6. Boot the machine and start the installation program

In this chapter we will find out how to get the installation program up and running.

6.1. Boot the machine

To boot the 7248, just insert the bootdisk and switch on the machine. Insert the installation CD at the PowerPC splash screen. If it won't boot off the floppy drive, check SMS settings (Section 3), and try to force a floppy boot by pressing F5 (or F6) at the bootscreen while the check icons pop up in the bottom of the screen. After a while, the screen blanks out, and Linux will boot. At this point, you can shout a little "hooray" for yourself, if there are not too many in the room, and Tux, the Linux Penguin will show up in the upper left corner of the screen. Insert the ramdisk root floppy and ramdisk floppy #2 when prompted.

After some seconds, the installation program will complain about a lot of things. It can't find a usb mouse, it can't start the Xpmac X-server, it can't open the local display, and that kind of things. Don't worry, we'll take care of this in a minute. Just press enter, and you'll be thrown to a standard root bash prompt. For those of us who have used Unix systems earlier, this is enough to give good vibrations. For all others: Don't Panic [tm].

6.2. Make some hacks

To be able to start the installation program, we have to change the standard PowerMac setup to something that is useable for the 7248. This is what we are going to do in this section. Remember that all commands are case sensitive.

First, let's set up mouse, to make them work correctly with X. Issue these commands:

          rm -f /dev/mouse
          ln -s /dev/psaux /dev/mouse

Done! Now, that wasn't too difficult, was it? Let's continue with some X configuration. Issue these commands:

        cd /etc
        mv X11/XF86Config X11/XF86Config.old
        cp XF86Config.PReP X11/XF86Config
        rm -f /etc/X11/X
        ln -s /usr/X11R6/bin/XF68_FBDev /etc/X11/X

This XF86Config.PReP file is not complete, it so we have to fix it. The easiest way to do this is to run Red Hat's Xonfigurator program

        Xconfigurator

and follow the instructions on the screen. The usage of Xconfigurator is beyond the scope of this document, but it's quite easy. If you need help, try the Xconfigurator section in the Red Hat Installation guide. Xconfigurator should figure out that we use the IBM E15 frame buffer device by itself. Note that the frame buffer device has only support for 256 colors, so only 8 bit mode should be selected. Follow the on-screen instructions and enter values that match your Screen. Resolutions of 800x600 or 1024x768 should be allright. Skip the test at the end. It will fail.

If you try it ouy, you will maybe conclude that the X-server does not work. Again, Don't Panic [tm]. The reason for this is that Xconfigurator presumes you have an X font server running. You don't, so we have to add Font Paths manually. Edit the configuration with

        vi /etc/X11/XF86Config

(What? You don't like vi? Read this to get started.)

Look for the line which contains the FontPath. Comment out (that is: Put a '#' in front of) the existing line containing something like "unix/:7100", and add these lines instead.

        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc/:unscaled"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/cyrillic/:unscaled"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/:unscaled"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/:unscaled"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/cyrillic/"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/"
        FontPath    "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/"

You are now ready to start the installation program. Issue this command, and go for it:

        start_installer