openfirmware boot partition layout

[Dinar Valeev]

Hi,

I'm playing with kvm on powerpc (I have LPAR'ed IBM Power5 machine).

I have a couple of disk images which are working perfectly. (I've
tested it by deploying it using VIO server with usual dd command
directly to LPAR disk)

But when I'm trying to attach same image as qemu (with KVM enabled)
disk. VM won't boot. It just stuck on openbios banner.

I have another image with old mac partition table (which is working under qemu)

So I have actually two questions:
1) Is booting from PReP partition (type 0x41) is supported? (PReP just
consists raw copy of yaboot binary)

2) When VM have LVM root then it required to have FAT partition (type
0x06) with kernel, initrd, yaboot and its config.
Does this scenario supported as well?

Here is usual partition setups I have:
non lvm setup:
Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
 1      32.3kB  8225kB  8193kB  primary               boot, , , , , ,
, , , type=41, prep,
 2      8225kB  897MB   888MB   primary  ext3         , , , , , , , ,
, type=83, ,

lvm setup:
Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
 1      32.3kB  49.4MB  49.3MB  primary  fat16        boot, , , , , ,
, , , type=06, ,
 2      49.4MB  979MB   929MB   primary               , , , , , lvm, ,
, , type=8e, ,

I'll glad to provide additional information or participate in testing
in the future.

Thanks in advance,
Dinar

[Mark Cave-Ayland]

On 15/02/11 14:09, Dinar Valeev wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm playing with kvm on powerpc (I have LPAR'ed IBM Power5 machine).
>
> I have a couple of disk images which are working perfectly. (I've
> tested it by deploying it using VIO server with usual dd command
> directly to LPAR disk)
>
> But when I'm trying to attach same image as qemu (with KVM enabled)
> disk. VM won't boot. It just stuck on openbios banner.

Okay - first question to ask is this: which version of KVM and which SVN 
revision of OpenBIOS are you using? There has a been a lot of work in 
this area last year for example.

Note that you can get more debugging output from OpenBIOS if you load up 
KVM with a couple of extra options on the command line: -nographic 
-prom-env='auto-boot?=false'. This will enable you to see the debug 
output, and also drops you to the Forth command prompt rather than 
trying to boot the device automatically.

You can then try manually booting a PPC partition, e.g.

boot cdrom:1
boot disk:2
boot

etc.

Or even browse some of the filesystem contents to see if the FS is 
recognised:

dir cdrom:1\
dir disk:2\
> I have another image with old mac partition table (which is working under qemu)
>
> So I have actually two questions:
> Is booting from PReP partition (type 0x41) is supported? (PReP just
>
> consists raw copy of yaboot binary)
> When VM have LVM root then it required to have FAT partition (type
>
> 0x06) with kernel, initrd, yaboot and its config.
> Does this scenario supported as well?
>
> Here is usual partition setups I have:
> non lvm setup:
> Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
>   1      32.3kB  8225kB  8193kB  primary               boot, , , , , ,
> , , , type=41, prep,
>   2      8225kB  897MB   888MB   primary  ext3         , , , , , , , ,
> , type=83, ,
>
> lvm setup:
> Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
>   1      32.3kB  49.4MB  49.3MB  primary  fat16        boot, , , , , ,
> , , , type=06, ,
>   2      49.4MB  979MB   929MB   primary               , , , , , lvm, ,
> , , type=8e, ,
>
> I'll glad to provide additional information or participate in testing
> in the future.

Andreas is the person most likely to know the current status of PPC support.

HTH,

Mark.

[Dinar Valeev]

On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 1:32 PM, Mark Cave-Ayland
 wrote:
> On 15/02/11 14:09, Dinar Valeev wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm playing with kvm on powerpc (I have LPAR'ed IBM Power5 machine).
> >
> > I have a couple of disk images which are working perfectly. (I've
> > tested it by deploying it using VIO server with usual dd command
> > directly to LPAR disk)
> >
> > But when I'm trying to attach same image as qemu (with KVM enabled)
> > disk. VM won't boot. It just stuck on openbios banner.
>
> Okay - first question to ask is this: which version of KVM and which SVN
> revision of OpenBIOS are you using? There has a been a lot of work in this
> area last year for example.

I'm using kvm with 2.6.38-rc3-67365-g7a67422 kernel

mine qemu version is:
QEMU emulator version 0.14.50, Copyright (c) 2003-2008 Fabrice Bellard

I believe this is most recent version.
> Note that you can get more debugging output from OpenBIOS if you load up KVM
> with a couple of extra options on the command line: -nographic
> -prom-env='auto-boot?=false'. This will enable you to see the debug output,
> and also drops you to the Forth command prompt rather than trying to boot
> the device automatically.
>
> You can then try manually booting a PPC partition, e.g.
>
> boot cdrom:1
> boot disk:2
> boot
>
> etc.
>
> Or even browse some of the filesystem contents to see if the FS is
> recognised:
>
> dir cdrom:1\
> dir disk:2\

My qemu command is:
./ppc64-softmmu/qemu-system-ppc64 -enable-kvm -drive
file=/root/k0daz_ppc_lvm_appliance.ppc64-1.0.1.raw -cpu power4
-nographic -prom-env 'auto-boot?=false'

Once I'm in OF prompt I've tried to invoke:
0 > dir disk:1\ pc-parts: Unable to determine filesystem
 ok

If I'm trying to boot VM with one you proposed. VM just hangs.
> > I have another image with old mac partition table (which is working under
> > qemu)
> >
> > So I have actually two questions:
> > Is booting from PReP partition (type 0x41) is supported? (PReP just
> >
> > consists raw copy of yaboot binary)
> > When VM have LVM root then it required to have FAT partition (type
> >
> > 0x06) with kernel, initrd, yaboot and its config.
> > Does this scenario supported as well?
> >
> > Here is usual partition setups I have:
> > non lvm setup:
> > Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
> >  1      32.3kB  8225kB  8193kB  primary               boot, , , , , ,
> > , , , type=41, prep,
> >  2      8225kB  897MB   888MB   primary  ext3         , , , , , , , ,
> > , type=83, ,
> >
> > lvm setup:
> > Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
> >  1      32.3kB  49.4MB  49.3MB  primary  fat16        boot, , , , , ,
> > , , , type=06, ,
> >  2      49.4MB  979MB   929MB   primary               , , , , , lvm, ,
> > , , type=8e, ,
> >
> > I'll glad to provide additional information or participate in testing
> > in the future.
>
> Andreas is the person most likely to know the current status of PPC support.

Andreas, have you tried such scenarios?
> HTH,
>
> Mark.
>
> Sirius Labs: http://www.siriusit.co.uk/labs

[Mark Cave-Ayland]

On 16/02/11 13:23, Dinar Valeev wrote:
> > Okay - first question to ask is this: which version of KVM and which SVN
> > revision of OpenBIOS are you using? There has a been a lot of work in this
> > area last year for example.
>
> I'm using kvm with 2.6.38-rc3-67365-g7a67422 kernel
>
> mine qemu version is:
> QEMU emulator version 0.14.50, Copyright (c) 2003-2008 Fabrice Bellard
>
> I believe this is most recent version.

Ooooh okay but since you're using ppc64, you're going to have to build 
from SVN trunk - the changes are that recent! BTW I thought the latest 
qemu/kvm version was 0.13.x, i.e. 0.14.x is still currently at RC stage 
at least in qemu world.
> > Note that you can get more debugging output from OpenBIOS if you load up KVM
> > with a couple of extra options on the command line: -nographic
> > -prom-env='auto-boot?=false'. This will enable you to see the debug output,
> > and also drops you to the Forth command prompt rather than trying to boot
> > the device automatically.
> >
> > You can then try manually booting a PPC partition, e.g.
> >
> > boot cdrom:1
> > boot disk:2
> > boot
> >
> > etc.
> >
> > Or even browse some of the filesystem contents to see if the FS is
> > recognised:
> >
> > dir cdrom:1\
> > dir disk:2\
>
> My qemu command is:
> ./ppc64-softmmu/qemu-system-ppc64 -enable-kvm -drive
> file=/root/k0daz_ppc_lvm_appliance.ppc64-1.0.1.raw -cpu power4
> -nographic -prom-env 'auto-boot?=false'
>
> Once I'm in OF prompt I've tried to invoke:
> 0>  dir disk:1\ pc-parts: Unable to determine filesystem
>   ok

So that's easy - OpenBIOS can't work out what the filesystem on the 
partition is.
> If I'm trying to boot VM with one you proposed. VM just hangs.

Andreas' last email to the list was here: 
http://lists.openbios.org/pipermail/openbios/2011-February/006275.html. 
The short version is, the basic PPC64 BIOS works but if you need RTAS 
then currently developer help is needed. Would this be something you'd 
be willing to help with?

ATB,

Mark.

[Dinar Valeev]

On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 3:53 PM, Mark Cave-Ayland
 wrote:
> On 16/02/11 13:23, Dinar Valeev wrote:
> > > Okay - first question to ask is this: which version of KVM and which SVN
> > > revision of OpenBIOS are you using? There has a been a lot of work in
> > > this
> > > area last year for example.
> >
> > I'm using kvm with 2.6.38-rc3-67365-g7a67422 kernel
> >
> > mine qemu version is:
> > QEMU emulator version 0.14.50, Copyright (c) 2003-2008 Fabrice Bellard
> >
> > I believe this is most recent version.
>
> Ooooh okay but since you're using ppc64, you're going to have to build from
> SVN trunk - the changes are that recent! BTW I thought the latest qemu/kvm
> version was 0.13.x, i.e. 0.14.x is still currently at RC stage at least in
> qemu world.

Will try to build svn version of openbios.
> > > Note that you can get more debugging output from OpenBIOS if you load up
> > > KVM
> > > with a couple of extra options on the command line: -nographic
> > > -prom-env='auto-boot?=false'. This will enable you to see the debug
> > > output,
> > > and also drops you to the Forth command prompt rather than trying to boot
> > > the device automatically.
> > >
> > > You can then try manually booting a PPC partition, e.g.
> > >
> > > boot cdrom:1
> > > boot disk:2
> > > boot
> > >
> > > etc.
> > >
> > > Or even browse some of the filesystem contents to see if the FS is
> > > recognised:
> > >
> > > dir cdrom:1\
> > > dir disk:2\
> >
> > My qemu command is:
> > ./ppc64-softmmu/qemu-system-ppc64 -enable-kvm -drive
> > file=/root/k0daz_ppc_lvm_appliance.ppc64-1.0.1.raw -cpu power4
> > -nographic -prom-env 'auto-boot?=false'
> >
> > Once I'm in OF prompt I've tried to invoke:
> > 0>  dir disk:1\ pc-parts: Unable to determine filesystem
> >  ok
>
> So that's easy - OpenBIOS can't work out what the filesystem on the
> partition is.

Just little finding.

So If I try to boot from iso without disk image attached then it boot's fine:
0 > dir cdrom:\suseboot\
      2048 2011-02-08 23:16:17 .\
      2048 2011-02-08 23:16:17 ..\
       154 2011-02-08 23:16:17 yaboot.cnf
    405028 2011-02-08 23:16:17 yaboot.ibm
 ok
0 > boot cdrom:\suseboot\yaboot.ibm
yaboot starting: loaded at 00040000 000657a8 (0/0/fff02464; sp: 07de7ff0)
Config file 'yaboot.cnf' read, 154 bytes

Welcome to yaboot version r22.8-r1190.SuSE

But if I boot with disk image attached Then it just hangs.
> > =============================================================
> > OpenBIOS 1.0 [Feb 9 2011 21:07]
> > Configuration device id QEMU version 1 machine id 3
> > CPUs: 1
> > Memory: 128M
> > UUID: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
> > CPU type PowerPC,POWER4

Welcome to OpenBIOS v1.0 built on Feb 9 2011 21:07

0 > boot cdrom:\suseboot\yaboot.ibm
> > If I'm trying to boot VM with one you proposed. VM just hangs.
>
> Andreas' last email to the list was here:
> http://lists.openbios.org/pipermail/openbios/2011-February/006275.html. The
> short version is, the basic PPC64 BIOS works but if you need RTAS then
> currently developer help is needed. Would this be something you'd be willing
> to help with?

Unfortunately I have no programming skills. Just basics.

I'm glad to help with testing.
> ATB,
>
> Mark.
>
> Sirius Labs: http://www.siriusit.co.uk/labs

[Mark Cave-Ayland]

On 16/02/11 15:06, Dinar Valeev wrote:
> Just little finding.
>
> So If I try to boot from iso without disk image attached then it boot's fine:
> 0>  dir cdrom:\suseboot\
>        2048 2011-02-08 23:16:17 .\
>        2048 2011-02-08 23:16:17 ..\
>         154 2011-02-08 23:16:17 yaboot.cnf
>      405028 2011-02-08 23:16:17 yaboot.ibm
>   ok
> 0>  boot cdrom:\suseboot\yaboot.ibm
> yaboot starting: loaded at 00040000 000657a8 (0/0/fff02464; sp: 07de7ff0)
> Config file 'yaboot.cnf' read, 154 bytes
>
> Welcome to yaboot version r22.8-r1190.SuSE
>
> But if I boot with disk image attached Then it just hangs.
> > > =============================================================
> > > OpenBIOS 1.0 [Feb 9 2011 21:07]
> > > Configuration device id QEMU version 1 machine id 3
> > > CPUs: 1
> > > Memory: 128M
> > > UUID: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
> > > CPU type PowerPC,POWER4
>
> Welcome to OpenBIOS v1.0 built on Feb 9 2011 21:07
>
> 0>  boot cdrom:\suseboot\yaboot.ibm

Oh I see - so even booting the CDROM with a disk image attached fails. 
If you do this, does specifying "-boot d" on the kvm command line help? 
The default list of devices to use during boot is built up based upon 
the information obtained from kvm at runtime. I'm not sure it makes a 
difference here, but it may be worth trying.
> > Andreas' last email to the list was here:
> > http://lists.openbios.org/pipermail/openbios/2011-February/006275.html. The
> > short version is, the basic PPC64 BIOS works but if you need RTAS then
> > currently developer help is needed. Would this be something you'd be willing
> > to help with?
>
> Unfortunately I have no programming skills. Just basics.
>
> I'm glad to help with testing.

Excellent :)

ATB,

Mark.

[Andreas Färber]

Am 16.02.2011 um 16:06 schrieb Dinar Valeev:
> On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 3:53 PM, Mark Cave-Ayland
>  wrote:
> > On 16/02/11 13:23, Dinar Valeev wrote:
> > > > Okay - first question to ask is this: which version of KVM and  
> > > > which SVN
> > > > revision of OpenBIOS are you using? There has a been a lot of  
> > > > work in
> > > > this
> > > > area last year for example.
> > >
> > > I'm using kvm with 2.6.38-rc3-67365-g7a67422 kernel
> > >
> > > mine qemu version is:
> > > QEMU emulator version 0.14.50, Copyright (c) 2003-2008 Fabrice  
> > > Bellard
> > >
> > > I believe this is most recent version.
> >
> > Ooooh okay but since you're using ppc64, you're going to have to  
> > build from
> > SVN trunk - the changes are that recent! BTW I thought the latest  
> > qemu/kvm
> > version was 0.13.x, i.e. 0.14.x is still currently at RC stage at  
> > least in
> > qemu world.
>
> Will try to build svn version of openbios.
> > > > Note that you can get more debugging output from OpenBIOS if you  
> > > > load up
> > > > KVM
> > > > with a couple of extra options on the command line: -nographic
> > > > -prom-env='auto-boot?=false'. This will enable you to see the debug
> > > > output,
> > > > and also drops you to the Forth command prompt rather than trying  
> > > > to boot
> > > > the device automatically.
> > > >
> > > > You can then try manually booting a PPC partition, e.g.
> > > >
> > > > boot cdrom:1
> > > > boot disk:2
> > > > boot
> > > >
> > > > etc.
> > > >
> > > > Or even browse some of the filesystem contents to see if the FS is
> > > > recognised:
> > > >
> > > > dir cdrom:1\
> > > > dir disk:2\
> > >
> > > My qemu command is:
> > > ./ppc64-softmmu/qemu-system-ppc64 -enable-kvm -drive
> > > file=/root/k0daz_ppc_lvm_appliance.ppc64-1.0.1.raw -cpu power4
> > > -nographic -prom-env 'auto-boot?=false'
> > >
> > > Once I'm in OF prompt I've tried to invoke:
> > > 0>  dir disk:1\ pc-parts: Unable to determine filesystem
> > >  ok
> >
> > So that's easy - OpenBIOS can't work out what the filesystem on the
> > partition is.
>
> Just little finding.
>
> So If I try to boot from iso without disk image attached then it  
> boot's fine:
> 0 > dir cdrom:\suseboot\
>      2048 2011-02-08 23:16:17 .\
>      2048 2011-02-08 23:16:17 ..\
>       154 2011-02-08 23:16:17 yaboot.cnf
>    405028 2011-02-08 23:16:17 yaboot.ibm
> ok
> 0 > boot cdrom:\suseboot\yaboot.ibm
> yaboot starting: loaded at 00040000 000657a8 (0/0/fff02464; sp:  
> 07de7ff0)
> Config file 'yaboot.cnf' read, 154 bytes
>
> Welcome to yaboot version r22.8-r1190.SuSE
>
> But if I boot with disk image attached Then it just hangs.
> > > =============================================================
> > > OpenBIOS 1.0 [Feb 9 2011 21:07]
> > > Configuration device id QEMU version 1 machine id 3
> > > CPUs: 1
> > > Memory: 128M
> > > UUID: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
> > > CPU type PowerPC,POWER4
>
> Welcome to OpenBIOS v1.0 built on Feb 9 2011 21:07
>
> 0 > boot cdrom:\suseboot\yaboot.ibm

And you're sure you disabled the default iso9660 driver? It was  
reported non-working, cf.
http://repo.or.cz/w/openbios/afaerber.git/commitdiff/072a920ae2f506f6c02c109...

Andreas

[Andreas Färber]

Hi Dinar,

Am 16.02.2011 um 14:23 schrieb Dinar Valeev:
> On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 1:32 PM, Mark Cave-Ayland
>  wrote:
> > On 15/02/11 14:09, Dinar Valeev wrote:
> > > I'm playing with kvm on powerpc (I have LPAR'ed IBM Power5 machine).
> > >
> > > I have a couple of disk images which are working perfectly. (I've
> > > tested it by deploying it using VIO server with usual dd command
> > > directly to LPAR disk)
> > >
> > > But when I'm trying to attach same image as qemu (with KVM enabled)
> > > disk. VM won't boot. It just stuck on openbios banner.
> >
> > Okay - first question to ask is this: which version of KVM and  
> > which SVN
> > revision of OpenBIOS are you using? There has a been a lot of work  
> > in this
> > area last year for example.
>
> I'm using kvm with 2.6.38-rc3-67365-g7a67422 kernel
>
> mine qemu version is:
> QEMU emulator version 0.14.50, Copyright (c) 2003-2008 Fabrice Bellard
>
> I believe this is most recent version.

It may be, but its OpenBIOS version has not been updated for a while.  
For ppc64 you still need an SVN version.
> My qemu command is:
> ./ppc64-softmmu/qemu-system-ppc64 -enable-kvm -drive
> file=/root/k0daz_ppc_lvm_appliance.ppc64-1.0.1.raw -cpu power4
> -nographic -prom-env 'auto-boot?=false'
>
> Once I'm in OF prompt I've tried to invoke:
> 0 > dir disk:1\ pc-parts: Unable to determine filesystem
> ok
>
> If I'm trying to boot VM with one you proposed. VM just hangs.
> > > I have another image with old mac partition table (which is  
> > > working under
> > > qemu)
> > >
> > > So I have actually two questions:
> > > Is booting from PReP partition (type 0x41) is supported? (PReP
> > >
> > > just
> > > consists raw copy of yaboot binary)
> > > When VM have LVM root then it required to have FAT partition
> > >
> > > (type
> > > 0x06) with kernel, initrd, yaboot and its config.
> > > Does this scenario supported as well?
> > >
> > > Here is usual partition setups I have:
> > > non lvm setup:
> > > Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
> > >  1      32.3kB  8225kB  8193kB  primary                
> > > boot, , , , , ,
> > > , , , type=41, prep,
> > >  2      8225kB  897MB   888MB   primary   
> > > ext3         , , , , , , , ,
> > > , type=83, ,
> > >
> > > lvm setup:
> > > Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
> > >  1      32.3kB  49.4MB  49.3MB  primary  fat16         
> > > boot, , , , , ,
> > > , , , type=06, ,
> > >  2      49.4MB  979MB   929MB   primary               , , , , ,  
> > > lvm, ,
> > > , , type=8e, ,
> > >
> > > I'll glad to provide additional information or participate in  
> > > testing
> > > in the future.
> >
> > Andreas is the person most likely to know the current status of PPC  
> > support.
>
> Andreas, have you tried such scenarios?

No. I don't have a KVM setup.

Emulating a PReP machine (-M prep) I didn't get too far.
That was before Hervé's NVRAM patch though and booting ELF OpenBIOS  
with -M prep needs QEMU patches:
http://repo.or.cz/w/qemu/afaerber.git/commitdiff/b73968204a262e36a33da3c33dd...

Regards,
Andreas