IRIX and Software

In http://forums.nekochan.net/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=16725178 , I shared news of my recent (substantial!) acquisition of SGI stuff. In order to get some of these machines operational, I am looking for a rapid and somewhat automated means of installing IRIX. I have done quite a few IRIX installations with CDs (5.3 and 6.2.30) but the process can take hours per system if done the "hard" way. Is there a better way? Can an NFS installation just proceed from disk source to disk source without requiring any manual interaction? What about the other stuff, like SGI freeware and Nekoware installations... any way to automate those?

If you have more than one system of a particular type (and the hardware is similar enough to support the same base install), one possibility would be to install just one and make clones of that disk for the rest.

Here's a link to Ian's Cloning guide: http://www.sgidepot.co.uk/disksfiles.html#CLONE

Yep, clone it.

Have one build for each major CPU/graphics version and clone em.

IP22/R4k/Express (IP22 Indigo2 XZ/Extreme and all R4x00 Indy with XZ)
IP22/R4k/Newport (IP22 Indigo2 XL and Indy R4x000/XL)
IP22/R5k/Newport (Indy R5k XL, you probably don't have any Indy R5k XZs)
IP28/Express (Indigo2 R10k XZ/Extreme)
IP28/IMPACT (Indigo2 R10k all IMPACT)

should do it, as long as none of your Octanes are working (if they are add IP30/whatever graphics it is)

You can do RoboInst to automate installs, but the decompression/install/setup still takes a very long time. Choose the fastest CPU in the class to set up your image with (e.g. R4k/250 for IP22), and patch it before cloning. Set up your image on the smallest disk you have (make sure to give yourself enough swap, native swap is a bit faster than fs-based swap)(*if you're doing a dd-based clone, xfsdump/tar doesn't need this), then use xfs_growfs to expand onto bigger drives. Be sure to change everything you need to change.

When I was doing several installs a week, I used to quite enjoy an 18gb 15krm hdd in an external enclosure that had an /inst dir in it with everything blatted in there. Fire up sash, drop to shell, mount the external disk and feed it as a source. Patches, overlays everything. Let it have rattle around solving deps (usually I'd removed older things and cleaned up the install order a lot), then tell it to install. Would get a 6.5.24 system in there with compilers, nfs and various other crimes I needed in an install on an O2 in under an hour for very little effort. Octane even with a 195mhz cpu would do the install in about 20mins with quick disks and an indy would generally finish in about an hour and a quarter.

Longest part for the indy and o2 was the rqsall at the end. Perhaps this isn't a great way to do it.. but it worked like a trooper.

If you really can be bothered, you can do it off the network.

Go easy!

Roboinst would be the preferred way of doing autmatic multiple installs.
I use an O2 for that as it has a 100Mb NIC.
You can read up on Roboinst in the SGI docs.
If your interested you can get my config files to get you started, I have config iles mostly for 6.5.22 installs.

You type a command at PROM and it will boot, partition the drive and Install the OS fully automatically, hands off.
It's a beautiful thing when you got it all set up!

You can easily add your own, Nekoware, Freeware software at the same time.

The PROM command would be :


//Harry

@debug:

I'd be interested in seeing it out of curiosity (not that I have >1 machine at the moment). Worth putting a factoid page up on how to drive roboinst on the wiki for fresh punters?

Al.

uridium wrote: @debug:

I'd be interested in seeing it out of curiosity (not that I have >1 machine at the moment). Worth putting a factoid page up on how to drive roboinst on the wiki for fresh punters?

Al.

Yeah I know, I already promised in one thread that I will write something up, but you know... time... spare time... free time... etc
I'll see if I can post my config, that should get interested parties a head start.

I originally wanted to make DINA fully automatic and port roboinst (it seems to be just a bunch of scripts) but I found out that the check-sum calculation is done by a binary so that can not be ported to DINA (x86 NetBSD)
I tried to move over all the config and IRIX stuff from a working roboinst to DINA but the client SGI would not boot properly so there are some voodoo stuff going at boot on that I don't understand.

I really like the idea of being able to create a fully automated install process.
Ideally it would contain all the great software and have a menu system where you choose what to install.
Or possible predefined sets like "Developer machine" or "Game and Demo machine" etc.
This is what I am trying to do nowadays when I spend time with my SGIs.
I have also started a "repacking" effort for some software like for example Adobe Photoshop so that instead of using the stupid original installer script and answer the meaningless question I have investigated what the script does and have done what Adobe should have done in the first place - created a tardist that installs Photoshop.
So the idea is to have all of IRIX, Nekoware and commercial software installable from a single PROM command
Time will tell if I will ever succeed with that effort.

Thanks SAQ and deBug, that's useful. uridium's approach also seems appealing to a lazy guy like me

deBug, if you ever do write that guide or get the awesome installation system you describe up and running, please be sure to let me know! I'd love to use it.

...but Roboinst requires a license on the installation server, IIRC.

Ah poop. That's silly.. where would you install to that isn't sgi?

Reminds me of HP-UX's igniteUX server concept for remote installs.

josehill wrote: ...but Roboinst requires a license on the installation server, IIRC.

That is common misconception.
I believed the same by just glancing the documentation but if you read it in detail you will find that a license is only needed for after-installs.
Roboinst has two working "modes"
1 Do a install from PROM
2 Do additional install from IRIX.
Only the second mode requires a license.

So you do not need a license for roboinst as long as you do them from PROM

//Harry

Harry - thanks for the info! I had a license in my previous shop, and I found Roboinst to be very helpful. Nice to know about the other mode!

deBug wrote:

josehill wrote: ...but Roboinst requires a license on the installation server, IIRC.

That is common misconception.
I believed the same by just glancing the documentation but if you read it in detail you will find that a license is only needed for after-installs.
Roboinst has two working "modes"
1 Do a install from PROM
2 Do additional install from IRIX.
Only the second mode requires a license.

So you do not need a license for roboinst as long as you do them from PROM

//Harry

Started a wiki page on roboinst .
Go for broke on it..


R.

PymbleSoftware wrote: Started a wiki page on roboinst .
Go for broke on it..
R.

To be comprehensive that would be a looooong wiki page. Techpubs has a chapter on it in "IRIX Admin: Software Installation and Licensing," chapter nine, html version here:

http://techpubs.sgi.com/library/tpl/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?coll=0650&db=bks&fname=/SGI_Admin/books/IA_InstLicns/sgi_html/index.html&srch=IRIX%20Installation%20and%20Licensing

Also in pdf form:

http://techpubs.sgi.com/library/manuals/1000/007-1364-130/pdf/007-1364-130.pdf

Copywrite 2000, not sure how current that is, I think these are the most recent release notes:

http://techpubs.sgi.com/library/tpl/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?coll=0650&db=relnotes&fname=/usr/relnotes/roboinst

Updated the wiki topic, also put a link back to this forum thread.

R.