Hi Gordan, On Sat, Jan 29, 2011 at 8:17 PM, Gordan Bobic <gordan@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On 29/01/2011 17:05, Niels de Vos wrote: >> Hi there! >> >> I'm looking into getting an ARM system as small home-server. Of course >> I'd like to run Fedora on it, but unfortunately it seems that current >> Fedora releases are not completely ready for this yet. > > It's probably ready enough. F12 is the stable one, and F13 alpha rootfs > is available. A few things are missing (a few important KDE parts, but > they do build OK on F12), and a few things are broken and unstable > (Firefox of the F12 vintage isn't of generically good enough quality to > handle bug-free running on ARM), but overall it's more than usable > enough. I run a F12/F13 hybrid (F12 rootfs yum updated to F13 alpha from > the koji repository where packages update cleanly) on my Sheevaplug > (Kirkwood ARMv5) and on my Toshiba AC100 (Tegra 2 ARMv7), and they work > quite well - certainly well enough for any common server tasks. > > You may want to check the archives and sign up to the redhat bugzilla > where bugs are tracked. I submitted a patch recently to add a feature to > rc.sysinit that changes the default kernel behaviour about alignment > errors. I suggest you apply it and set the default to fix+warn and file > bugzilla reports for all the apps that cause these warnings. > > Here's a direct link to the bugzilla report: > https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=673691 Cool! I'm complete unaware what makes ARM a special architecture, so this is quite interesting. I've added some notes/thoughts to the bug, maybe it helps to get it included ;) >> I'd like to help with this, and as a start I am trying to get a fully >> functioning VM up and running. Obviously there are issues to overcome >> with this too. Many thanks for documenting the issues in the wiki! >> Before I decide to buy myself a Pandaboard or similar, I'd like to get >> some more experience with Fedora on ARM. My first personal project >> will be getting libvirt work with ARM out of the box. I hope that this >> attracts some more interested parties and lowers the barrier for >> contributions. > > I'd suggest starting with something self-contained and well supported, > such as the Sheevaplug. It's quite speedy (not as fast as the > Pandaboard, but fast enough and better for development because it's > ARMv5, which means you'll get to see the alignment errors when they > occur rather than them being silently fixed up. Better for testing, IMO. > I have a Mk1 Sheevaplug and it's quite well supported by the community. Good suggestion! And obviously the Sheevaplugs come in a nice box too. Today I received a Beagleboard on loan, so I think I'll start there for now. (It doesn't have any network, so I might switch soon...) >> While I am checking the details of qemu and libvirt, I am wondering if >> there is a kernel available that has virtio support. If not, I will >> need to compile my own kernel, which feels a little silly. >> https://arm.koji.fedoraproject.org does only seem to have one kernel >> package available, and that is kernel-headers which I hardly can use >> for booting. I am wondering if there are any scratch-builds available >> that have a functioning vmlinz. > > You will almost certainly need to build your own kernel anyway, because > kernels on ARM are pretty CPU specific. While it has recently been > mentioned that there is a project underway to provide a small-ish set of > kernels to try to cover a majority of popular ARM devices, right now you > will almost certainly want to build your own kernel. Hmm, thats good to know. I was just hoping that there is something like a general basic arm kernel with all the modules, which boots on most boards, but would run sub-optimal. > ARM emulation using qemu on x86 is OK for minor things to begin with, > but performance is quite crippling. > > As for development on ARM and virtualization - I suggest you look at > Linux vserver. I have it pretty much working, but there are a couple of > bugs in the tools stemming from the fact that dietlibc isn't quite bug > free on ARM yet, but it's getting close (see this bug: > https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=667852 ) Well, my laptop runs libvirt and I m quite happy with that. I'll stick with libvirt/qemu as that does not interfere with my 'production' VMs. Maybe you understood my question wrong... Gol i to do some development/tests on my x86_64 laptop, and then run the resulting packages on the hardware ARM. > That means that you'll have to create your /etc/vserver entries for the > VMs manually, but it's not that hard, and I can provide you with some > working examples if you decide to go that way. libvirt/qemu on ARM may > be too slow for any sensible work - I am not sure what the status with > KVM is on ARM, but I wouldn't bet on it working on most (if any) ARM > hardware. Vserver, OTOH, comes with just about no overhead at all, if > you want a jail for testing and developing things. Of course, this > assumes you already have an ARM device already set up and working. > >> Furthermore I'd like to know what the best way is to follow the status >> of the current ARM builds, and where to find out where help is most >> needed? > > This list and the RedHat bugzilla are a good place to start. :) Great! I'll get all sorted and hope to be able to provide some help soon :) Cheers, Niels > Gordan > _______________________________________________ > arm mailing list > arm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx > https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/arm > _______________________________________________ arm mailing list arm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/arm
