[Cbe-oss-dev] A simple PS3 question...

[Jim Paris]

Durga Choudhury wrote:
> Hi
> 
> I have a simple question I am really hoping you will be able to answer.
> 
> I have Fedora 12 installed on my PS3. This installs the yaboot
> bootloader and the stock kernel, of course. The yaboot bootloader
> expects a compressed kernel, i.e. a vmlinuz file.
> 
> However, (native) compiling the stock kernel on the PS3 creates an
> uncompressed kernel, i.e. a vmlinux file. From a brief web search it
> looks like this is the correct file format on PPC64 architecture, but
> then yaboot refuses to boot it. Even the 'make install' process does
> not automatically insert the new entry in /boot/yaboot/yaboot.conf, as
> it does in the PC architecture by modifying /boot/grub.conf. I tried
> manually editing the yaboot.conf file to make an entry for the new
> kernel (and the associated Ramdisk etc), but the bootloader simply
> hangs while trying to boot the uncompressed kernel.
> 
> My simple question is: how do I compile the stock kernel that I can
> boot with a Fedora installed yaboot boot loader, or, generate a
> vmlinuz compressed kernel file?

The PS3 doesn't use yaboot.  The PS3 uses a Linux-based bootloader
like kboot or petitboot, which are capable of reading a yaboot.conf
for compatibility with existing installers.

Generally a bootloader doesn't care if the format is compressed or
not.  Code at the beginning of the kernel image handles the
decompression, independent of the bootloader.  Specifically, kexec
should be able to handle vmlinux or bzImage just fine.

If your kernel is hanging during boot, it's most likely to be a
configuration problem.  Did you start with "make ps3_defconfig"?

-jim