1. META Information

1.1. The Purpose of this Document

This document is to serve as a comprehensive HOWTO and FAQ collection regarding the Sun JavaStation NC and enabling the GNU/Linux OS on it.

The intended audience of this document is anyone who has an interest in enabling Linux on the Sun JavaStations. The document structure is laid out to serve as either a top-to-bottom read for a newcomer, or as quick reference on a single topic for advanced users. Pointers to sample files submitted by users are included for extremely hurried readers.

The author of this document is Robert Dubinski <rsd@dubinski-family.org>. Robert is the former computer technician and UNIX systems administrator for Marquette University's Math, Statistics and Computer Science Department, where he had 125 JavaStations running Linux. These machines were all configured using the information, techniques and files presented in this document.

In early 1999, Eric Brower <ebrower@usa.net> wrote the first informal HOWTO for the JavaStation. Parts of this document are inspired by his work, and all unique information presented there have since been merged into this document. Eric's original mini-HOWTO is saved for posterity at: http://dubinski-family.org/~jshowto/Files/texts/eric_brower_js_howto_19980218.txt

This HOWTO also aims to serve as a member document of the Linux Documentation Project. The LDP can be reached at: http://www.linuxdoc.org

1.2. Acknowledgments

Enabling Linux on the JavaStations , and allowing this HOWTO to come to be would never have been possible without the fine work of the following people:

• Pete Zaitcev <zaitcev@yahoo.com> (Primary JavaStation kernel mod author)

• Eric Brower <ebrower@usa.net> (XFree mods and author of the original embedded-build HOWTO)

• Varol Kaptan <varol@ulakbim.gov.tr> (made available his Krups images and patches. Backported kernel support to 2.2.x series)

• David Miller <davem@redhat.com> (the original Linux/SPARC kernel porter)

• The Linux/SPARC kernel porters and mailing list

• The thousands of contributors to the Linux kernel

The HOWTO author wishes to give a second thank-you to Pete and Eric for their work:

1.3. History

1.4. Document Copyright and Licenses

Copyright (c) 1999-2001 Robert S. Dubinski. Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with the Invariant Sections being: "Why JavaStations are No Longer Produced", with one Front-Cover Text: "Linux on JavaStation HOWTO", and with one Back-Cover Text: "This document was written by Robert S. Dubinski in the hope that more people can put their JavaStation hardware to good use. Thank-you to the Linux kernel hackers who made this happen, and thank-you to Sun for a rock-solid piece of hardware." A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License".

The document author makes no warranties that all the information presented here is completely accurate, and cannot be held liable to any loss you experience as a result of the information you use from here.

Best efforts have been made to ensure everything included is accurate as of the publication date listed at the beginning of this document, but there is always a possibility something may be wrong. In this case, doublecheck with alternative sources first before considering implementing anything at a production-level. If you find something wrong, drop the author a line at <rsd@dubinski-family.org> or send a patch to the document source, and corrections will be made immediately.

This document is an official member document of the Linux Documentation Project.

1.5. Location of the Latest Version and Source

The latest online version of this document can be found at: http://dubinski-family.org/~jshowto .

The pre-processed XML source to this document, written to the Docbook DTD, version 4.1.2, is available from: http://dubinski-family.org/~jshowto/doc/src/

The pre-processed XML source to the GNU Free Documentation License, written to the Docbook DTD, and which this document is licensed under, is available from: http://dubinski-family.org/~jshowto/doc/src/gfdl.xml

Copies of this document are also available from the Linux Documentation Project at: http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/JavaStation-HOWTO.

This project used to be available at the URL 'http://javastation-howto.homeip.net'. In Spring 2001, homeip.net discontinued their free service and moved to a fee based scheme. Given the hundreds of mirrors of LDP documents, I do not find the fees justifiable. I have changed all references in this document back to my home server. Between my server's address, http://dubinski-family.org/~jshowto, the LDP website, and its hundreds of mirrors, you should be able to always find the JavaStation-HOWTO. If this is not the case, email me immediately at either <rsd@dubinski-family.org> or <dubinski@mscs.mu.edu>.

1.6. Reporting Bugs Found In or Additions to the HOWTO

Any problems or concerns about the HOWTO should be reported via email to the author, Robert Dubinski, at <rsd@dubinski-family.org>. Do NOT send document bug reports to the SparcLinux mailing list, the debian-sparc mailing list, or the Linux Documentation Project. The folks on there really do not care about my typos or server misconfigurations, so please don't trouble them.

1.7. TODO List for this HOWTO

1. As NetBSD now supports JavaStations as well, it would be good to talk about support and sample files for it too.