RIMBoy's RIMDistro RIMiGate Release 0.2 If You've Got the Money (I've Got the Time) sean@rimboy.com Aprsd server on a floppy disk. i486 and better! Apr 3, 03 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- This README contains: 1. Unpacking directions (you've already completed step one!) 2. Notes 3. TODO 4. Changelog 5. Acks ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- This distribution originally based on the CClinux distro. This release under the terms of the GNU Public License (GPL). www.gnu.org for more details. Furthermore, the software contained within is also under the terms of the GPL. Please contact me if you believe otherwise. No warranty expressed or implied. Use at your own risk. Fitness of merchandise not backed for given purpose. Do not taunt happy fun ball. APRS is a registered trademark of APRS Software and Bob Bruninga, WB4APR. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. Unpacking Directions ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Well, it's one glorious zip now Martha! Welcome to RIMiGate v. 0.2. 0.2 of this release is a major change in distribution of RIMiGate. Whereas with 0.1 you had to have a Linux system to build a RIMiGate floppy, 0.2 removes that need and makes it easier than ever to setup a linux based iGate for APRS. All you need is a system that supports writing a disk image and you've built a disk! Aside from needing this zip, you'll need rawrite if you are using windows, and you'll need a Unix/Linux compatible text editor if you're using Macintosh or Windows. Under Macintosh, you may wish to use BBEdit and use the save option to save under the Unix file format. Under Windows, you may be able to use WordPad or you can download the freeware Metapad at: http://www.liquidninja.com/metapad/ The key is your editor supports Unix/Linux linefeeds. Well, you're either reading this from the website or you've managed to unzip the zip file. If that's the case you're almost all of the way there. You should see a disk image titled rimigate002.img. You will need to use one of the following programs that takes in the image and writes that image to disk. Please note that each of these programs will erase your floppy disks. You have been warned. Linux: Under linux, issues the following command (provided you are in the rimigate002 directory) dd if=rimigate002.img of=/dev/fd0 Windows (of various flavors): Under windows, you will need the rawrite utility (It's a great utility to have). You can download the utility at: http://uranus.it.swin.edu.au/~jn/linux/rawwrite.htm or from: http://www.tux.org/pub/dos/rawrite/ You should be able to run the program and be prompted accordingly. Please note that it is probably best to run rawrite from the directory that RIMiGate is unpacked into. Macintosh: You should be able to use the Apple Disk Copy utility under Classic or the Disk Utility under OSX. Please note that this is untested. If you get this working please drop me a line and I'll include what information you provide in these docs. Once you have written the disk, you should see the following files on a MSDOS type filesystem: aprsd.cnf boot.msg hosts initrd.img init.tnc ldlinux.sys linux network passwd syslinux.cfg welcome.txt Please note that it is suggested that you use a Here are what each of those files are: aprsd.cnf This is the aprsd.conf file. Please note the truncation for msdos compatibility. Please edit this file to your needs and liking. It's annotated, and additional information on the parameters can be found at: http://www.wa4dsy.net/aprs/index.html#aprsservers Please note that in order to properly pass information to the APRS-IS, you need to set the APRS password. You can generate that password by visiting this site and following the directions: http://www.rimboy.com/rimdistro/rimigate/calculate/ Please note that the I construct is used between the Lat/Long to delineate that the station is an IGate. It is suggested that this delimeter be used unless you know you have a reason to change it. You may wish to visit the Nashville APRS website at: http://www.nashvilleaprs.net and in particular, http://www.nashvilleaprs.net/configs/igate.php for addition information. boot.msg This file is used by Syslinux to display a message at boot time. Please do not edit. hosts This file is used to define hosts per the standard /etc/hosts format under Unix/Linux. Please edit this file if necessary (if you need to map names to IP address). Please do not edit the localhost line, it is necessary for the operation of RIMiGate. You may safely ignore this file and do not have to edit it. initrd.img This file is the compressed file system. It is loaded at boot time (actually before the kernel) and contains all of the filesystem used by RIMiGate. Do NOT open this file in an editor because it is in binary. There is nothing to edit (unless you know what you are doing). init.tnc This file defines the programming for the connected TNC. Please edit it to your liking. Please note that certain options in this file override options as set by the aprsd.cnf file. The aprsd.cnf file lists those options which are trumped by the init.tnc file. Again, please visit http://www.wa4dsy.net/aprs/index.html#aprsservers for additional information. ldlinux.sys This file is the bootstrap to start the floppy. It does not need to be edited or touched. linux This is the kernel, 2.2.25 as of this writing. This is again a binary file, do not attempt to open or edit. network This file contains the network options RIMiGate will need in order to operate. The options are in a simple OPTIONNAME=OPTIONVALUE format. This file is parsed at boottime. Here are the options: IPADDR=192.168.1.105 This is the IP address of the RIMiGate floppy. NETMASK=255.255.255.0 This is the netmask of your network. DEFAULTGW=192.168.1.1 This is the default gateway of your network. NAMESERVER1=192.168.1.1 NAMESERVER2=192.168.1.1 You can define up to 2 name servers for RIMiGate. passwd This is the password file. RIMiGate is setup to have 2 accounts, root (superuser, the administrator of the system) and admin, a non priveledged account to be used for minor administrivia. You have two options in regards to this file. One is to leave this file as is. The accounts have their passwords *'d, which under Unix means those accounts are not allowed to login. If you would like to have accounts, you can generate a proper passwd field with hashed passwords for both accounts using the following utility: http://www.rimboy.com/rimdistro/rimigate/createpasswd/ Please read thru the disclaimer at the top of the page before you proceed. syslinux.cfg This file defines boot time options for RIMiGate. It should not be edited unless you know what you are doing. welcome.txt This is the banner that aprsd throws out at connection time. Please edit it to your liking. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2. Notes: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Monolithic Kernel custom compiled with an i486 target. Network drivers included: 3c509 / 3c579 3c590 / 3c900 ne2000 / NE1000 ne2k (pci ne2000 clone) DECchip Tulip (dc21x4x) PCI support EtherExpressPro/100 support To my knowledge there is no support for ide devices. This was done on purpose. The idea is that everything is self contained on one floppy disk. The kernel is linux. You can do a make bzImage when building a new kernel. Just copy the bzImage out of arch/i386 and name it linux when you save it to the floppy. The libs contained in this distro are libc6 (glibc2) (from RH6.2). There are plans to move to newer libs provided things don't break too much. This distro makes use of Busybox, brought to you by Bruce Perens and the folks at Lineo. They do cool stuff, and Busybox is the coolest. That being said, please bear in mind that the busybox equiv of some utils may not be as full featured. Hence the reason the busybox mount was not used. I may add in more functionality to the BB bin, but this is the baseline for future RIMDistros. Please note that I included the BB telnet client. RIMDistro also makes use of some of the features provided by Tinylogin. Important aprsd notes: The aprsd that ships with RIMiGate is aprsd215a7-tt, which is available on http://www.rimboy.com/rimdistro/rimigate/ This version of aprsd ships with the Terry Trapp (KE4PJW) supplied patch to provide for priority hubbing that is being used in the Nashvilleaprs.net setup. Please see the notes in the aprsd.cnf file for additional information on this patch. As a result of using a7, this version of aprsd does not support the q constructs as layed out by: http://www.wa4dsy.net/aprs/aprsdDOC.html#PktSource It is my intention to upgrade to a version of aprsd with the q constructs at a future date. At this time, according to the aprsd documentation aprsd has a slow memory leak that requires a monthly reboot (of course, I go to look what version it applies to and it's no longer listed). After extensive testing we've found 2.1.5a7-tt to be a stable release and thus why I'm using it as of now for RIMiGate. However, aside from minor error and bug fixes, it's my intention that the next release of RIMiGate will contain the latest version of aprsd (with the -tt patch of course). --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3. Todo: --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- * Lib support The libs contained on this are from RH6.2. They seem to work fine. However, fbw (the CCLinux guy) seemed to think that they are a little large. They are stripped, but is it possible to make them any smaller? I'll entertain any worthy suggestion. :) Likewise, it may be time to upgrade in order to support newer versions of aprsd. * SuperDaemon / tcpwrappers I'd like to get a telnet server working on this, ideally wrapped and fired out of inetd. Where I am spacewise depends on what kind of bug reports / solutions / fixes appear over the next few releases. Ideally this distro can be used in systems with remote administration, this is going to be the best way to get this done. FYI, I've included the BB telnet client for whatever purpose you may see fit. * Modular NIC support Might we consider making the NIC stuff modular and dropping in the module that is needed for each disk? It could prove interesting. For now I'm staying monolithic, but the thought is interesting. * Upgrade aprsd to the latest 2.1.5 release At some point I should probably get with the program and update aprsd to the latest and current release. (See above for additional information). * Misc I am sure there are other things I am forgetting. Let me know if something needs fixin, is broken, etc. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4. Changelog ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 0.1 Initial release. 0.2 Initial release after moving to a DOS based filesystem using the syslinux approach to bootstrapping Linux. Space was actually gained and this removed the need to have a working linux system to build RIMiGate. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5. Acks: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dale Heatherington (wa4dsy) http://www.wa4dsy.net Terry Trapp (ke4pjw) George Currey Jr (kg4ozl) for testing beta releases. Bruce Martin Rob Huffstedtler Craig Buscheck (glad you got some /. karma!) Roundeye Holland Griffis Steven "Critch" Critchfield Brett Miller