Solbourne ROM Monitor commands

Documentation Resources on the ROM Monitor

• The online manual pages have a few items of interest
  • man bootrom
  • man eeprom

Environment Variables and Values

BOOT_SAFE

If in Secure mode (PASSWD variable is set), then this value allows a "boot" (boot from value in variable DEFAULTBOOT) to be executed without knowing the secure ROM password.

BOOTMODE

The Mode in which to boot. Acceptable values are:

AUTO

Automatically attempt a boot

MANUAL

Do not boot until user types a boot command

CONSOLE (KBUS only)

bw()

Use the Black and White IO-board framebuffer as the console

cg()

Use the first Color (cg30 or cg40) framebuffer as the console

zs()

Use the serial port as the console
Could specify using zs(,,0) ttya or zs(,,1) ttyb

fb()

Use the Framebuffer of preference (cg30, cg40, bw20)

DEFAULTBOOT

The filename of the boot kernel. Normally set to vmunix

DEFAULTDUMP

Device specification of the default dump partition device. In the form:

	[proto.]device([controller, unit, devspecific])
E.G.
	sd.si(0,0,1)

DEFAULTROOT

Device specification of the default root partition device. In the form:

	[proto.]device([controller, unit, devspecific])
E.G.
	sd.si(0,0,0)

DEFAULTSWAP

Device specification of the default swap partition device. In the form:

	[proto.]device([controller, unit, devspecific])
E.G.
	sd.si(0,0,1)

See the "Boot Commands" section below for details on the intricate nature of the DEFAULTSWAP variable.

DIAG-SWITCH?

hmmm....

DIAGBOOT

This string is the fully specified device and file path to a diagnostic program you wish to use when a KBus system is in "Diag" mode, or when any system is booted with "boot -d". The normal value for this is something like sd.si(0,0,6)kvm/stand/dg

DIAGMODE

Power-On diagnostics mode. Acceptable values are:

LONG

Perform a more extensive diagnostic, including memory test

SHORT

Perform a minimal diagnostics check

DISPLAYRES

Display resolution of the console frame buffer

ENETADDR (read only)

The 6 octet ethernet address. The normal vendor octet triplet for Solbourne systems was 00:00:8e

HOSTID (read only)

The "unique" host identification longword usually used for software licensing

INPUT-DEVICE (IDT only)

keyboard

ttya

ttyb

INSTALLDEV (IDT only)

Device specification of the default Operating System installation device. In the form:

	[proto.]device([controller, unit, devspecific])
E.G.
	st.si(0,0,3)

INSTALLPATH (IDT only)

The UNIX filesystem path appended to INSTALLDEV during network installation

IP_ADDR (IDT only)

IP Address of this station during network boots

INSTALLED (IDT only)

Set this to "0" before installing an Operating System, set to "1" when the OS is installed

KBD_LAYOUT

This variable is akin to the Sun type 4 keyboard DIP pack for setting the "keyboard language identity", this variable may be set to any of:

COUNTRY			HEX VALUE
-------			---------
US			00
FRANCE_BELGIUM		02
CANADA_FRENCH		03
DENMARK			04
GERMANY			05
ITALY			06
NETHERLANDS		07
NORWAY			08
PORTUGAL		09
SPAIN_LATINAMERICA	0a
SWEDEN_FINLAND		0b
SWITZERLAND_FRENCH	0c
SWITZERLAND_GERMAN	0d
UK			0e
JAPAN			20

MASTER (KBUS only)

Slot number of the Master CPU. Generally not set by the user, unless you specifically wish to override selection of the lowest numbered slot cpu location. (mainly for diagnostic testing)

MODEL (read only) [not really]

Model name of system. Generally Specified as Series4,5,5E,6/[5679]0n, where n is the number of cpus. For example:

	ROM> setenv MODEL Series6/908

would indicate a KBus machine in a 900 chassis with 8 Series6 cpus

Additionally, i think i've seen the nomenclature for the middle digit of the Chassis spec indicating something like the number of MCAB boards installed.

OUTPUT-DEVICE (IDT only)

screen

ttya

ttyb

NOSPINNER

Supress "N Pages Left" in dumps and savecore processing.

PASSWD

Encrypted value of a security password

RAMTEST_#MB (IDT only?)

The Number of Megabytes to test when the DIAGMODE variable was set to "long"

SBUS-PROBE-LIST (IDT only)

This envvar tells the system in what order to probe the SBUS slots for devices. The SBUS slots are numbered starting with 1 closest to the power-supply.
If OUTPUT-DEVICE is set to screen, the last frame buffer found in the system will be used as the console output device.
An example setting for a system with a frame buffer in all 3 sbus slots for which you want the one in SBUS slot 2 to be the console using OUTPUT-DEVICE as screen would be

	setenv SBUS-PROBE-LIST 132

so SBus slot 2, being the last probed, will handle the console.

Note :

by changing ordering in the kernel configuration file, you can force a specific ordering of like-type devices, since i'm not sure the kernel probe routines pay any attention to SBUS-PROBE-LIST. For example:

device          bwtwo1 at obio ? csr 0x00001000 priority 6
device          bwtwo0 at obio ? csr 0x00001000 priority 6

will allocate bwtwo1 prior to bwtwo0 giving you the opposite effect of the default.

SCREEN-#COLUMNS

Number of columns the screen has for the ROM console driver

SCREEN-#ROW

Number of rows the screen has for the ROM console driver

SERIAL (read only)

Serial Number
some of the systems we got from Solbourne had Serial Numbers like ncc1701, hyuck, hyuck

SI_NSPERBYTE

allows slowing down the SCSI bus by limiting the maximum synchronous transfer rate that will be negotiated in nanoseconds per byte. A 5MB/sec rate translates into 200ns per byte. Setting this variable to 300 will slow the bus to 3.33MB/sec.

STDOUT_PATH

hmm...

SUNMON-COMPAT? or SUNMON

Like the Sun OpenBootProm setting, this defines on S4000 series systems whether to use the standard Solbourne ROM Monitor command set, or to use Solbourne's FORTH (minimal compatibility with Sun's) Monitor.

TRUE

Use the old style monitor

FALSE

Use the FORTH-alike monitor

SVn_MODE

sets modes for the Cougar SCSI controller. See the _MANUAL(sv(4)) manual page for details.

TTYA_MODE

TTYB_MODE

These variables set the operating mode for the TTY ports when used in console mode. An example setting might be:

	setenv TTYA_MODE 9600,8,n,1

TZ

Timezone string in System V format

UNAME

Allows the 'uname' command to return a different format. If set to 'sun', 'uname' will return a sun compatible output like:

	SunOS foo 4.1.3 3 sun4

This can be very beneficial for lame-brain software (like AcroRead, etc) that think's it's smarter than you and refuses to run on a '4.1C' machine (stupid shell-script case statements are easy to modify, also)

VME_RORA

Inform kernel that there is a VME Release on Register Access (RORA) interrupter on the VME bus. If set to 1 the OS calls interrupt handler routines immediately. Otherwise the OS queues VME interrupt requests for later processing.

Boot Commands

The boot command syntax is as follows:

     boot [ filename ] [ -nbaws ] [ -f filename ] [ -- ]  arg 
	or
     boot -d

boot -d (diagnostic boot) is of most use on the S4000 Series, since it has no DIAG switch (unless you have the tricorder which i'm sure you don't -- but if you do, can i please have it?). This command will use the value in the DIAGBOOT variable to boot.

Without arguments, boot uses the values in the DEFAULTBOOT and DIAGBOOT environment variables

Because the Solbourne BootRoms have builtin Boot Code for UFS partitions, there's no need to 'installboot' on Solbournes (actually, you can't) to build a boot block. Additionally, this allows use of the ROM Monitor 'ls' command to view UFS partition contents.

Another thing to watch out for is that a standard kernel (with default swap spec) will use the value in the ROM variable DEFAULTSWAP, instead of the "b" partition of the root device. You can hose yourself if you aren't careful.

Also, if DEFAULTSWAP doesn't exist, the default kernel sends out a bootparam request to find its swap device. This can be hard to figure out if you don't know what to watch for.

Other ROM Commands

cp copy

    cp sd.si(,,)etc/fstab fb()

dmesg