NetBSD on NEC MobilePro 790 - Install Issue

Sorry Mark, I hate to disappoint you.

I'm not planning to give up tho, just taking a break

I have some information from the Japanese world.

Seems like 9.99.97 of hpcmips worked until the installer on Mobile Gear MC-R 550 (Latest version of Mobile Gear)

The tweet:
https://twitter.com/n12i/status/1542050795163889667

Picture of it partially working:
https://twitter.com/n12i/status/1542067530675564544

Found a good source of information that may help you guys out:

How to install hpcmips without installer (Japanese)
https://qiita.com/furandon_pig/items/c3942b92047e06ad3b1f

Google Translated Ver:
https://qiita-com.translate.goog/furandon_pig/items/c3942b92047e06ad...

Stingraze- we have 9.3 working, but it's buggy and no working X.

5.2 is the last verified "fully working" version with a working X out of the box.

It's also the last version with working suspend/resume as far as I know.

Edited by thenzero 2023-01-16 9:04 PM

Ok. Got it.

I've read there are some configs you have to do for X to work.

Just another information that may come in handy:
hpcmips by cross compiling (NetBSD 5.1.5 in this sample)

https://qiita.com/furandon_pig/items/68cd2c191d50a3010d55

English via Google Translate
https://qiita-com.translate.goog/furandon_pig/items/68cd2c191d50a301...

Good luck!

-stingraze

That's great. We do have some other references on building the kernel (such as that powerpoint of ebihara I linked the other day). Have you seen anything on there about cross building pkgsrc??

This site (by ebijun) says you can just extract pkgsrc.tar.gz after downloading from: http://www.pkgsrc.org/
Example:

tar xzvf pkgsrc.tar.gz -C /usr 
ls /usr/pkgsrc 

CVS comms ...

https://github.com/ebijun/NetBSD/blob/master/Guide/pkgsrc.rst

Other than that if you're talking about compiling pkgsrc itself, I found just a very old thread on Japanese NetBSD.
http://www.jp.netbsd.org/ja/JP/ml/port-hpcmips-ja/200205/msg00056.h...

Google Translate English Ver:
https://www-jp-netbsd-org.translate.goog/ja/JP/ml/port-hpcmips-ja/20...

Edited by stingraze 2023-01-18 12:24 AM

Thank you stingraze.

To elaborate further on the approach we're currently taking- I'm trying to do cross compile on a desktop computer (for speed) targeting netbsd 5.2 hpcmips. Unfortunately the pkgsrc archives are gone from the usual places, but I'm able to get the period appropriate source files from cvs. I'm able to successfully build a cross-build toolchain (./build.sh -m hpcmips tools) and the distribution files (./build.sh -m hpcmips distribution).

The hangup I have right now is that when I try to "make package" on even the simplest packages, I get a circular dependency error with digest. I feel like I must be missing a step but I'm not sure what. I'm following this guide: https://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/pkgsrc/current/pkgsrc/doc/HOWTO-use-cross...

I have found several guides and (I think) followed them pretty closely, but I can't seem to get past the digest error.

https://www.netbsd.org/gallery/presentations/riastradh/asiabsdcon201...

On cross compiling the system (similar but slightly different steps):
https://netbsd.org/docs/guide/en/chap-build.html
https://www.slideshare.net/he4722/cross-compile-71218081

Hopefully, you can figure it out....

Maybe Kain or some other kind soul on NetBSD list (?) can advise?

Thinking positive....

Well kain came back this evening after being away for a few days. He said he never actually did the cross compile for pkgsrc, only for the system.

He also found a linux distribution (not the linux-vr one) for the 780/790 and we discussed switching to that instead.

I'm giving the cross compile one more shot tho, I feel like there must be something simple I'm overlooking.

p.s. the NetBSD folks weren't super helpful, but then again, I haven't tried their IRC channel.

Thanks for the latest update....

Still thinking positive.....

Thank you for the URL.
I hope you guys can figure it all out.

I will let you know when I find some helpful information.

-stingraze

I successfully built my first 5.2 package this evening! Never could get cross compile working, but decided to just suck it up and build on the MP.

The 780<->790 swap helped because now I have a MobilePro I don't mind just leaving set up to build stuff.

Kain and I are going to start building packages and sticking them on my FTP server. Next one I'm going to tackle is a web browser (probably firefox).

Edit: the first package I built (figlet) was SUPER simple, just to prove it's working

Edited by thenzero 2023-01-21 2:44 AM

Also want to share a quick tip with anyone interested-

In Linux you can typically hit ctrl-Z to suspend a process and then to resume it you type fg [n] where n is a number returned when you hit ctrl-Z. I have found in BSD that I could hit ctrl-Z but fg [n] didn't work. This was a pain because with these devices, we really need to be able to suspend the process before we suspend the system, or we risk not resuming correctly (so I did not know how to pause long processes like building things). However, last night I figured out that in BSD, processes are identified by %[n] instead. So you can hit ctrl-Z to suspend the process, suspend the system with the power button, resume the system later and type "fg %1" (for example) to resume. Incidentally you can also type "bg %1" to continue the process in the background so you can do other things. ^_^

Edit: Apparently the %[n] syntax works on Linux too- I just have never noticed because the [n] syntax works fine (at least in bash). But at least on ksh in NetBSD, it does not work without the %.

Edited by thenzero 2023-01-21 3:27 AM