[gentoo-dev] Diskless Gentoo client

[Pat Double <double@inebraska.com>]

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I originally posted this in gentoo-user. I don't normally like to cross post 
but I haven't received a response yet, so I thought the devs would have more 
insight into these problems. Hopefully you'll tell me to change permissions 
on some file and it'll work :) ....

I'm having trouble setting up a diskless Gentoo client. I have a Gentoo server
that will serve the root filesystem via NFS. The client's root has been setup
using a stage1 tarball and going through the bootstrap, etc. process to get
xfree merged. (The client will only provide an XDM login into the server so I
don't need a lot of packages).

I've gotten far in the process: A correct kernel with NFS root support has
been setup. I've used the mknbi program to create a bootable network image. I
have a floppy disk that will grab the kernel from the server using the
etherboot package. A tftp server is setup correctly to server the kernel. The
kernel boots, finds the nfs server and mounts the correct filesystem. It does
go through the boot sequence. I have modified /sbin/rc to create /etc, /var ,
/tmp and /root on tmpfs and copy the /etc and /var files from the root
filesystem into the temporary copy. I am mounting /mnt/.etc-tmpfs to tmpfs,
copying the files and then using mount -o bind to mount /mnt/.etc-tmpfs to
/etc. Same with /var. /tmp and /root is directly mounted to tmpfs with no
files in them. I have disabled the filesystem checks as well.

The boot sequence works fine until I get the init level 3. I only have the
"local" service starting and it completes fine (there is nothing in
/etc/conf.d/local.start so it does nothing). When init tries to start agetty
then the system hangs (no response to the keyboard, not VC switch). I've
tried to change init to start /bin/login instead and it runs, but when I type
in the user/pass it hangs as well. I changed to use "/bin/su - --login"
instead of agetty and I can login and issue commands successfully, etc but I
would like to get agetty working correctly.

I also tried getting the X Server to start. The client has an nvidia card. I
have successfully installed Gentoo to a hard drive on this machine and it
works without trouble. I tried xf86cfg without an XF86Config file, but it
blanked the screen and locked up the machine. I tried using a VESA
configuration but it says no display modes are available. I used an nvidia
configuration but it hangs the machine.

I think there is some basic problem here, not specific to xfree, since agetty
hangs and login (after typing user/pass) hangs. I tried to mount the root
filesystem rw and not use /etc, /var, /tmp and /root in RAM, no change.

I am using kernel gentoo-sources-2.4.19-r9. Is there a known bug in the kernel
or perhaps devfs? Should I not being using devfs with /dev on nfs? I can move
a copy of /dev to a tmpfs if necessary, that's about the only thing I haven't
tried.

Any help is greatly appreicated.

Thanks.
- -- 
Pat Double, double@inebraska.com
"In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth."
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