[syslinux] ifcpu[64].c32 functions drop to command line

[Gene Cumm]

On Tue, Apr 30, 2013 at 2:33 PM, John McDonnell <mcdonnjd at pcam.org> wrote:
>> On Behalf Of Gene Cumm

>> 3) I find logging in atftpd better although a packet capture can also work (and
>> is sometimes necessary).
>
> I had debated between aftpd and tftp-hpa when I originally setup my PXE server a couple years ago, but it seems I was reading more recommendations for using tftp-hpa at that time (not sure if that recommendation has changed now) and never looked further into it as I never had any issues. (One of the goals was RIS though I still have yet to get around to setting that up, though I have actually done some of the work for it now, but just haven't added the labels for it yet to test.)

tftpd-hpa offers the advantage of block number rollover (and the
possibility of much larger files).  atftpd with PXELINUX should top
out about 92 MiB per file.

>> 4) What about if you use pxelinux.0 (but requires only TFTP) or lpxelinux.0?
>
> I have never used lpxelinux.0, though I did copy the file over to my test install of 5.10-pre2. Hoping it takes the same syntax and such. I'll give it a try.

Same.  pxelinux.0 only speaks to the PXE (which speaks with the UNDI).
 gpxelinux.0 uses gPXE to speak to the UNDI while lpxelinux.0 has lwIP
integrated and speaks directly to the UNDI.  All three use the same
config (minus the additional protocols offered like HTTP, FTP and
gPXE's sanboot).

> When booting 5.10-pre2 with lpxelinux.0 it still seems to load into text mode instead of graphical. I get "netconn_write error -5 failed: No such file or directory" when trying to boot my System Rescue menu item. So, once again it seems that ifcpu.c32 is working but it's not loading it from HTTP. After converting it to pull from TFTP since I'm going to try pxelinux.0 next, it does boot into System Rescue on both 64-bit and 32-bit machines. After testing with pxelinux.0 (just for thoroughness) I'll try this back on gpxelinux.0.

This makes me think there's an uncooperative UNDI and/or PXE.

As HPA said, what are your results booting the *32 and *64 options
directly (ignoring ifcpu.c32) via gpxelinux.0 and lpxelinux.0 on the
32b and 64b PCs (6 possible tests).

> pxelinux.0 and gpxelinux.0 both work with 5.10-pre2 to boot my ifcpu.c32 label to select the proper boot item and then boot my selection using TFTP. I did leave the netboot=http://****/sysrcd.dat line in as I don't remember if it can actually load those files via TFTP, but it worked as it had already boot into the Linux install and pulled that fine.) [g|l]pxelinux.0 all fail when trying to boot via HTTP however on 5.10-pre2.
>
> I know you're not supposed to mix c32 modules with different versions of syslinux, but I tried using the ifcpu.c32 module from 5.10-pre2 with 5.01 just to see what happens... And it still drops me to the command line.
>
>> 5) Reading over the entire config, I don't see anything wrong.  Could you try
>> pwd.c32 (which should show "::") and Ctrl-N (which should show the IP
>> address and path prefix)?  I vaguely recall reading someone hit that message
>> when the menu got confused somehow.
>
> pwd.c32 still shows :: on 5.10-pre2 and Ctrl-N seems to bring up my last used command or goes to the next menu option if in the menu. 5.01 does the same.

Ctrl-N from the "boot:" prompt should display the network information
unless the new CLI in 5.xx is interpreting it differently.  I should
have been more clear about that.

https://github.com/geneC/syslinux/blob/doc-elflink-for-mfleming/txt/syslinux-cli.txt#LC20

> I think I remembered to try all the suggestions given and a few variations thereof. Any more ideas?
>
> I'll have to check further into lpxelinux.0 as I don't know anything about it. Is it recommended to use lpxelinux.0 over gpxelinux.0?

It's an alternative but still beta.

--
-Gene