On Mon, Feb 14, 2011 at 12:24 AM, Stan Hoeppner <s...@hardwarefreak.com>wrote:

> >> No.  What I'm saying is that Qlogic never shipped, and does not ship, a
> >> SPARC/Linux binary of its utility package.  And they don't ship the
> source.
> >>  If
> >> that package is required to program that HBA, then you're hosed,
> screwed.
> >>
> >>
> > Hi Stan,
> >
> > thanks for that. Just FYI and FWIW,
> >
> > They actually do ship packages for RH /SuSE Linux (32-bit and 64-bit) and
> > Solaris for x86 and SPARC both.
>
> Note very carefully what I stated above:
>
> "...does not ship, a SPARC/Linux binary..."
>
> This is the thorn in your side.
>
>
Right, that's true! None of the packages I had worked in my environment
since using the packages for Linux in rpm format won't convert to deb using
alien (complains about some libpthread.so.0 library missing which is
actually there) and then trying to install the rpm using the rpm utility
isn't working either as it can't find '/bin/sh' which is ALSO there, but my
guess is that it needs the sh.rpm installed? so I might have to do that as
well. I should've stuck with using Solaris/OpenSolaris on
Sparc...considering I'm not smart enough to muck around with these
cross-platform, porting etc. and not all 3rd party packages are available
for Debian on Sparc.


> Regarding getting the Qlogic tools installed and working on Linux/SPARC?
>  Yes,
> they are that bad.  In this regard your ship is already sunk, as you won't
> be
> able to obtain the tools in Linux/SPARC binary format.  Qlogic won't give
> you
> source to built your own, either, unfortunately.
>

Yeah it's all hitting me in the face now!


> > I will take your advice however and go pester the people in these other
> > mailing lists you mentioned to see if someone's tinkered with the
> available
> > driver and utility packages to reverse-engineer/rebuild/port them to
> Debian
>
> The problem isn't "porting" to Debian.  Debian is just another Linux
> distro.  If
> the machine was an Opteron or Xeon you could simply use alien to install
> the Red
> Hat or SuSE RPM and you'd be done in 10 minutes or less.  The problem is
> you're
> running on SPARC processors.  If you had a Red Hat/SPARC binary RPM
> available
> from Qlogic you could simply use alien with that.  But, again, there is no
> Linux/SPARC binary.  You can't get around this, and no one else has either.
>
> As I see it you have two possible options:
>
> 1.  Boot from a Solaris/SPARC live CD, program the HBA, an hope the
> settings
> stick in EEPRON/FLASH/etc.  This is probably a no-go since you haven't
> changed
> the settings since installing Debian onto the box.  This may actually be a
> good
> thing as it means the OS kernel needs to program the HBA on each
> boot/hotplug.
>
> 2.  Assuming the device is configured by the kernel as hot plug, you should
> be
> able to find out where in sysfs the parameters for the HBA exist, and
> simply
> echo the parameters you need into those files.  Or, it could be as simple
> as
> creating something in /etc.  This is still a long shot, but someone on one
> of
> these lists I mentioned (or others) may have this information you seek.
>
> Don't waste time trying to get the Qlogic binary utils installed.
>  Concentrate
> your efforts on #2 above.  If it's possible to hit pay dirt, you'll do so
> using
> path #2.
>
> Good luck.
>
>
Thanks Stan. I really appreciate you taking the time in thinking through
this for me. You are right on every account. I even opened a case at QLogic
and they simply said, just go and install Redhat or Suse and I'm like WTF?
You can't just change OSes willy-nilly. So then they said well just try the
RH/suse packages and see if they work, then that didn't either so they were
like ok, try and configure the HBA in the BIOS and add targets in the BIOS
and then when the OS boots up it'll attach the targets, the problem is that
I don't know how to get into the BIOS in these SUN machines. So I'm screwed.
Like you said, my only shot at hitting pay-dirt is method #2 above, but I
don't know where I'll find that info as to what files that QLogic manager
writes to and what it writes in those files to configure these adapters.
Maybe I can call Qlogic this time as you suggested as clearly opening a case
didn't help and lastly join the iSCSI mailing list and ask if someone there
has configured this on their redhat/suse machines and if they can send me
their configs so I can copy them to my machine by hand and see if that works

All through this though I'm assuming that since the kernel modules seem to
be loaded already and if I'm planning to configure the HBAs via config files
I don't need the driver that is available from Qlogic for the Redhat and
Suse packages as I don't have to worry about accessing those adapters to
configure them?

Thanks again Stan,
\R

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