Getting CentOS up to date on SPARC

Hi all,

I hope this is the correct list for this question: how
trivial/non-
trivial would it be to get CentOS/SPARC up to speed again on
a Netra X1?
I have primarily used Linux on x86 the last twelve years or
so. I have
only little experience with SPARC machines.

The reason I am asking is because I have seen some cheap
Netra X1s on
the net at low prices, and it seems like a fun project for
the
summer .

-- Daniel

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On Wed, 2006-06-21 at 16:14 +0200, Daniel de Kok wrote:
> The reason I am asking is because I have seen some
cheap Netra X1s on
> the net at low prices, and it seems like a fun project
for the
> summer .

Ah, I see that most or all updates for SPARC are at 4.3
level. My bad!

-- Daniel

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Daniel de Kok wrote:
> On Wed, 2006-06-21 at 16:14 +0200, Daniel de Kok wrote:
>> The reason I am asking is because I have seen some
cheap Netra X1s on
>> the net at low prices, and it seems like a fun
project for the
>> summer .
> 
> Ah, I see that most or all updates for SPARC are at 4.3
level. My bad!
> 

We are presently looking for a Sparc maintainer ( or two,
would be
better ) - Pasi has way too much work on his plate at the
moment and is
also already doing ( and will continue to do so, for the
time being )
his other arch's ( ia64/ s390(x) / Alpha ). But he has
expressed desire
to resign the Sparc build.

If you are interested, and have the time to spend this might
be
something you can get involved with ?

Would a NetraX1 be beefy enough to be a build box ?

- KB
-- 
Karanbir Singh : http://www.karan.org/ :
2522219icq
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On Wed, 2006-06-21 at 16:22 +0100, Karanbir Singh wrote:
> If you are interested, and have the time to spend this
might be
> something you can get involved with ?

I'd be willing to invest time to see if I could help here.

> Would a NetraX1 be beefy enough to be a build box ?

The particular machine I have my eye on has a 500 MHz IIe
CPU and 1GB
RAM. So, they are fairly slow by today's standards, but I
suppose
compilation can be offloaded a bit to an Athlon64 machine
with distcc
and a cross-compiler?

-- Daniel

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Karanbir Singh wrote:
> We are presently looking for a Sparc maintainer ( or
two, would be
> better ) - Pasi has way too much work on his plate at
the moment and is
> also already doing ( and will continue to do so, for
the time being )
> his other arch's ( ia64/ s390(x) / Alpha ). But he has
expressed desire
> to resign the Sparc build.

I could get my hands on a 220R with 36G (2x Ultrasparc) in a
few weeks,
but don't have the time at the moment to speed up that
process. I also
talked to Pasi and he doesn't have the time to "work
in" a new person.
But there's still some interest on our side to work on
this, though it's
not completely clear, where the hooks and claws are on that
build (no
real C confidence over here). 

> If you are interested, and have the time to spend this
might be
> something you can get involved with ?

So if that process can be doubled ...

I don't see much chances though that I could give away user
accounts on
that machine, which are reachable from the outside world, as
that
machine sits in our server intranet. And still has to lose
the job it's
doing at the moment. 

Ralph
-- 
Ralph Angenendt......rabr-online.de | .."Text processing
has made it possible
Bayerischer Rundfunk...80300 München | ....to right-justify
any idea, even one
Programmbereich.Bayern 3, Jugend und | .which cannot be
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..........grounds." -- J. Finnegan, USC
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On Wednesday 21 June 2006 08:22, Karanbir Singh wrote:
> We are presently looking for a Sparc maintainer ( or
two, would be
> better ) - Pasi has way too much work on his plate at
the moment and is
> also already doing ( and will continue to do so, for
the time being )
> his other arch's ( ia64/ s390(x) / Alpha ). But he has
expressed desire
> to resign the Sparc build.
>
> If you are interested, and have the time to spend this
might be
> something you can get involved with ?

I would love to donate time, but don't have any.  I DO have
quite a few Netra 
T1 105's I was planning to try to sell.  Perhaps donating 1
or 2 would help.  
Older and slower than the X1's though.

http://sunsolve.sun.com/handbook_pub/S
ystems/Netra_t1_105_shared/spec.html

> Would a NetraX1 be beefy enough to be a build box ?

I've often wondered that, what sort of hardware do you guys
generally devote 
to a build box?

-- 
- Kevan Benson
- A-1 Networks
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Kevan Benson wrote:
>> If you are interested, and have the time to spend
this might be
>> something you can get involved with ?
> 
> I would love to donate time, but don't have any.  I DO
have quite a few Netra 
> T1 105's I was planning to try to sell.  Perhaps
donating 1 or 2 would help.  
> Older and slower than the X1's though.

If people are interested in helping with the testing and
development 
side of things - rather than building itself, these box's
would come in 
handy.

What part of the world are you located in ?

> 
> http://sunsolve.sun.com/handbook_pub/S
ystems/Netra_t1_105_shared/spec.html
>> Would a NetraX1 be beefy enough to be a build box ?
> 
> I've often wondered that, what sort of hardware do you
guys generally devote 
> to a build box?

There are quite a few box's being used in the i386 and
x86_64 
buildsystems, a couple of Sun V20z's and home brew AMD64's
and Xeon's 
and P-4's. Lots of ram and lots of drive space.

-- 
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2522219icq
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Hi Daniel,

Daniel de Kok wrote:
> On Wed, 2006-06-21 at 16:22 +0100, Karanbir Singh
wrote:
>> If you are interested, and have the time to spend
this might be
>> something you can get involved with ?
> 
> I'd be willing to invest time to see if I could help
here.

yes! that would be great.

> 
>> Would a NetraX1 be beefy enough to be a build box ?
> 
> The particular machine I have my eye on has a 500 MHz
IIe CPU and 1GB
> RAM.

Should not be much of a problem  - as long as you have a
usable system, 
we can setup a collaborative process, so the builds can be
offloaded to 
a chunkier machine if required.

What would count a lot more is the testing and some
developer time, if 
you can put that in.

> So, they are fairly slow by today's standards, but I
suppose
> compilation can be offloaded a bit to an Athlon64
machine with distcc
> and a cross-compiler?

dist-cc and xcompile is prolly something that we dont really
want to do.

- KB
-- 
Karanbir Singh : http://www.karan.org/ :
2522219icq
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Hi Ralph,

this is good stuff, we should just a wiki section started on
this I think.

Ralph Angenendt wrote:
> Karanbir Singh wrote:
> I could get my hands on a 220R with 36G (2x Ultrasparc)
in a few weeks,
> but don't have the time at the moment to speed up that
process. I also

A few weeks should be ok, its not something that is
effecting us this 
much, Also Pasi mentioned dropping it at the end of the 4.3
cycle ( 
which is still a month+ away ).

> talked to Pasi and he doesn't have the time to
"work in" a new person.
> But there's still some interest on our side to work on
this, though it's
> not completely clear, where the hooks and claws are on
that build (no
> real C confidence over here). 

What we need to do is get the h/w setup at a central space
where someone 
( even if its just the one person who has physical access )
can build 
on. Apart from that once the CentOS4.3/sparc is setup on the
machine I 
am sure we can all pitch in and help out.

I suppose whats critical here is that we get a few people
involved right 
from the start.

>> If you are interested, and have the time to spend
this might be
>> something you can get involved with ?
> 
> So if that process can be doubled ...
> 
> I don't see much chances though that I could give away
user accounts on
> that machine, which are reachable from the outside
world, as that
> machine sits in our server intranet. And still has to
lose the job it's
> doing at the moment. 

thats not a problem, I think there might be enough machines
locally that 
people could contribute from off-site, as long as there is
some means ( 
we can setup whatever is required ) to get code over into
the 
buildsystem and built + scp'ed out.

And I dont imagine you will have that ADSL-Curse of .4MB/sec
upload 
limit either 

-- 
Karanbir Singh : http://www.karan.org/ :
2522219icq
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>> Karanbir Singh wrote:
>> I could get my hands on a 220R with 36G (2x
Ultrasparc) in a few weeks,
>> but don't have the time at the moment to speed up
that process. I also
> 
Hi,

I can help with the recompiling/debugging/developing of some
srpms for 
the sparcs, maybe not all of them as I don't have a
hardware on hand but 
I can help from a remote shell and of course having contact
with someone 
onsite in case something goes wild.

I have some experience working with rpms and Im really
interested in 
helping in some ways the CentOS project.

Im located in the internet, sorry, in Quito - Ecuador but
connected to 
the internet 100%.

> I suppose whats critical here is that we get a few
people involved right 
> from the start.

Getting a sparc hardware down here is not impossible, but if
possible I 
would preffer to use a remote one, until seeing how the
project evolve 
and then try to get some hardware to do the tests locally.

regards
ernesto
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