2010/11/2 Jörg Faschingbauer
Hi all,
I recently managed to get a ServeRAID M1015 SAS/SATA Controller to work under kernel 2.6.34.7-12-default, by grabbing the driver source from Fedora 13 and compiling it.
While this was a relatively simple task, I wonder what's the way to install openSUSE on a system that has no disks other than this controller.
To put it another way: how can I add a storage driver before the installer goes out to probe for disks?
It would be great if you could provide me with some links and hints on where to read on.
For example: The bootloader presents me with the "F6" option to add a "Driver update medium"; I'm wondering what this is, and if this is the way. Is http://ftp.suse.com/pub/people/hvogel/Update-Media-HOWTO/index.html still up to date?
I'm new to SUSE; Linux itself is well understood.
Thanks in advance, Joerg
Jörg, I don't actually know the "normal" way, but if you want to do something a little more exotic and you are indeed comfortable with linux, I would consider building a custom install CD with your driver already on it! Before you think I'm crazy, you can do that via susestudio relatively easily, but I'm sure you invest several hours getting your hands around the process. See http://susestudio.com/ You need to request an account, but they've been getting those out within a day or so afaik. Then as a first step, with the studio build a standard install CD with just the minimum you need to get up and running on your system less the module. You can find samples in the gallery (http://susegallery.com/browse), but I think you need your studio account first so you can login. Since I'm a KDE 4.5 user, I would just create my basic install CD by cloning: http://susegallery.com/a/zpzr67/kde-4-reloaded (Note it has already been cloned over 3000 times. I have no idea what people are doing with it that they need to clone it so oftem.) After you have your basic appliance, then you need to upload your compiled driver module to susestudio. You do that as a tar.gz file I believe and when you next build the your appliance, it will autoextract at the location you have the tar.gz file. (Clearly you need to install it to /lib/modules/....) Once you've got the module installed on your "appliance" in the right place, run it in virtual mode at susestudio (test drive). Within that test drive session update initrd the normal way (ie. via mkinitrd, etc.). That initrd update should be preserved in your appliance after you exit testdrive. So then just download the ISO for your custom install CD. You don't need it to be a full DVD because once you've done the basic install, you can install the rest of the packages from the normal install DVD or from the Internet repo's. And if you think your custom install CD is of value, you can publish it in the gallery for other users to find. Greg -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org