Where there's SPARC there is fire

[jwt@example.com (Jim Tittsler)]

The long suffering readers of the list will recall that I've been
wanting to try another architecture.  I had been leaning toward
the Digital ALPHA to help feed Stephen's brother.  The recently
discontinued Multia/UDB looked really attractive at <US$700, but
getting it shipped to Japan proved a bit of a hassle.

So... this weekend was the annual Ham Fair, held this year at the
new convention center in Ariyake, Tokyo Big Sight (sic).  Part of
this gathering is a flea market, and there was a fair bit of older
Sun stuff available.  I bought a SPARCstation ELC, the second of
the two models that consist of a 17 inch monochrome monitor with
the processor built into the back of the housing.  Its almost
twice as fast as a SPARCStation 1, but not as fast as a 2 or IPX.

Getting it to run Linux proved embarrassingly easy.  I got the
binary of the 2.0.14 kernel and the "easy-nfs-root*.tar.gz" file.
The "easy-nfs-root" package includes the base set of utilities
that you need for a functioning system.  I put the kernel and
untarred root file system on my Pentium's hard disk.  I then
recompiled the Pentium kernel to support RARP, so that the SPARC
could find out its IP address.  I installed tftp*, the trivial
file transfer protocol support so that the SPARC could suck out
its kernel once it found out its IP address and its host IP.
By default, the system will also look for its root filesystem
as an NFS mounted filesystem in the same directory that supplies
the kernel.  So booting with the command "boot net" rewarded me
(eventually) with a working linux system on my home network.  I
then went on to suck down a few more RPMS for useful tools and
utilities.  RPM 2.2's dependencies proved useful in alerting me
to all of the different components I needed, given a desired 
"goal" package.  The 17" monitor provides 12 very nice 128x54
virtual consoles.

This all proved easy because of a couple of useful HOW-TOs on
the SPARCLinux web pages.  There were a couple of glitches, but
the HOW-TO got me close enough that looking through /var/log/messages
was enough to finish the job.

This is fun.  I wanted to try a different architecture, and have
confirmed for myself just how architecture independent Linux has
become.  I can also work toward retiring the old 20MHz 386 that
has been serving as my router/firewall/IP-Masquerader/ham radio BBS
with something a bit faster.

Jim

P.S.  I don't have a Sun mouse.  Are there good sources for used
Sun stuff in Akihabara?  (Amulet used to have interesting stuff,
but seems to have really shrunk.)

-- 
Jim Tittsler, Tokyo  7j1ajh@example.com  <URL:http://shrine.cyber.ad.jp/~jwt/>
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