1000baseSX) SysKonnect SK-9521 v2.0 (1000baseT 32-bit) SysKonnect SK-9821 v2.0 (1000baseT) SysKonnect SK-9843 v2.0 (1000baseSX) 3Com 3c940 (1000baseT) D-Link DGE-530T (1000baseT) Linksys EG1032v2 (1000baseT) Linksys EG1064v2 (1000baseT) SMC 9452TX (1000baseT) FDDI Adapters [*] Digital DEFPA PCI FDDI adapters (fpa) Cryptography Accelerators [*] Hifn 7751/7811/7951/7955/7956-based boards (hifn), including: Soekris Engineering vpn1201, vpn1211, vpn1401, and vpn1411 GTGI PowerCrypt Encryption Accelerator NetSec 7751 Hifn 7751 and 9751 reference boards Invertex AEON Sound Devices [*] Ensoniq AudioPCI (eap) SoundBlaster PCI128 (eap) Untested Peripherals: The following peripherals are compiled into the system, but are not known to work. It's our best guess that they do, but any feedback is appreciated. SCSI Host Adapters [*] AdvanSys ABP940UW, ASB3940UW-00, ASB3940U2W-00 and ASB3950U160 PCI SCSI controllers. (adw) RAID and Cache Controllers [*] 3ware Escalade 3W-5x00, 3W-6x00 DPT SmartCache and SmartRaid III/IV PCI/EISA adapters (dpt) ICP-Vortex GDT 6xxxR[DNPS] series (gdt) Serial Ports [*] Cyclades PCI Cyclom-{4, 8, 16}Y serial boards (cy) Communications Controllers [*] Universal Serial Bus host controllers, including: USB Universal Host Controller (uhci) USB Open Host Controller (ohci) Ethernet Adapters 3Com 3c503 (ec) [*] 3Com 3c509, 3c579, and 3c59x (ep) [*] (disabling PnP on 3c509B is recommended) Adaptec "Starfire" AIC-6915 based PCI adapters (sf), including: [*] Adaptec Single32 ANA-69011 Adaptec Single64 ANA-62011 and ANA-62020 Adaptec Duo64 ANA-62022 Adaptec Quartet64 ANA-62044 ADMtek AN986-based USB adapters (aue), including: [*] Abocom UFE1000 Abocom DSB650TX Accton USB320-EC Accton SpeedStream Ethernet Admtek Pegasus, Pegasus II Billionton Systems USB100 Corega FEther USB-TX D-Link DSB-650, 650TX, 650TX-PNA Elecom LD-USB Elsa Microlink USB2Ethernet I/O Data USB ETTX Kingston KNU101TX LinkSys USB100TX, USB100H1 and USB10TA Melco Inc. LUA-TX Siemens SpeedStream USB SmartBridges smartNIC 2 SMC 2202USB/ETH SMC 2206USB/ETH SOHOware NUB100 ASIX Electronics AX88172 USB Ethernet adapters, including: [*] ATEN UC210T BAFO BF-320 Billionton Systems USB2AR Buffalo(MELCO) LUA-U2-KTX Corega FEther USB2-TX D-Link DUB-E100 Good Way GWUSB2E Hawking UF200 Intellinet USB 2.0 to Ethernet (rev A) JVC MP-PRX1 LinkSys USB200M Netgear FA120 Sitecom LN-029 SMC 2209USB/ETH SnapPort USB 2.0 LAN Adapter ST Lab USB 2.0 Fast Ethernet Surecom EP-1427X-2 System TALKS SGC-X2UL TRENDnet TU2-ET100 Z-TEK ZK-R01-2 AMD LANCE and PCnet-based PCI adapters (le), including: [*] BOCALANcard/PCI AT&T StarLAN 10, EN100, and StarLAN Fiber ASIX 88140A/88141-based PCI adapters (dc), including: [*] CNet Pro110B Alfa Inc. GFC2204 CATC USB-EL1210A-based USB adapters (cue), including: [*] CATC Netmate and Netmate II Belkin F5U011/F5U111 Davicom DM9009, DM9100, DM9102, and DM9102A based PCI adapters (dc), including: [*] Jaton XpressNet Davicom DM9601 based USB adapters, including: [*] Corega FEther USB-TXC Digital DC2114x-based four port cards, (de) including: Adaptec ANA-6944A Cogent EM400 Compex 400TX Znyx ZX346 Kawasaki LSI KL5KUSB101B-based USB adapters (kue), including: [*] 3Com 3C19250 3Com 3c460 HomeConnect AboCom Systems URE450 Ethernet ADS Technologies USB-10BT Aox USB101 Asante USB to Ethernet ATen DSB-650C ATen UC10T Corega USB-T D-Link DSB-650C Entegra NET-USB-E45 I/O Data USB-ET/T Jaton USB XpressNet Kawasaki USB101 Kingston Ethernet LinkSys USB10T Mobility Ethernet Netgear EA101 Peracom USB Portgear Ethernet Portsmith Express Ethernet Psion Dacom Gold Port Ethernet Shark Pocket Adapter Silicom U2E SMC 2102/2104USB Lite-On PNIC/PNIC-II-based adapters (dc), including: [*] Kingston KNE110TX LinkSys LNE100TX Matrox Networks FastNIC 10/100 Netgear FA310TX Macronix 98713/98715/98725-based adapters (dc), including: [*] Accton EN1217 Addtron AEF-320TX/AEF-330TX CNet PRO120A/B Complex RL-100TX NDC Communications SOHOware SFA110A SVEC PN102-TX Fast Ethernet card National Semiconductor DP83815/DP83816-based PCI adapters (sis), including: [*] Netgear FA311 Netgear FA312 Netgear FA331 RealTek RTL8150L based USB adapters, including: [*] Abocom RTL8151 BAFO BF-310 Billionton USBKR-100 Compex UE202-B GreenHouse GH-USB100B GreenHouse GH-USB100B with HomePNA Hawking Technology HUF11 Linksys USB100M Longshine LCS-8138TX Melco Inc. LUA-KTX Micronet SP128AR NetComm NP1010 Repotec RP-USB100-A SMC 2208USB/ETH TrendNet TU-ET100C Zt USB10/100 Z-TEK ZK-R02 SiS 900 and SiS 7016-based PCI adapters (sis), including: [*] Mototech ME313 NetSurf NS-KFE30D SMC/WD 8003, 8013, and the SMC "Elite16" ISA boards (we) [*] Sundance ST201-based PCI adapters (ste), including: [*] D-Link DFE-550TX Texas Instruments ThunderLAN PCI adapters (tl), including: [*] Compaq Netelligent PCI Adapters Compaq NetFlex 3/P Compaq Deskpro integrated adapter Compaq Prosignia integrated adapter Olicom OC2135, OC2183, OC2325, OC2326 Racore 8165 and 8148 TI ThunderLAN adapters Winbond W89C840F-based adapters (wb), including: [*] Trendware TE100-PCIE Compex RL100-ATX 10/100 Please be aware that many NE2000 adapters fail or perform very poorly. We do not recommend using them, but your mileage may vary. Gigabit Ethernet Adapters [*] Alteon Tigon I/II-based adapters (ti), including: 3Com 3c985 and 3c985B Alteon ACEnic V (fiber and copper) Digital EtherWORKS 1000SX Farallon PN9000SX Netgear GA620 and GA620T SGI Tigon Wireless Ethernet Adapters Ralink RT2500 based PCI IEEE 802.11b/g adapters [*] A-Link WL54H Amigo AWI-926W AMIT WL531P AOpen AOI-831 ASUS WL-130g ASUS WIFI-G-AAY Atlantis Land A02-PCI-W54 Belkin F5D7000 v3 Canyon CN-WF511 CNet CWP-854 Compex WLP54G Conceptronic C54Ri Corega CG-WLPCI54GL Digitus DN-7006G-RA Dynalink WLG25PCI E-Tech WGPI02 Edimax EW-7128g Eminent EM3037 Encore ENLWI-G-RLAM Eusso UGL2454-VPR Fiberline WL-400P Foxconn WLL-3350 Gigabyte GN-WPKG Hawking HWP54GR Hercules HWGPCI-54 iNexQ CR054g-009 (R03) JAHT WN-4054PCI LevelOne WNC-0301 v2 Linksys WMP54G v4 Micronet SP906GK Minitar MN54GPC-R MSI MS-6834 MSI PC54G2 OvisLink EVO-W54PCI PheeNet HWL-PCIG/RA Pro-Nets PC80211G Repotec RP-WP0854 SATech SN-54P Sitecom WL-115 Surecom EP-9321-g Sweex LC700030 TekComm NE-9321-g Tonze PC-6200C Unex CR054g-R02 Zinwell ZWX-G361 Zonet ZEW1600 Ralink RT2500 based USB 2.0 IEEE 802.11b/g adapters [*] AMIT WL532U ASUS WL-167g Belkin F5D7050 Buffalo WLI-U2-KG54 Buffalo WLI-U2-KG54-AI Buffalo WLI-U2-KG54-YB CNet CWD-854 Compex WLU54G Conceptronic C54RU D-Link DWL-G122 (b1) Dynalink WLG25USB E-Tech WGUS02 Eminent 3035 Gigabyte GN-WBKG Hercules HWGUSB2-54 KCORP LifeStyle KLS-685 Linksys WUSB54G v4 Linksys WUSB54GP v4 MSI MS-6861 MSI MS-6865 MSI MS-6869 SerComm UB801R SparkLAN WL-685R Sphairon UB801R Surecom EP-9001-g Tonze UW-6200C Zaapa ZNWUSB-54 Zinwell ZWX-G261 Zonet ZEW2500P ATM Adapters [*] Efficient Networks EN-155 and Adaptec ANA-590x ATM interfaces (en) FDDI Adapters [*] Digital DEFEA EISA FDDI adapters (fea) WAN Adapters [*] Lan Media Corporation SSI (T1)/HSSI/DS1/DS3 WAN interfaces (lmc) Universal Serial Bus (USB) Devices [*] USB Audio (uaudio) [-] USB Diamond MultiMedia Rio MP3 players (urio) [-] USB Ethernet adapters (aue, cue, kue), see above USB Generic Human Interface Devices (catch-all) (uhid) USB Handspring Visor (uvisor) [-] USB Hubs (uhub) USB Keyboards (ukbd) USB Mass Storage devices, i.e., USB floppy drives and USB memory stick controllers (umass) USB Mice (umouse) [-] USB Modems (umodem) [-] USB Printers (ulpt) [-] USB Scanners (uscanner, usscanner) [-] USB-USB cables (upl) [-] Sound Devices [-] C-Media CMI8[37]38 (cmpci) ESS Solo-1 PCI AudioDrive (eso) Forte Media FM801 audio (fms) VIA VT82C686A SouthBridge integrated AC'97 audio (auvia) S3 SonicVibes (sv) Drivers for hardware marked with "[*]" are NOT included on the installation floppies, but are available in the CD-ROM installation kernel as well as the GENERIC kernel which will be installed. Drivers for hardware marked with "[-]" are NOT available on the installation floppies, or the CD-ROM installation kernel, but are available in the GENERIC kernel which will be installed. Console frame buffers and keyboards are only supported on systems explicitly mentioned above. On other systems, including all TURBOchannel-based machines, OpenBSD/alpha *must* be used with a serial console. Getting the OpenBSD System onto Useful Media: --------------------------------------------- Installation is supported from several media types, including: CD-ROM (NOT supported if booting from floppy) FFS partitions (for upgrades only) Tape FTP HTTP If you can burn the bootable CD-ROM mini image, you can boot from it. Otherwise, you will need to create a bootable floppy disk. Creating a bootable floppy disk using DOS/Windows: First you need to get access to the OpenBSD bootable floppy images. If you can access the distribution from the CD-ROM under DOS, you will find the bootable disks in the 3.8/alpha directory. Otherwise, you will have to download them from one of the OpenBSD FTP or HTTP mirror sites, using an FTP client or a web browser. In either case, take care to do "binary" transfers, since these are images files and any DOS cr/lf translations or control/z EOF interpretations will result in corrupted transfers. You will also need to go to the "tools" directory and grab a copy of the rawrite.exe utility and its documentation. This program is needed to correctly copy the bootable filesystem image to the floppy, since it's an image of a unix partition containing an ffs filesystem, not an MSDOS format diskette. Once you have installed rawrite.exe, just run it and specify the name of the bootable image, such as "floppy38.fs" and the name of the floppy drive, such as "a:". Be sure to use good quality HD (1.44MB) floppies, formatted on the system you're using. The image copy and boot process is not especially tolerant of read errors. Note that if you are using NT, 2000, or XP to write the images to disk, you will need to use ntrw.exe instead. It is also available in the "tools" directory. Grab it and run in with the correct arguments like this "ntrw :" Note that, when installing, the boot floppy can be write-protected (i.e. read-only). Creating a bootable floppy disk using SunOS, Solaris or other Un*x-like system: First, you will need obtain a local copy of the bootable filesystem image as described above. If possible use the cksum(1) or md5(1) commands to verify the checksums of the images vs. the values in the CKSUM or MD5 files on the mirror site. Next, use the dd(1) utility to copy the file to the floppy drive. The command would likely be, under SunOS: dd if=floppy38.fs of=/dev/rfd0c bs=36b and, under Solaris: dd if=floppy38.fs of=/dev/rdiskette0 bs=36b unless the volume management daemon, vold(1M), is running, in which case the following command is preferable: dd if=floppy38.fs of=/vol/dev/rdiskette0 bs=36b If you are using another operating system, you may have to adapt this to conform to local naming conventions for the floppy and options suitable for copying to a "raw" floppy image. The key issue is that the device name used for the floppy *must* be one that refers to the correct block device, not a partition or compatibility mode, and the copy command needs to be compatible with the requirement that writes to a raw device must be in multiples of 512-byte blocks. The variations are endless and beyond the scope of this document. If you're doing this on the system you intend to boot the floppy on, copying the floppy back to a file and doing a compare or checksum is a good way to verify that the floppy is readable and free of read/write errors. Note that, when installing, the boot floppy can be write-protected (i.e. read-only). If you neither have a floppy drive nor a CD-ROM drive on your alpha: If you don't have a floppy drive you can copy the floppy image onto the hard disk you intend to install OpenBSD on. Doing so will overwrite the disk's old contents, however. You must use a UN*X-like system to write the floppy image to the hard disk you will be using for OpenBSD/alpha. You should use the "dd" command to copy the file system image (floppy38.fs or floppyB38.fs) directly to the raw 'c' device (whole disk) of the target hard disk. It is suggested that you read the dd(1) manual page or ask your system administrator to determine the correct set of arguments to use; it will be slightly different from system to system, and a comprehensive list of the possibilities is beyond the scope of this document. Please note that this will put a floppy disklabel on your disk which will confuse the install script. To fix this you need to ask for a shell (answer "s" to the first question) when booting your disk and do "dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/rsd0c count=20", assuming you booted from sd0. After doing this you will not be able to boot that disk again unless you complete the install. You can now enter "install" and start the actual install process. The steps necessary to prepare the distribution sets for installation depend on which method of installation you choose. Some methods require a bit of setup first that is explained below. The installation allows installing OpenBSD directly from FTP mirror sites over the internet, however you must consider the speed and reliability of your internet connection for this option. It may save much time and frustration to use ftp get/reget to transfer the distribution sets to a local server or disk and perform the installation from there, rather than directly from the internet. Creating an installation tape: While you won't be able to boot OpenBSD from a tape, you can use one to provide the installation sets. To do so, you need to make a tape that contains the distribution set files, each in "tar" format or in "gzipped tar format". First you will need to transfer the distribution sets to your local system, using ftp or by mounting the CD-ROM containing the release. Then you need to make a tape containing the files. If you're making the tape on a UN*X-like system, the easiest way to do so is make a shell script along the following lines, call it "/tmp/maketape". #! /bin/sh TAPE=${TAPE:-/dev/nrst0} mt -f ${TAPE} rewind for file in base etc comp game man misc xbase xetc xfont xserv xshare do dd if=${file}38.tgz of=${TAPE} obs=8k conv=sync done tar cf ${TAPE} bsd mt -f ${TAPE} offline # end of script And then: cd .../3.8/alpha sh -x /tmp/maketape If you're using a system other than OpenBSD or SunOS, the tape name and other requirements may change. You can override the default device name (/dev/nrst0) with the TAPE environment variable. For example, under Solaris, you would probably run: TAPE=/dev/rmt/0n sh -x /tmp/maketape Note that, when installing, the tape can be write-protected (i.e. read-only). If you are upgrading OpenBSD, you also have the option of installing OpenBSD by putting the new distribution sets somewhere in your existing file system, and using them from there. To do that, do the following: Place the distribution sets you wish to upgrade somewhere in your current file system tree. At a bare minimum, you must upgrade the "base" binary distribution, and so must put the "base38" set somewhere in your file system. It is recommended that you upgrade the other sets, as well. Preparing your System for OpenBSD Installation: ----------------------------------------------- OpenBSD/alpha requires the SRM console. Some alphas come with the AlphaBIOS (also known as the ARC firmware on older machines) instead; this is what Windows NT uses. It is fairly simple to replace the AlphaBIOS with the SRM firmware. Switching your alpha to SRM console: Recent machines (such as the Miata and later models) have enough flash ROM space to carry both the AlphaBIOS and the SRM console. To switch to SRM from AlphaBIOS, do the following: - enter the AlphaBIOS setup upon startup (F2 key, or ^B from serial console) - choose "CMOS Setup" from the menu - select "Advanced CMOS Setup" (F6 key, or ^F from serial console) - change the "Console Selection" setting to "OpenVMS console (SRM)" - confirm your changes with F10 (or ^U) twice, then enter. - power-cycle your system for the changes to take effect. If you didn't find a "Console Selection" entry (for example on 164SX or 164LX), your system can not hold both the AlphaBIOS and SRM console in flash, and you will have to upgrade your firmware. You can get replacement firmware either from a firmware update CD-ROM or via FTP from ftp://ftp.digital.com/pub/DEC/Alpha/firmware/ Please refer to http://ftp.digital.com/pub/DEC/Alpha/firmware/readme.html for more information. AXPpci33 Motherboard specific notes: The 1994 version of the OEM guide has an incorrect pinout for the serial ports. The newer version from ftp://ftp.digital.com/pub/Digital/axppci/design_guide.ps.Z has a corrected pinout (as well as more information than the 1994 edition). Note that there are two flavors of PC serial connectors. If you have the wrong kind, you won't get any output from the serial console. Using the SRM console: This is not intended to be an exhaustive guide on using the SRM firmware console. It should, however, give you enough information to boot OpenBSD/alpha. To see a list of devices connected to your alpha, you can use the "show device" command. For booting, the devices you are interested in are "dva0" (the floppy drive) and "dka*" (the disk drives). You can set ROM variables by saying "set VARIABLE VALUE". Some variables you will want to set: auto_action Determines what happens when you turn the power on, halt, or crash your machine. Valid values include "halt", "boot", and "restart". Most users will want to set this to "boot". bootdef_dev Default boot device (or list of devices). boot_file Name of the kernel to boot. If this variable is empty, "bsd" will be loaded. Note that this variable does not exist in all versions of the SRM console, in which case you need to always specify a kernel filename if it differs from "bsd". boot_osflags Flags to pass to the kernel. IMPORTANT! For multiuser boot, this needs to be set to "a". To see a list of all variables on your machine, use the "show" command with no arguments. You can bypass the boot_file and boot_osflags values from the command prompt, with the -fi (to override boot_file) and -fl (to override boot_osflags) options. For example, boot -fi bsd -fl ac dka0 will boot the "bsd" kernel with the "ac" flags on dka0. However, some versions of the SRM console (mainly on DEC 3000 series) will only let you specify uppercase filenames. SRM console boot device restrictions: The SRM firmware on your system may or may not be able to boot from any disk controller you may install in your alpha. The built-in disk controllers on your alpha will always be supported, however on IDE-based machines, such as the EB164, 164SX and 164LX, as well as the low-end Personal Workstation (non-u models), you can plug in a SCSI controller, and boot from it if it is recognized. Recent SRM releases for these machines will be able to boot from the following controllers: QLogic PCI SCSI controllers Symbios Logic (NCR) 53C8xx (but not on PC164) Adaptec AHA-[23]9[34]x[U][W] cards The following controllers are known not to be supported as boot devices by the SRM: Adaptec AHA-[23]9[34]xU2 cards Depending on your specific model, your mileage may vary, though. A more detailed, and perhaps more up-to-date, list is available at the following URL: http://www.pofo.de/alpha-boot OpenBSD/alpha console device restrictions: On systems with no framebuffer supported, including all TURBOchannel-based machines, OpenBSD/alpha must be used with a serial console. Setting an Alpha system to use a serial console is system-specific. The procedure for most common hardware is: DEC 3000/[4-9]00's: Flip the appropriate switch on the back of the machine. DEC 3000/300 family machines: Boot the machine with the keyboard/mouse connector unplugged. Other machines running the SRM console on local display: From the SRM console, enter set console serial at the SRM prompt, then enter init or cycle power. See your owner's manual for more details on how to set your machine to use a serial console. Note that some alpha computers currently *require* a serial console and can't be used from a regular keyboard/display console, even though the motherboard has appropriate connectors. Currently, only the TURBOchannel alpha computers (DEC 3000) require use of a serial console. If your machine was not listed in the list above, please report this to . Installing the OpenBSD System: ------------------------------ Installing OpenBSD is a relatively complex process, but if you have this document in hand and are careful to read and remember the information which is presented to you by the install program, it shouldn't be too much trouble. Before you begin, you should know the geometry of your hard disk, i.e. the sector size (note that sector sizes other than 512 bytes are not currently supported), the number of sectors per track, the number of tracks per cylinder (also known as the number of heads), and the number of cylinders on the disk. The OpenBSD kernel will try to discover these parameters on its own, and if it can it will print them at boot time. If possible, you should use the parameters it prints. (You might not be able to because you're sharing your disk with another operating system, or because your disk is old enough that the kernel can't figure out its geometry.) There are several ways to install OpenBSD onto a disk. The easiest way is to boot from the bootable CD-ROM mini image, then install from your favorite source. You can also use one of the OpenBSD installation floppies, if your machine has a floppy drive. Network booting is supported through means of dhcpd(8) and tftpd(8). Booting from Floppy Disk installation media: At the SRM console prompt, enter boot dva0 You should see info about the primary and secondary boot and then the kernel should start to load. It will take a while to load the kernel from the floppy, most likely more than a minute. If some action doesn't eventually happen, or the spinning cursor has stopped and nothing further has happened, or the machine spontaneously reboots, then either you have a bad boot floppy (in which case you should try another) or your alpha is not currently supported by OpenBSD. Booting from CD-ROM installation media: At the SRM console prompt, enter show device to find the device ID of your CD-ROM drive (the device ID is usually in the second column (``bootdev'') and should start with DKA for a SCSI CD-ROM drive). If your drive shows up with a drive number with trailing zeros, you will want to ignore them (unless it is DKA0). For example, if your CD-ROM drive is listed as DKA600, you want to use dka6 (device IDs are case insensitive). On all alpha computers but the TURBOchannel DEC 3000 series, insert the OpenBSD/alpha CD-ROM and enter boot -fi 3.8/alpha/bsd.rd DEVICE where DEVICE is the dka device name. On the DEC 3000 series, insert the OpenBSD/alpha CD-ROM and enter boot -fi ALPHA DEVICE where DEVICE is the dka device name. Note that, in both cases, the argument order is important. You should see info about the primary and secondary boot and then the kernel should start to load. If the kernel fails to load or the spinning cursor has stopped and nothing further has happened, you either have a hardware problem or your alpha is not currently supported by OpenBSD; try booting from a floppy instead if possible. Booting from Network: In order to bootstrap via the network, you must provide a second system to act as a boot server. It is convenient if this is a second OpenBSD machine as the necessary services are already installed, although source code for such programs as dhcpd can be found in OpenBSD's source tree, and should be reasonably portable to other UN*X-like operating systems. More information on diskless booting can be found in the OpenBSD diskless(8) manual page. In this case, you will need to set up dhcpd on the server, which can serve bootp protocol requests. Start by editing the /etc/dhcpd.conf on the bootserver, and declare an information block. Here is an example: subnet 10.0.0.0 netmask 255.0.0.0 { host piper { filename "netboot"; option root-path "/alpha"; hardware ethernet 00:02:56:00:73:31; fixed-address 10.42.42.42; } } Do not forget to enable dhcpd. You will also need to enable tftpd, for the alpha to download the "netboot" from the server in the /tftpboot directory. Only uncompressed kernels are supported for booting in this release. This means you have to execute the following command on your boot server before installing a new kernel for your alpha to boot: # gzip -dc bsd.rd > /alpha/bsd This assumes you have path /alpha exported via NFS. Once loaded, netboot will mount /alpha over NFS and load the kernel from there. Installing using the Floppy, CD-ROM or Network procedure: You should now be ready to install OpenBSD. The following is a walk-through of the steps you will take while getting OpenBSD installed on your hard disk. If any question has a default answer, it will be displayed in brackets ("[]") after the question. If you wish to stop the installation, you may hit Control-C at any time, but if you do, you'll have to begin the installation process again from scratch. Using Control-Z to suspend the process may be a better option, or at any prompt enter '!' to get a shell, from which 'exit' will return you back to that prompt (no refresh of the prompt though). Boot your machine from the installation media as described above. It will take a while to load the miniroot image, especially from a slow network connection or a CD-ROM, most likely more than a minute. If some action doesn't eventually happen, or the spinning cursor has stopped and nothing further has happened, either your boot media is bad, your diskless setup is incorrect, or you may have a hardware or configuration problem. Once the kernel has loaded, you will be presented with the OpenBSD kernel boot messages. You will want to read them to determine your disk's name and geometry. Its name will be something like "sd0" or "wd0" and the geometry will be printed on a line that begins with its name. As mentioned above, you will need your disk's geometry when creating OpenBSD partitions. You will also need to know the device name to tell the install tools what disk to install on. If you cannot read the messages as they scroll by, do not worry -- you can get at this information later inside the install program. You will next be asked for your terminal type. If you are installing from a non-serial console, the default of "vt220" is correct. If you are installing from a serial console you should choose the terminal type from amongst those listed. (If your terminal type is xterm, just use vt220.) After entering the terminal type you will be asked whether you wish to do an "(I)nstall" or an "(U)pgrade". Enter 'I' for a fresh install or 'U' to upgrade an existing installation. You will be presented with a welcome message and asked if you really wish to install (or upgrade). Assuming you answered yes, the install program will then tell you which disks of that type it can install on, and ask you which it should use. The name of the disk is typically "sd0" for SCSI drives. Reply with the name of your disk. Next the disk label which defines the layout of the OpenBSD file systems must be set up. The installation script will invoke an interactive editor allowing you to do this. Note that partition 'c' inside this disk label should ALWAYS reflect the entire disk, including any non-OpenBSD portions. If you are labeling a new disk, you will probably start out with an 'a' partition that spans the disk. In this case you should delete 'a' before adding new partitions. The root file system should be in partition 'a', and swap is usually in partition 'b'. It is recommended that you create separate partitions for /usr, /tmp, and /var, and if you have room for it, one for /home. In doing this, remember to skip 'c', leaving it as type "unused". For help in the disk label editor, enter '?' or 'M' to view the manual page (see the info on the ``-E'' flag). The swap partition (usually 'b') should have a type of "swap", all other native OpenBSD partitions should have a type of "4.2BSD". Block and fragment sizes are usually 8192 and 1024 bytes, but can also be 4096 and 512 or even 16384 and 2048 bytes. The install program will now label your disk and ask which file systems should be created on which partitions. It will auto- matically select the 'a' partition to be the root file system. Next it will ask for which disk and partition you want a file system created on. This will be the same as the disk name (e.g. "sd0") with the letter identifying the partition (e.g. "d") appended (e.g. "sd0d"). Then it will ask where this partition is to be mounted, e.g. /usr. This process will be repeated until you enter "done". At this point you will be asked to confirm that the file system information you have entered is correct, and given an opportunity to change the file system table. Next it will create the new file systems as specified, OVERWRITING ANY EXISTING DATA. This is the point of no return. After all your file systems have been created, the install program will give you an opportunity to configure the network. The network configuration you enter (if any) can then be used to do the install from another system using HTTP or FTP, and will also be the configuration used by the system after the installation is complete. If you select to configure the network, the install program will ask you for the name of your system and the DNS domain name to use. Note that the host name should be without the domain part, and that the domain name should NOT include the host name part. Next the system will give you a list of network interfaces you can configure. For each network interface you select to configure, it will ask for the IP address to use, the symbolic host name to use, the netmask to use, and any interface-specific flags to set. The interface-specific flags are usually used to determine which media the network card is to use. Typically no media flags are required as autodetection normally works, but you will be prompted with a list of the acceptable media flags, and asked if you want to provide any. In doubt, do not enter any media flags; or you can refer to the manual page for your interface for the appropriate flags. After all network interfaces have been configured, the install pro- gram will ask for a default route and IP address of the primary name server to use. You will also be presented with an opportunity to edit the host table. At this point you will be allowed to edit the file system table that will be used for the remainder of the installation and that will be used by the finished system, following which the new file systems will be mounted to complete the installation. After these preparatory steps have been completed, you will be able to extract the distribution sets onto your system. There are several install methods supported; FTP, HTTP, tape, CD-ROM, or a local disk partition. Note that installation from floppies is not currently supported. To install via FTP: To begin an FTP install you will need the following pieces of information. Don't be daunted by this list; the defaults are sufficient for most people. 1) Proxy server URL if you are using a URL-based FTP proxy (squid, CERN FTP, Apache 1.2 or higher). You need to define a proxy if you are behind a firewall that blocks outgoing FTP (assuming you have a proxy available to use). 2) Do you need to use active mode FTP? By default, ftp will attempt to use passive mode and fall back to an active connection if the server does not support passive mode. You only need to enable this option if you are connecting to a buggy FTP daemon that implements passive FTP incorrectly. Note that you will not be asked about active FTP if you are using a proxy. 3) The IP address (or hostname if you enabled DNS earlier in the install) of an FTP server carrying the OpenBSD 3.8 distribution. If you don't know, just hit return when asked if you want to see a list of such hosts. 4) The FTP directory holding the distribution sets. The default value of pub/OpenBSD/3.8/alpha is almost always correct. 5) The login and password for the FTP account. You will only be asked for a password for non-anonymous FTP. For instructions on how to complete the installation via FTP, see the section named "Common URL installations" below. To install via HTTP: To begin an HTTP install you will need the following pieces of information: 1) Proxy server URL if you are using a URL-based HTTP proxy (squid, CERN FTP, Apache 1.2 or higher). You need to define a proxy if you are behind a firewall that blocks outgoing HTTP connections (assuming you have a proxy available to use). 2) The IP address (or hostname if you enabled DNS earlier in the install) of an HTTP server carrying the OpenBSD 3.8 distribution. If you don't know, just hit return when asked if you want to see a list of such hosts. 3) The directory holding the distribution sets. There is no standard location for this; You should use the directory specified along with the server in the list of official HTTP mirror sites that you received in step 3. For instructions on how to complete the installation via HTTP, see the section named "Common URL installations" below. To install from tape: In order to install from tape, the distribution sets to be installed must have been written to tape previously, either in tar format or gzip-compressed tar format. You will also have to identify the tape device where the distribution sets are to be extracted from. This will typically be "nrst0" (no-rewind, raw interface). Next you will have to specify how many files have to be skipped on the tape. This number is usually zero. The install program will not automatically detect whether an image has been compressed, so it will ask for that information before starting the extraction. To install from CD-ROM: When installing from a CD-ROM, you will be asked which device holds the distribution sets. This will typically be "cd0". Next you will be asked which partition on the CD-ROM the distribution is to be loaded from. This is normally partition "a". Next you will have to identify the file system type that has been used to create the distribution on the CD-ROM, this can be either FFS or ISO CD9660. The OpenBSD CD-ROM distribution uses the CD9660 format. You will also have to provide the relative path to the directory on the CD-ROM which holds the distribution, for the alpha this is "3.8/alpha". For instructions on how to complete the installation from the CD-ROM distribution, see the section named "Common file system installations" below. To install from a local disk partition: When installing from a local disk partition, you will first have to identify which disk holds the distribution sets. This is normally "wdN" or "sdN", where N is a number 0 through 9. Next you will have to identify the partition within that disk that holds the distribution; this is a single letter between 'a' and 'p'. You will also have to identify the type of file system residing in the partition identified. Currently, you can only install from partitions that have been formatted as the Berkeley fast file system (ffs). You will also have to provide the relative path to the directory on the file system where the distribution sets are located. Note that this path should not be prefixed with a '/'. For instructions on how to complete the installation from a local disk partition, see the next section. Common file system installations: The following instructions are common to installations from mounted disk partitions and CD-ROMs. A list of available distribution sets will be listed. You may individually select distribution sets to install or enter `all' to install all of the sets (which is what most users will want to do). You may also enter `list' to get a file list or `done' when you are done selecting distribution sets. You may also use wildcards in place of a file name, e.g. `*.tgz' or even `base*|comp*'. It is also possible to enter an arbitrary filename and have it treated as a file set. Once you have selected the file sets you want to install and entered `done' you will be prompted to verify that you really do want to extract file sets. Assuming you acquiesce, the files will begin to extract. If not, you will be given the option of installing sets via one of the other install methods. Common URL installations: Once you have entered the required information, the install program will fetch a file list and present a list of all the distribution sets that were found in the specified directory. (If no valid sets were found, you will be notified and given the option of unpacking any gzipped tar files found or getting a file list if none were found.) At this point you may individually select distribution sets to install or enter `all' to install all of the sets (which is what most users will want to do). You may also enter `list' to get a file list or `done' when you are done selecting distribution sets. You may also use wildcards in place of a file name, e.g. `*.tgz' or even `base*|comp*'. It is also possible to enter an arbitrary filename and have it treated as a file set. Once you have selected the file sets you want to install and entered `done' you will be prompted to verify that you really do want to download and install the files. Assuming you acquiesce, the files will begin to download and unpack. If not, you will be given the option of installing sets via one of the other install methods. When all the selected distribution sets has been extracted, you will be allowed to select which time zone your system will be using, all the device nodes needed by the installed system will be created for you, and the file systems will be unmounted. For this to work properly, it is expected that you have installed at least the "base38", "etc38", and "bsd" distribution sets. Congratulations, you have successfully installed OpenBSD 3.8. When you reboot into OpenBSD, you should log in as "root" at the login prompt. You should create yourself an account and protect it and the "root" account with good passwords. You should have got a mail from the install program we recommend you to read, it contains answers to basic questions you might have about OpenBSD (like setting up your system, installing packages, getting more information about OpenBSD, sending in your dmesg output and more). This you can do by running mail and then just enter "more 1" to get the first message. You quit mail by entering "q". Some of the files in the OpenBSD 3.8 distribution might need to be tailored for your site. We recommend you run: man afterboot which will tell you about a bunch of the files needing to be reviewed. If you are unfamiliar with UN*X-like system administration, it's recommended that you buy a book that discusses it. Upgrading a previously-installed OpenBSD System: ------------------------------------------------ Warning! Upgrades to OpenBSD 3.8 are currently only supported from the immediately previous release. The upgrade process will also work with older releases, but might not execute some migration tasks that would be necessary for a proper upgrade. The best solution, whenever possible, is to backup your data and reinstall from scratch. To upgrade OpenBSD 3.8 from a previous version, start with the general instructions in the section "Installing OpenBSD". Boot from the CD-ROM or an installation floppy. When prompted, select the (U)pgrade option rather than the (I)nstall option at the prompt in the install process. The upgrade script will ask you for the existing root partition, and will use the existing filesystems defined in /etc/fstab to install the new system in. It will also use your existing network parameters. From then, the upgrade procedure is very close to the installation procedure described earlier in this document. Note that the upgrade procedure will not let you pick the ``etc38.tgz'' set, so as to preserve your files in `/etc' which you are likely to have customized since a previous installation. However, it is strongly advised that you unpack the etc38.tgz set in a temporary directory and merge changes by hand, since all components of your system may not function correctly until your files in `/etc' are updated. Getting source code for your OpenBSD System: -------------------------------------------- Now that your OpenBSD system is up and running, you probably want to get access to source code so that you can recompile pieces of the system. A few methods are provided. If you have an OpenBSD CD-ROM, the source code is provided. Otherwise, you can get the pieces over the Internet using anonymous CVS, CTM, CVSync or FTP. For more information, see http://www.OpenBSD.org/anoncvs.html http://www.OpenBSD.org/ctm.html http://www.OpenBSD.org/cvsync.html http://www.OpenBSD.org/ftp.html Using online OpenBSD documentation: ----------------------------------- Documentation is available if you first install the manual pages distribution set. Traditionally, the UN*X "man pages" (documentation) are denoted by 'name(section)'. Some examples of this are intro(1), man(1), apropos(1), passwd(1), passwd(5) and afterboot(8). The section numbers group the topics into several categories, but three are of primary interest: user commands are in section 1, file formats are in section 5, and administrative information is in section 8. The 'man' command is used to view the documentation on a topic, and is started by entering 'man [section] topic'. The brackets [] around the section should not be entered, but rather indicate that the section is optional. If you don't ask for a particular section, the topic with the least-numbered section name will be displayed. For instance, after logging in, enter man passwd to read the documentation for passwd(1). To view the documentation for passwd(5), enter man 5 passwd instead. If you are unsure of what man page you are looking for, enter apropos subject-word where "subject-word" is your topic of interest; a list of possibly related man pages will be displayed. Adding third party software; ``packages'' and ``ports'': -------------------------------------------------------- As complete as your OpenBSD system is, you may want to add any of several excellent third party software applications. There are several ways to do this. You can: 1) Obtain the source code and build the application based upon whatever installation procedures are provided with the application. 2) Use the OpenBSD ``ports'' collection to automatically get any needed source file, apply any required patches, create the application, and install it for you. 3) Use the OpenBSD ``package'' collection to grab a pre-compiled and tested version of the application for your hardware. If you purchased the OpenBSD CD-ROM set you already have several popular ``packages'', and the ``ports'' collection. Instructions for installing applications from the various sources using the different installation methods follow. You should also refer to the packages(7) manual page. Installing applications from the CD-ROM package collection: The OpenBSD CD-ROM ships with several applications pre-built for various hardware architectures. The number of applications vary according to available disk space. Check the directory 3.8/packages/alpha to see which packages are available for your hardware architecture. That directory will be on the same CD-ROM containing the OS installation files for your architecture. To install one or more of these packages you must: 1) become the superuser (root). 2) mount the appropriate CD-ROM. 3) use the ``pkg_add'' command to install the software. Example (in which we use su(1) to get superuser privileges, thus you have to be in group "wheel", see the manual page for su(1)). $ su Password: # mkdir -p /cdrom # mount /dev/cd0a /cdrom # pkg_add /cdrom/3.8/packages/alpha/ # # umount /cdrom Package names are usually the application name and version with .tgz appended, e.g. emacs-21.3.tgz Installing applications from the ftp.OpenBSD.org package collection: All available packages for your architecture have been placed on ftp.OpenBSD.org in the directory pub/OpenBSD/3.8/packages/alpha/ You may want to peruse this to see what packages are available. The packages are also on the OpenBSD FTP mirror sites. See http://www.OpenBSD.org/ftp.html for a list of current FTP mirror sites. Installation of a package is very easy. 1) become the superuser (root) 2) use the ``pkg_add'' command to install the software ``pkg_add'' is smart enough to know how to download the software from the OpenBSD FTP server. Example: $ su Password: # pkg_add \ ftp://ftp.OpenBSD.org/pub/OpenBSD/3.8/packages/alpha/emacs-21.3.tgz Installing applications from the CD-ROM ports collection: The CD-ROM ``ports'' collection is a set of Makefiles, patches, and other files used to control the building and installation of an application from source files. Creating an application from sources can require a lot of disk space, sometimes 50 megabytes or more. The first step is to determine which of your disks has enough room. Once you've made this determination, read the file PORTS located on the CD-ROM which contains the ports tree. To build an application you must: 1) become the superuser (root) 2) have network access, or obtain the actual source files by some other means. 3) cd to the ports directory containing the port you wish to build. To build samba, for example, where you'd previously copied the ports files into the /usr/ports directory: cd /usr/ports/net/samba 4) make 5) make install 6) make clean Installing applications from the OpenBSD ports collection: See http://www.OpenBSD.org/ports.html for current instructions on obtaining and installing OpenBSD ports. You should also refer to the ports(7) manual page. Installing other applications: If an OpenBSD package or port does not exist for an application you're pretty much on your own. The first thing to do is ask if anyone is working on a port -- there may be one in progress. If no such port exists, you might want to tinker with the FreeBSD ports or NetBSD pkgsrc. It is also quite possible that the NetBSD binary packages, if they exist, will work for you. Note that you will need to enable NetBSD binaries emulation with sysctl(8) and set up a complete emulation environment. If you can't find an existing port, try to make your own and feed it back to OpenBSD. That's how our ports collection grows. Some details can be found at http://www.OpenBSD.org/porting.html with more help coming from the mailing list, . Administrivia: -------------- There are various mailing lists available via the mailing list server at . To get help on using the mailing list server, send mail to that address with an empty body, and it will reply with instructions. There are also two OpenBSD Usenet newsgroups, comp.unix.bsd.openbsd.announce for important announcements and comp.unix.bsd.openbsd.misc for general OpenBSD discussion. To report bugs, use the 'sendbug' command shipped with OpenBSD, and fill in as much information about the problem as you can. Good bug reports include lots of details. Additionally, bug reports can be sent by mail to: bugs@OpenBSD.org Use of 'sendbug' is encouraged, however, because bugs reported with it are entered into the OpenBSD bugs database, and thus can't slip through the cracks. As a favor, please avoid mailing huge documents or files to the mailing lists. Instead, put the material you would have sent up for FTP somewhere, then mail the appropriate list about it, or, if you'd rather not do that, mail the list saying you'll send the data to those who want it. For more information about reporting bugs, see http://www.OpenBSD.org/report.html