FreeBSD 8.0 Setup
Contents |
A step-by-step tutorial on installing FreeBSD/ARM onto USB Disk
One possible method of preparing an USB Stick for booting FreeBSD will be shown here.
The scenario is the following:
* an computer running FreeBSD * FreeBSD 8.0 full source code is installed in /usr/src * one USB Stick (minimum 512 MB capacity) * 60 minutes for the build process to complete * root user logged in
Building the Userland
build# cd /usr/src build# make -j 8 buildworld TARGET_ARCH=arm
This command will build the userland part of FreeBSD. For details see: [1] and [2]
Building the Kernel
The release comes with a kernel configuration file is /usr/src/sys/arm/conf/SHEEVAPLUG . You should make copy and customize it for local boot, eg. adding msdosfs support, in this document, we'll refer to the copy as SHEEVAPLUG_COPY. One working kernel configuration is available at the wiki download section([3]).
This is the step when you should apply patches to the kernel. There are known problems with patches, see: [4]
build# cd /usr/src build# make buildkernel TARGET_ARCH=arm KERNCONF=SHEEVAPLUG_COPY
Partition your USB Disk
Connect your USB Stick, and check its present, device name with:
build# tail /var/log/messages
In the following "da0" will be used as the device name.
First step is to erase all partitioning info on the disk. (THIS WILL ERASE ALL YOUR DATA!)
build# gpart destroy da0
Create the standard IBM partition table, add one small slice for the kernel and cover the rest with a second slice. Create one BSD label on the second slice, this will hold the whole root file system.
build# gpart create -s MBR da0 build# gpart add -s 32M -t freebsd da0 build# gpart add -t freebsd da0 build# bsdlabel -w /dev/da0s2
Now create the filesystems:
build# newfs_msdos /dev/da0s1 build# newfs -n da0s2a
Install kernel
build# mount -t msdosfs /dev/da0s1 /mnt build# cp /usr/obj/arm/usr/src/sys/SHEEVAPLUG_COPY/kernel.bin /mnt build# umount /mnt
Install userland
build# csh build# cd /usr/src build# mount /dev/da0s2a /mnt build# setenv DESTDIR /mnt build# make installworld TARGET_ARCH=arm build# make distrib-dirs TARGET_ARCH=arm build# make distribution TARGET_ARCH=arm
After the "world" is installed we still do not unmount the device as we will prepare some config files.
Create basic configuration
From the previous step we have the ARM root file system mounted on /mnt.
Setup /etc/rc.conf
build# echo 'hostname="sheeva"' > /mnt/etc/rc.conf build# echo 'ifconfig_mge0="DHCP"'>> /mnt/etc/rc.conf build# echo 'sshd_enable="YES"' >> /mnt/etc/rc.conf build# echo 'ipv6_enable="YES"'>> /mnt/etc/rc.conf
Setup /etc/fstab
build# echo '# Device Mountpoint FStype Options Dump Pass#' > /mnt/etc/fstab build# echo '/dev/da0s2 / ufs rw,noclusterr,noclusterw 0 0' >> /mnt/etc/fstab
Finish
Now we have prepared everything, we are ready to unmount the target filesystem.
build# umount /mnt
Setup U-Boot to boot FreeBSD
First take note of your existing uboot bootcmd environment variable using and placing it somewhere safe
Marvell>>printenv bootcmd
and placing it somewhere safe, then change the boot command:
setenv bootcmd 'usb start;fatload usb 0:1 900000 kernel.bin;go 900000' saveenv
