Jim Mohr's SCO Companion

Index

Copyright 1996-1998 by James Mohr. All rights reserved. Used by permission of the author.

Be sure to visit Jim's great Linux Tutorial web site at https://www.linux-tutorial.info/

1 Installing and Registering Free SCO

The installation of the Free SCO product on the CD is essentially the same as for any other SCO product. However, the products that you get and the licensing is slightly different. In this chapter we are going to talk specifically about the installation and registration of Free SCO.

Unlike in the first book, I cannot make the assumption that you have installed SCO before. One of the most appealing aspects of this book is that we are providing you a copy of the Free SCO. Since getting the Free SCO may be you primary motivation for buying this book, it is a logical assumption that you have never installed an SCO system before.

Most of the issues that we are going to address I talked about in the first book. However, in the first book it was assumed that you already had a commercial copy of SCO and therefore had the Installation Guide. Since we are giving you a copy of SCO and not providing the Installation Guide, it is a logical assumption that you don't have an Installation Guide to work from. Plus, I don't want to have you flipping back and forth between the two books. Therefore, we are going to go into a lot more detail about the installation in this chapter than we did in the first book.

An important part of this installation is planning. You need to know what you have and what you are going to do with it. The range that this simple statement can cover is amazing. My years in SCO support have taught me that when someone says they know what kind of computer they have can mean anything from being able to say that it's a "Compaq” to being able to describe the chip on each card. For the average person it lies somewhere toward the first end. It is therefore important to gather as much information about your system as possible before you start the installation.

First, it helps you make the right choices during the installation. Second, if you do call into support or post a message on Compuserver you have all the necessary information in front of you.Unfortunately, SCO will does not provide support for the FreeSCO. The only way you can get support is either from a free source like Compuserve, or you have a support contract with SCO.

Knowing what hardware you have is just part of it. You also need to know what software you are going to install. The first response is "Free SCO” or "SCO OpenServer Desktop System” or something similar. For the most part, this is correct. However, the SCO OpenServer Desktop System is a fairly large product and composed of many different packages. Depending on your goal (or size of your hard disk), you may not want or need to install everything. Plus, when you register you free SCO you get licenses for more than just the SCO OpenServer Desktop System. What you get and what it is composed of we'll talk about first.

The Software

The first thing is the operating system itself. Free SCO is a nothing more than the SCO OpenServer Desktop product. You have the same components as you would with the normal OpenServer desktop. Also, you have to get your license from SCO before you install. Since the product is shipped without a license, you have to connect to the SCO Web site to get your license.

Without over simplifying too much, we can say the SCO OpenServer Desktop System is composed of four major components, or products. These products are:

• Operating System

• Graphical Environment (the X Windowing System)

• Network Connectivity

• Documentation

There are certain portions of the operating system that you cannot do without. However, most of the others can be left out or installed on a piece by piece basis. The nice thing is that the installation program will not let you not install the things that you must have.

If you have a partition of greater than 300MB, then you can install everything on the CD that you get a license for and have plenty of room to spare. Since I have licenses for a range of other SCO products that I wanted to install on top of the Free SCO, I need more space.

Another thing is the products that are provided. In addition to the OpenServer Desktop product, you get a copy of the SCO OpenServer Development System and the Advanced File and Print Server (which allows you to provide file and print servers to MS-Windows based machines.) There are also two other products on the CD that you can install without licenses: SCO Doctor (a system monitoring tool) and ARCServer/Open (a backup package). There are also many other products on the CD.

I need to step back here for a moment. Saying that these products are provided for you is true, but I need to clarify it a little more. When you license the product through the SCO Web site, you are given a license for these three products. However, there are several more products on the CD, including WABI, the Virtual Disk Manager and SMP. You can even install them. However, without the necessary licenses they won't run.

However, with the correct licenses they run just as they would on any other SCO system. The reason is that you are given a license for the SCO OpenServer Desktop system. As far as it is concerned, it cannot tell that you have the free version. The kernel (and the system, in general) supports all of the products that it normally would. In addition to the remainder of the Free SCO, I installed the Virtual Disk Manager and WABI. These work just as they do on my other SCO systems.

Installation

One of the first things to do is to get your license from the SCO Web site. As of this writing, there is link on the SCO Home page, announcing Free SCO UnixWare. The page that this link brings you to also contains the necessary information for licensing your of the Free SCO OpenServer Desktop. There is a link, under the heading ÒLicense Now:Ó which will bring you directly to the page where you can get you license. We'll talk more about this shortly.

Note that the only way to register the product is on the SCO Web site. You cannot call, email or fax them to get them to send you the licensing information. The administration costs are just too high. Therefore, you have to have Internet access. If you do not have it, this would be the perfect time to get a CompuServe account. The SCOFORUM on CompuServe is a fantastic source of support and information for the entire range of SCO products. You will then have access to the Web and can get your license information.

Once on the SCO Web site, clicking on the link "Free SCO OpenServer” brings you to a page which contains a lot of introductory information, including frequently asked questions and the release notes. Unfortunately, as of this writing, there is no single file that you can download. Instead, you need to click through the various links to get the information you need. Fortunately, I will be covering the more important issues here, so there is no great need to wade through the SCO Web site.

When you finally reach the form to license your SCO product, you may be intimidated by the amount of information you have to provide. However, considering that filling out this form will save you hundreds of dollars, it's worth the five minutes to fill it out. Once the form is complete, you get a new page that contains the licensing information for the SCO OpenServer Desktop, the SCO OpenServer Development System and the SCO Advanced File and Print Server.

During the installation process there are a few terms that you will need to know. These are related to the licensing information that you got from the page at the SCO Web site.

Prior to the installation, it is a good idea that you have a plan of action. The OpenServer installation guide provides a checklist that you can fill out prior to starting the installation. Since you do not have a copy of the OpenServer Installation guide, I have provide a modified version of this checklist.

Preparing for the Install

I suggest you make a copy of the checklist in Table 0\1 for each system that you install. You can fill in each entry and include it in a notebook. You will notice that there are some very basic questions concerning keyboard language and time zone. It may seem almost too basic to include this type of information in a checklist. However, I can speak from experience that the more you have written down, the less prone you are to making mistakes. Even if the information is Òbasic.Ó

Note also that the minimum space mentioned in the SCO documentation is just enough to get installed. You need to consider future growth of the system, as well.

Table 0\1 Installation Checklist

Before you start you need to check out your system. The very first thing you need to check is the hardware itself. The first question to ask yourself is whether or not the hardware is supported. IÕm sure there are a few of you out there who are groaning thinking this is an attempt to blow you off. I talked with many customers while I was in SCO Support that went ballistic when I brought up the question of the hardware being supported.

ÒIt works under DOS!Ó Is a common response. However, as I have said many times, all that really means is that the hardware is probably not broken. I say ÒprobablyÓ because I have seen defective hardware work under DOS, but not on UNIX. Under DOS a lot of hardware is accessed through the system BIOS. The BIOS is often built especially for that machine. It understands the hardware in a way that SCO doesnÕt. Since the SCO device drivers are accessing the hardware directly, the hardware has to behave in a standard way. Otherwise, the SCO device drivers donÕt know what to expect. (For more details on the system BIOS, see Chapter 10, The Computer, in the first book)

Does this mean that your no-name hardware wonÕt work? Not at all. My server is running a fair bit of ÒunsupportedÓ hardware. Much of it is clones of supported hardware (which causes a lot of grief). However, it works. When I tried to install something that wasnÕt supported and it didnÕt work, there was no frustration because working was something that wasnÕt guaranteed (okay, so there was a little frustration).

There is also the issue of conflicts. SCO is good about being able to install a wide number of cards at their default. The common place for conflicts is with cards of the same type, such as host adapters. However, having the list in front of you will confirm this before you try to install and have something go wrong.

As you can see in the checklist, each card that you have in your system has the same basic set of information that you should record. The key pieces of information are:

• base address

• IRQ

• DMA channel

• Memory address (if the card has one)

Once you have installed the operating system and it works diligently for six months, the first problems may begin to crop up. Now, what was the model of the hard disk? Rather than digging through a box of papers looking for the invoice, you have it right in front of you.

During the course of the installation, you will have the choice of several different installation types, from fully automatic to fully configurable. For the more advanced system administrators, the fully configurable allows you to control many different aspects of the install. Fully automatic, basically does everything for you; that is, it evaluates your system and essentially makes all the decisions itself. My recommendation is that if you are a novice administrator and there is nothing on the hard disk that you want to save, then the fully automatic is your best choice.

Preparing for the Worst

One thing that many administratorÕs donÕt plan for is the possibility that things will go wrong. Although, good planning and preparation can prevent many disasters, the most devastating are obviously the ones that you are not prepared for. When doing an upgrade, there will come a point in which backing out is no longer possible. If the new operating system doesnÕt boot and you cannot go back to the old one, then you have problems.

One problem that I have had personal experience with is third party device drivers. Although the installation notes for the driver might say that it is for SCO UNIX 3.2. version 4.0 and later, this may not be true. If it is an older card, then what they mean by Òand laterÓ is SCO UNIX 3.2 version 4.2 (ODT). In the case of the network card I had it wasnÕt true. What I had was an NE2000 compatible that worked fine in ODT. However, it gave me errors when I tried to relink it under OpenServer.

The problems that my brother encountered were much more dramatic. He has a third party filesystem compression software on his system that he uses for his /u filesystem. Although this is a very stable product and he is completely satisfied with it, the version he has was incompatible with OpenServer. As a result, when he tried to relink, it failed. He then tried to load the backup software he had, only to discover that the install script did not work correctly with the OpenServer custom. The choice was either to wait until he got the OpenServer version of the backup software or reinstall ODT. Since his work depends on timely access to his data, his only choice was to re-install. Since he had a complete backup of his system, he was running again within a couple of hours.

This story illustrates two important issues when doing an upgrade. First, be prepared for the possibility that your third party drivers will not work. It is possible that the device was unsupported in ODT, but is now supported in OpenServer. Installing the manufacturerÕs driver may not only be unnecessary, it may cause problems. Check the SCO Hardware Compatibility Guide (available on the SCO Web site) or with the hardware vendor.

Keep in mind that the compression software is not a ÒdeviceÓ in the traditional sense, despite having drivers. Therefore, you will not find it in the SCO Hardware Compatibility Guide. The best thing to do in cases like this is to talk to the vendor directly.

The other issue is that you must have a complete backup of your system before you start. In my brotherÕs case, he did have a complete backup. The problem was that the backup software didnÕt work in OpenServer. However, since he was prepared before he started the upgrade and had a complete backup, he was running again within a short time. No matter what goes wrong, these backups can get you running again.

One suggestion is to either have the new version of the backup software on hand and make sure that it is compatible with OpenServer or use some SCO tool like tar or cpio. Both the tar and cpio in OpenServer can read the backups created in ODT.

If you have access to CompuServe, you might want to consider downloading the demo copy of Lone-Tar from Library 8. This works with both ODT and OpenServer. This is a demo with a limited lifespan, but not limited functionality. I think you might be pleased enough with it to use it as your standard backup tool.

Doing the Install

Provided in the back of this book you have a CD and a boot disk. For those of you familiar with Open Desktop, you will find that one of the most startling differences between OpenDesktop 3.0 and OpenServer is that OpenServer only boots with a single floppy. I have been doing installs for years. There is supposed to be an N1 and N2 floppy, right? The kernel is almost the size of an entire floppy, so how can you get the kernel and the necessary programs to do an install on less than two floppies? You compress them!

Not only is the kernel compressed, but so are the installation programs. Although a certain amount of time needs to be spent decompressing things, the kernel is uncompressed as it is being loaded. Since you do not have to switch floppies and begin loading that as well, the time you gain more than compensates for the time needed to decompress things. A RAM disk is created and the root filesystem image is loaded into the RAM disk. Like the kernel, this filesystem image is compressed to get it to fit on the floppy. Note that although the files on the floppies are compressed, it is not a compressed filesystem.

When it finally comes time to do the install, the first step is gathering all the documentation together. This includes not only all of the SCO doc but all the handbooks (pamphlets?) that came with your hardware. The next thing to get is a notebook. Here you record all the details about your system configuration. Since you havenÕt installed anything, yet, now is a good time to start writing things down. This is the perfect opportunity to write down manufacturer, model, and settings of all the hardware. This is valuable information if you run into problems, either during the install or later. You should also write down the vendor support number if itÕs available. Here, again, having everything in one place will save you time later.

Another thing that you absolutely must do is check the hardware configuration through the systems CMOS, PCI setup or EISA config, depending on what kind of system you have. Note that PCI and EISA allow you to configure the cards through the system and not directly on the card. You don't need to guess as what the card is configured at as the setup will show exactly what it is set to. Also, don't expect the operating system to see the hardware if the configurations programs don't.

Next is the checklist that we talked about earlier. Having a completed installation checklist has a couple of benefits. First, it can be a real time saver during the installation. You donÕt have to keep bouncing around between the doc and hardware or scratching your head thinking about what a good value for each entry would be. YouÕve made all the decisions before and now you just fill in the blanks. You are therefore less likely to input mistakes or guess at what you should answer. In addition, this ÒforcesÓ you to plan out the upgrade before you start.

The installation is started by inserted the boot disk and booting your machine. You will then see a prompt on you screen that looks like this:

Boot:

If you do not have any boot time loadable drivers (see below) you can continue simply by pressing return. This will load and run the kernel the floppy and then start the Installation Query Manager (IQM). The IQM is a graphic interface to the installation process. You will be ask a series of questions about the type of installation you want to do, the software you want to install and then configuration parameters based on the software you chose to install. In the following sections we will cover the various sets of questions you will be asked and some of the more common responses.

When you boot from the floppy during the installation, one of the first things you need to consider are Boot-Time Loadable Drivers (BTLD). These are drivers for hardware that is not supported by SCO on the release you are currently installing. However the vendor provides the appropriate drivers which are then linked into the kernel at boot time. These are not necessarily drivers for hardware that you install after the OS is finished, but rather for hardware that you need during the installation. A good example would be the host adapter that your root hard disk is installed on. However, the mechanism used to install BTLDs is not just restricted to the installation. You can install a BTLD at any time. These are just drivers that are loaded at boot time, not just install time. For more details, see the section on BTLDs.

When the kernel has finished loading and the root filesystem is uncompressed, the Installation Query Manager (IQM) is started. Although the IQM in OpenServer is conceptually the same as that for ODT, the new one is much more extensive in terms of both what areas are asked as well as the depth of information you can provide. Once you finish answering the questions, the IQM does the rest of the work.

One very important thing you need to be aware of is that the OpenServer installation does not prompt you to install the release supplement like it does in ODT. You must, instead, go through the Software Manager to install new software. This is very important as the Release Supplement contains the latest corrections to known problems (in English: bug fixes). One thing to keep in mind is that when you add the release supplement in OpenServer, you select ÒApply PatchÓ and not ÒAdd New Software.Ó

If somewhere during the installation you run into a snag and have to restart the installation, you need to be careful. For example, you may get halfway through the installation and realize you did not leave any room for a /u filesystem. So, you need to restart. The problem, depending on how far youÕve gotten, is that if you power off and reboot from the installation floppy, the system will recognize that it has already reached a particular point and continue on from there. In order to get the system to restart the install from the beginning, you need to enter ÒrestartÓ at the Boot: prompt.

Boot-Time Loadable Drivers

As their name implies Boot-Time Loadable Drivers (BTLDs) are drivers that are loaded at boot-time. This provides a very effective means of adding drivers to the system that are not contained within the normal distribution. These can be drivers provided by hardware vendors and on occasion, by SCO. Previous versions of SCO provided a BTLD disk with serverl drivers necessary for the installation. In most cases, BTLDs come from third party vendors and are used to support devices that you need to install from, such as SCSI host adapters. (If you donÕt need it to install the OS, why not wait until later to install that driver?) Despite this generality, BTLDs can be loaded any time you boot.

You can install the BTLD during the installation when you first start the system by adding the string link to the boot prompt. Without any arguments, the system will prompt you for the name of the package. After the kernel loads, it will prompt you for the floppy containing the BTLD you specified. Alternatively, you can input link=pkg where pkg is the name of the driver you want to link in. In this case, the system will not prompt you again for the name, but will prompt for the disk. If necessary, the system may also prompt you for parameters, such as IRQ or DMA of the card you are installing.

As an example, let's assume I have a Wonder Works host adapter. The package name is ÒwwhaÓ. The boot string would look like this:

Boot: link=wwha

After the kernel has loaded (but before it starts to execute) the /link program is run. This prompts me to insert the floppy disk containing the BTLD I specified. Next I may be prompted to input values to configure that hardware, such as base address, DMA channel, and interrupt vector. If I input values that conflict with existing hardware, link will scream at me and give me instructions on what I can do to correct the problem.

If you have multiple BTLDs that you wish to load, you can specify them all at the Boot: prompt. The system will then prompt you for each driver, in turn. For example, if you have the wwha and fyha, the bootstrings would look like this:

Boot: link="wwha fyha"

Note that you need to include all the drivers between the double quotes. You can also specify the link command on its own, in which case you will prompt for the names of the package(s) that should be linked.

One common misconception is that once you have added the driver at boot time, then the driver is part of your system for keeps. Well, it is until the next time you relink your kernel. The problem is that the driver is linked into the kernel that is being loaded, but is not made part of your link kit. The next time you reboot, the driver is gone. To get the driver into the link kit and into all subsequent kernels, you need to run the installpkg utility. Here you are prompted to insert the disk containing the BTLD. At this point, all subsequent relinks will include the new driver.

On the other hand, the installation of both ODT and OpenServer should prompt you to reinsert the BTLD disk to add it to the link kit. If so, it becomes part of the system for good. However, if you are not prompted, you will need to run installpkg. You are prompted to insert the disk and input the name of the driver you want to install. Here, too, the system may prompt you to input certain parameters. Once the package is installed, you will need to relink the kernel. See the link_unix man-page for details.

Installation Media

The installation media is the media from where you are going to install the product. Because we have provided you with a CD-ROM, that is probably the media you are going to choose. By default, the media suggested is a SCSI tape drive. By pressing the spacebar, you will be given the list of possible media sources. Use the up and down arrow until you find the appropriate CD-ROM device.

If you select a SCSI CD-ROM you will need to select the adapter type, the SCSI ID and logical unit number (LUN) of the CD-ROM drive. (For details of what this all means, see Chapter 10, The Computer in the first book.) To move between fields, use the tab key. In each case, when you are in the appropriate field, press the space bar to get a list of options.

If you do not need a BTLD for you SCSI host adapter, the system will automatically detect it. If you have more than one? host adapter on your system, you will need to select the appropriate one. Tabel 1-2 shows you a list of more common host adapters that the system will recognize. Note that some host adapters can emulate other ones. For example, the adapter 174x can be configured to emulate a 154x. In this case you would use the 154x driver and not the 174x.

Driver	Description
ad	Adaptec 154x, 164x
eiad	Adaptec 174x
spad	Adaptec 152x
alad	Adaptec 2940x (7870 Chip)
arad	Adaptec 274x (7770 Chip)
wdha	Future Domain 7000
wdex	Future Domain 7000ex
fdha	Future Domain 1650, 1670, 1680, 600, 700 (1800 Chip)
tmcha	Future Domain 845, 850, 860, 885 (950 Chip)
efp	Olivetti ESC-1, ESC-2, and EFP Adapter Driver
sumo	Storage Plus SCSI-AT (SUMO)
dptr	DPT RAID SCSI Host Adapter Driver
hf	IBM
ciha	386/486 CBUS SCSI
mdac	Mylex Disk Array Controller
ncr	NCR 53C710 for MCA

Table 1-2 Common SCSI host adapters.

Keyboard language

In my mind, this item is somewhat of a misnomer. A better choice would be keyboard country since the layout of the keyboard is dependent on the country you are in and not the language you speak. For example, the US English keyboard is different from the British English and the German keyboard is different from the Swiss German.

In many cases where there is a difference between countries, the appropriate keyboard is listed under the adjectival form of the country name. For example, you will find the Swiss German keyboard under Swiss and not Switzerland. Additionally, there may be two types of keyboards. The standard type and PS/2. Normally the PS/2 keyboard is specifically for IBM PS/2 machines. However, I have had some non-PS/2 machines that worked better with the PS/2 keyboard.

Which one you select will determine the file that the system uses to configure your keyboard. Despite what the characters on your keyboard say, the signals the keyboard sends are the same between the keyboards of different countries. This is why you have to tell the system to behave differently based on the language of the keyboard. If you are familiar with DOS, this is what the KEYB.SYS command does. By passing it the appropriate country code, it will "convert” the signals sent by the keyboard into the appropriate letter which is then displayed on the screen.

SCO UNIX is no different in this regard. This difference is that the default translation information is stored in the file /usr/lib/keyboard/keys. In addition to that file, the /usr/lib/keyboard contains all of the translation files. When you select a language, the keys file is linked to the file appropriate for that language. Once the system is booted, you can then examine these files to see if the one selected in correct. You can then either link or copy the appropriate files. Keep in mind that you won't be able to access these files until after the installation.

If necessary, you can make changes to these files to make it fit your keyboard. Normally, this is not necessary. However, I have encountered some keyboards that are slightly different than the standard for that country.

NOTE: I would recommend that you copy the file first before making any changes.

License Information

The next step in the installation is the serialization. In OpenServer you no longer have to input your serial number and activation key. Instead you have a license number and license code. In some cases (with certain upgrades), there is license data provided that must also be input during the installation. This is useful information to have when you need to call support, particularly if you donÕt already have a support contract.

The License Number is a unique number that identifies each SCO product. Along with it is the License Code, which is used to activate the product. For some products, this is enough. However, for the products provided with the Free SCO, you also get a fairly long string of characters, which is the Licensing Data.

The screen looks like Figure 0-1. All of this information is case sensitive, so it is essential that you type it in correctly. All three of these are provided to you when you register on the SCO Web site. Note that the numbers listed in the example are invalid. Therefore, you can't use them to install.

Figure 0-1 FreeSCO Installation - License Screen

Installation Type

Depending on what you already have on your system, you have a choice between a Fresh install and an Upgrade. The odds are that you will be required to do an Upgrade. I have installed the FreeSCO several times with existing systems on the disk an each time I was told that my system was "not suitable” for an upgrade.

The fresh install will overwrite any existing root filesystem you have. However, you can choose to keep the current sizes of your partitions and filesystems. However, your root filesystem will still get overwritten. That means that all user and configuration information will be gone.

In order to save time, many system administrators chose the upgrade option. Although this upgrade functionality has improved considerably since previous releases, it canÕt catch everything. There are many hardware and software products that become unusable after an upgrade and must be reinstalled. In the end, the administrator spends more time cleaning up from the upgrade than was saved by not doing a fresh install.

The alternative is doing an overwrite. This essentially removes all third party drivers and other products installed on the root filesystem as this is completely overwritten. However, it is somewhat faster than a fresh install. The problem is that there is no overwrite option for OpenServer. You either upgrade or do a fresh install.

Personally, IÕm not bothered by this. When I do an installation it is always a fresh install. Experience has taught me that the best way to avoid problems is not to let them happen. By doing a fresh install, I am much more aware of the effects each action has on my system. It may take longer initially. However, I am saved grief in the long run.

When you do a fresh install, you must ask some key questions. First, how should the disk be partitioned? If you have only one operating system, then using the entire disk for SCO is reasonable. If not, you need to consider how much will be used for each. The installation procedure of both ODT and OpenServer asks you how big you want different partitions to be. Despite that fact, there is still the question of, Òhow big?Ó

One thing to consider is what other software is going to be installed. Some database applications require an entire partition for its own purposes. Others may require their own filesystem. IÕve talked with customers who, after installing the OS discovered that they did not leave the necessary room for their application. They frantically call support asking for some way to change the partition and filesystems without having to reinstall. The answer is no. Therefore, know what your application expects before you start installing the operating system.

The next thing to consider is what other operating systems you are going to install. Although you can create the partitions for other operating systems during the SCO installation, it is much better to install them first and then SCO. You can get away with installing DOS after SCO;, however, if you are going to install OS/2, Windows NT, or Windows 95, these should be installed first. The reason is that they write the partition table differently than SCO or DOS, making the SCO partition inaccessible.

If you are planning to install DOS, you will still be limited to the 32MB partition size if you are still running MS-DOS 3.3. DonÕt use any version of MS-DOS 4.x. This doesnÕt work well with SCO partitions. If you have anything after MS-DOS 5.0, then the partition size can be anything greater than 3Mb. Keep in mind that if you plan to use DOS DoubleSpace or some other disk compression software, the compressed partition will not be accessible by SCO utilities such as doscp, nor will you be able to mount the DOS filesystem. Also pay attention to which partition is active. I have talked with many customers who have overwritten one or the other partitions. Both DOS and SCO install to the active partition. If you install one and then install the other without first making the other partition active, you end up overwriting the first operating system.

Since DOS can be installed after SCO, some people do. Even if you do remember to switch the active partition prior to installing DOS, some people forget about this later. They are used to booting systems with both DOS and SCO and seeing the SCO Boot: prompt. When the system boots directly into DOS, they have a heart attack and end up calling SCO Support. The way to correct this problem is to simply use DOSÕs fdisk to change the active partition to the UNIX partition.

Also keep in mind that when the SCO installation routines create the partitions, thatÕs all they are doing: creating them. They are not formatting the partition. You must use native DOS programs to do that. Even the dosformat command will not format a DOS partition. This partitioning is done by the fdisk command, although you donÕt actually see it doing its work.

When considering the UNIX partition size, you need to also consider the swap and filesystem sizes as well. The size of your swap space needs to be considered carefully. The absolute minimum size is slightly more than the amount of RAM you have. The reason is that if the system should panic, it will dump all of the memory to your swap device. If you do not have a large enough swap space, then you will not get a valid dump image, and it makes tracking down the cause of the crash more difficult. The extra amount is needed to write crash data if the system panics. By increasing it by a megabyte you donÕt lose too much space.

Another very important reason for having enough swap is that the kernel will only use as much RAM as it has swap space for. The reason is because there may be a case where a single process needs to take up all of the available RAM. Therefore all of the other processes must be swapped out. If there is not enough swap space, the system runs into trouble.

IÕve seen references that say swap should be one-and-a-half to two times the amount of RAM. Personally, I think this is too much, without a good reason. The swap space should be considered a safety net, not an integral part of your memory system. If you are swapping, performance will suffer. If you think you will need the extra swap space, then consider buying more RAM. That way, you are less likely to swap in the first place.

However, you need to consider growth. If you expect to be increasing your RAM in the future, you should consider this when setting how much space you are going to use for swap. RAM just slides into your system. Increasing swap may require reinstalling the operating system. So, how much do you assign to swap? Good question. My suggestion is twice as much as RAM. The Ògood reasonÓ I mentioned above is that it is easier to do it now and waste the space than to reinstall later. Another good reason is when there is more than one user running graphical applications. In this case, setting swap to two times RAM is reasonable. If you have all the space taken up on the primary hard disk, you can add a hard disk and use the swap command to add additional swap space.

You also need to keep in mind that swapping takes up system resources. The time to access the hard disk is hundreds of times slower than the time to access RAM. Therefore, if speed is an important consideration, you should think about having enough RAM so you donÕt swap.

At this point you also want to consider additional filesystems. With OpenServer, things are complicated already. The first question is how big you want your boot filesystem to be (/dev/boot). This holds a few files and a couple of copies of the kernel. Therefore, it doesnÕt need to be too big. However, you need to consider how much the kernels can grow. If you have a 3Mb kernel, then 5Mb for /dev/boot is not enough. However, making it 50Mb is going overboard to the other extreme. Personally, I think 10Ð15Mb gives you room for a larger kernel, but also gives you room to grow. However, you need to consider that there will probably be at least three kernels here. (15Mb is the default.)

One engineer at SCO mentioned to me that he uses 25Mb. This is because he does a lot of testing and has several different versions of the kernel. Therefore, if you do a lot of tinkering with your system, you may also need a larger /dev/boot filesystem.

The next question is whether you should make additional filesystems. If your application requires a filesystem to itself (usually a raw division), then you definitely need to create it. What about a /u or /home filesystem for your users? There are advantages to having one as well as advantages to not having one.

If you have one, it is easier to come up with a backup schedule if you donÕt want to do a full back-up of the system every night. For example, you could back up the whole system once a week, and the /u filesystem with the data every night. In addition, most of the hard disk activity is on the root filesystem. If your data is there and a head crash occurs, you can lose data. By moving your data to another part of the disk, you decrease the likelihood of data loss.

The disadvantage of a separate filesystem is that system accounts such as root or sys have their home directories in /usr. If you put other users in /u or /home, the home directories are in two different places. This may not be such a problem if the system accounts rarely, if ever, log in. The other problem is that creation of the filesystem does not mean that it gets mounted automatically (at least not in ODT). As a result, customers end up calling to SCO Support saying that half their disk is missing. They had created the filesystem, but didnÕt run mkdev fs to have it get mounted. Although it is mentioned in the ODT doc that you need to do this, finding it requires that you either know the problem or read the doc cover to cover. OpenServer corrected the problem by asking if you want to create the appropriate entries to automatically mount the filesystem.

The other problem is that the default is to create user home directories in /usr. Therefore, you need to change the HOME_DIR variable in /etc/default/authsh on ODT and in /etc/default/accounts on OpenServer. Personally, I think itÕs a good idea to have data on a separate filesystem and keep the root filesystem as static as possible. This makes backup schedules easier, and there is less chance of corruption as the root filesystem is usually the busiest and therefore has a greater potential for corruption.

System Information

The System Information is, as it's name implies, basic information about your system (see Figure 0-2). The first item is the system name. This is the name you are going to call your system. In other words, the host name. However, this is just the host name, not the fully qualified domain name (FQDN). The FQDN is created by taking the system/host name and adding it to the next item: the domain name. This will normally be of the form domainname.com, domainname.edu, or domainname.org. Both of these entries are fairly easy to change, so if you are not sure what to input, you can leave them at the defaults. For more information on domain names, see the section on the Domain Name System in Chapter 9, Talking to other Machines, in the first book.

Figure 0-2 FreeSCO Installation - Basic System Information

Next is the security profile, which determines how secure your system will be. There are four levels available, the default being traditional. This is what you would normally find on a UNIX system. Less secure is the low security profile. More secure is the improved security. This is comparable to a C2 level of security. At the top is high security, which imposes even more restriction than are required by C2. For details see the security section in chapter 4 "Users and User Accounts” in the first book.

One thing to keep in mind is that you can change the security level. However, you can never increase security. When created, each user is given a security profile, which describes the access they have. Unless you specifically change this, the security profile will be kept even if you change levels. So, if you are at a low security level and increase it, there will be users still at the lower level. My recommendation is that for home use, when you are not allowing users from the outside and not providing any Internet services, then either traditional or low security is a good choice.

The Timezone entry is used to set the time zone. Here you can select the geographical area you are in (such as North America, Europe, Asia) and the name of the time zone (EST, CET). There is also an entry to set whether daylight savings time is used in your area.

Preparing your disk

This section of the installation process allows you to configure your hard disk prior to installing the software. Here you select exactly how much of the hard disk the system should take for UNIX. Additionally, you definejust what software the system should install.

Hard Disk Setup.

In the hard disk setup portion, you need to be especially careful if you have existing partitions. The default is "UNIX Only” (see Figure 0-3). This means that the system will create a single UNIX partition, no matter what else is on the disk. Another option is "Customize”, which allows you to specify how large each partition will be. Although the partition table can hold four entries, you can only create three partitions at this point (UNIX, DOS and OTHER). Here, you also create the size of the filesystems within your UNIX partition.

Figure 0-3 FreeSCO Installation - Harddisk Preparation

The last alternative is Interactive fdisk/divvy. The fdisk command is used to partition the hard disk (just like the DOS FDISK.EXE program). The divvy command is used to create divisions within a partition in which the filesystems are created.

To change the hard disk layout, using the cursor keys to move the line labeled "Hard disk setup”. Then press the space bar to bring up the window in Figure 0-4.

Figure 0-4 FreeSCO Installation - Harddisk Setup

After you partition the disk, the system asks what type of disk scan to select. Here, the system will check for problems on the disk. You have two characteristics to choose from. First, you are given the choice between a Thorough and a Quick scan. As one would guess, a thorough scan takes longer than a quick scanÑseveral times longer. However, it is more reliable since the data is read and written more often.

You also choose between a destructive and nondestructive scan. A nondestructive scan reads the data first and then writes back whatever was there originally. A destructive scan writes a known pattern of bytes on the disk first and then reads it. This is obviously destructive because whatever was on that track is overwritten by this pattern. This is more reliable because you always know what the data is supposed to be. Assume the track is not ÒbadÓ just ÒflakyÓ; that is, only sometimes it is read incorrectly. With a nondestructive scan, you could have read in corrupt data if you write it back and read it again. You donÕt know what is correct.

The moral? If there is any question about the integrity of the hard disk, then do a thorough, destructive scan. I say it three times: Destructive means destructive. Destructive means destructive. Destructive means destructive. I have had a number of calls from customers who did a thorough, destructive scan of the complete hard disk, only to find the data on the second filesystem (which they had hoped to preserve across the installation) was gone. Their interpretation of destructive was anything from, Òdestroying the bad tracksÓ toÓIÕm not a techie. How should I know?Ó

If badtrk finds a problem in the first few tracks of the partition, you are returned to fdisk, so you can repartition the disk around these bad spots. If you have an IDE drive and it appears that your hard disk is full of bad tracks, it probably isn't. Instead, the hard disk parameters might be off, so the system is having trouble accessing the hard disk. You will have to restart the installation and ensure that the system has the correct hard disk parameters. (I specifically mention IDE as I have never seen this happen on a SCSI drive.)

When badtrk finishes, you are prompted for the number of entries to put in the badtrk table. Always put in as many as are recommended, if not more. If sometime in the future your disk develops problems and you need a lot of entries in the table, it can get filled up. Once itÕs full, there is nothing to do with additional bad tracks. The only solution is to reinstall. To calculate the amount of space lost, multiply the number of entries in the badtrk table by the sectors per track, then by 512 bytes per sector.

If you are planning to have UNIX take up the entire disk, then leave the option as "UNIX Only”. If this is a new disk or you want to change the partitions on an existing system, you want the "Customize” option. Be careful! Once the system has changed the partition table and begun installing UNIX, there is usually no way to get you other systems back. Therefore, if you choose the "Customize” option and change the partition sizes, you will either have to install the other system from scratch or restore from backups.

For existing systems that you want to leave alone, the Interactive fdisk/divvy option is the best. Here, you can leave the partitions alone and simply configure the divisions/filesystem on the UNIX partition.

My suggestion is that you simply accept the system defaults. The system will create three divisions. The boot division will contain the files and program necessary to boot your system. This is created in the first division (division 0). In division 1, the system creates your swap space. The swap space is used as sort of a temporary holding area when you start running out of physically memory (For details, see chapter 5 of the first book "The Operating System and its Environment.”) This should be at least the same size as the amount of RAM you have. If you have 16Mb or less and plan to run a lot of graphical programs, the swap space should be closer to twice the site of RAM.

In division 2, the system creates the root filesystem, which take up almost all of the remain space in the partition. (The rest is used for housekeeping purposes.)

Depending on what options you previously selected and whether or not there are already any filesystems, you may be asked if you want to preserve the layout of the divisions. If you say "no” the system will decide on some decent default. You may then also be asked if you want a separate /u filesystem. This is a good idea if you will have a lot data on your system. It is easier to backup and is safer if your data is in a separate filesystem.

During the installation it is the divvy program that divides the partition into divisions and then calls mkfs to create the filesystems on those divisions. Although there are eight entries in the division table, the last one (division 7) is reserved and is used to reference the entire partition. If you have a large enough disk, division 6 might be reserved as well. This is the scratch device that is used by fsck.

The filesystems created on the root hard disk are dependent on which OS you are installing. On ODT, the first division (division 0) is for the root filesystem. However, on OpenServer, the first filesystem is /dev/boot which contains the file necessary to boot. The root filesystem is on the third division. In both cases, the swap division is in division 1. Additional filesystems are created after the systems filesystems.

If you choose "fully configurable” or "interactive fdisk/divvy” as your installation type, you can change the starting and ending blocks, and therefore the sizes of the filesystems and get around any defaults created by the system. Here you can also name the filesystems to anything you want. However, I would not change the name of any of the system filesystems. You can also add a filesystem here. If so, you need to ensure that you create it as well. This will run mkfs to create the superblock and inode table. Note that the maximum filesystem size that you can create is 1TB for both DTFS (Desktop File System) and HTFS (High Throughput File System), and 2GB for other filesystems.

Some of you might see this statement as being incorrect. The SCO doc says that the HTFS can only be 512Gb. The word I got from an SCO engineer is that this is incorrect. Both can handle 1TB. For more details on filesystems see Chapter 6 of the first book "Files and Filesystems.”

Software

By default, almost the entire SCO OpenServer Desktop product and the associated documentation is selected for installation. Exceptions are the Lan Manager Client, the SCO Gateway for Netware, and the Language Support (French and German). All told, this comes out to 163MB (see Figure 0-3). When you add the space for the boot filesystem and for swap, you are close to, if not over, 200MB. If you select all the product, including those that are not selected by default, you hit 200Mb just for the software.

If disk space is scarce, you might want leave off some of the packages. Within the "Operating System Services” there is very little that you should leave out. If necessary, and not needed, you could leave off UUCP, the Calendar Utilities, Internationalization, and the Enhanced Mail Readers. However, this only saves you about 8MB.

To change the software to be installed, select the entry labeled "Optional Software” and press the space bar. This will bring up Figure 0-5. To select the product from which you want to leave our software, move up and down with the cursor and then press the space bar.

Figure 0-5 FreeSCO Installation - Optional Software

Assuming we had decided to not install certain parts of the connectivity software, pressing the space bar on the Connectivity entry would bring up the screen shown in Figure 0-6. Here, too, you move up and down with the arrow key. Pressing the space bar shows you the available choices.

Figure 0-6 FreeSCO Installation - Selecting Software

If you really need to save space, consider leaving off the entire graphical environment. This comes out to about 60MB, and if you are using your machine simple as a Internet Server and will not be surfing the Web yourself from this machine, this is a good thing to leave off.

If you are really tight for space, them my suggestion is to leave off the Graphical Environment, Connectivity, the Documentation and the Language Support. This leaves you with about 70MB of software. Once the system is installed, you can go back and install what you need. This is done with the Software Manger, which is part of SCOAdmin, which will give you much finer control over what you install.

Often, I often leave out the documentation to save time, even if I have enough space. Once I am up and running, I can add the doc at my leisure. I will often bring the system up into multi-user mode and configure users or printers while I am installing the doc. Depending on the system and time constraints, I may even leave off packages like X or TCP. However, this is really only an issue with floppies or tapes. If I have a CD-ROM, itÕs easier to install everything and then later remove the pieces I donÕt want. On the other hand, I often start the install and then go have lunch. If you have a fast system (including a fast CD-ROM drive) you can get the whole system, including documentation installed in about 30 minutes.

Configuring Optional Software

Depending on what software you have installed, you will need to configure different aspects of your system. The first entry is the network card. If you have not installed the network software, both this entry and the next one (network address) will say "No networking software” and you will not be able to configure them.

Figure 0-7 FreeSCO Installation - Configuring Optional Software

If you have installed the networking software, you can either select a network card or leave it as deferred. This means that although the network software should be installed, you are going to wait until later to install the network card. In that event, you cannot configure the network address at this point.

When choosing your network card, the SCO documentation says that the more common cards will be recognized by the autodetect mechanism. The alternative is to manually select it. Although my card (3COM 3C509 Combo) is listed, it is not automatically detected. Just because it is not automatically detected, does not mean there is something wrong with the card. You just need to select it manually. This shouldn't cause any problems, but you should be aware of the possibility that your card might not be detected although it is in good working order. (An engineer at SCO explained to me that the reason for this is that SCO scans more effectively for PCI and EISA cards than it does for ISA, which is what this card is.)

Depending on what card you have, you may need to input configuration information such as the base address, IRQ, shared RAM address, and so on. It is normally at this point that I am glad that I have my checklist and don't need to go hunting through a stack of papers.

If you have selected a card, you can then configure your network settings. Again, depending on what software you have installed, you will need to input TCP/IP parameters or IPX/SPX parameters. If you are not sure of the values, leave them at "deferred” and configure them later using scoadmin.

Next is the video and graphics system. The default is simply VGA graphics and is sufficient to get you running. If you want, you can select the card you have, assuming it appears in the list. If not, you should try to find the chipset that your card uses. It may not be sufficient to pick a video card that's "close” to the one you have. For example, I have a Miro Crystal 22S video card. There is a Miro Crystal 20SD and a Miro Crystal 32S card listed. Neither of these work properly. Instead, I had to choose the chipset the card has.

What video modes are available to you will depend on the video card selected. Which you select will depend on the monitor (and of course the card). In some cases, you may be presented options that are not really workable. For example, you might be presented the option of 1280x1024 and 64K colors. However, if this only works with 4MB of video RAM and all you have is 2MB, you might get something on your screen, but it won't look right.

The same sort of thing applies for your monitor that applies to your video card. Close does not mean correct. However, if you do not find the monitor you have, there are options such as ‘other 17”' (monitors) which work fine. If you are not sure about any of these values, simply defer the installation until after the system is installed and run mkdev graphics.

One aspect of the OpenServer installation that I am very grateful for is asking me whether I want scologin enabled by default or not. I donÕt. Although it is easy enough to disable it (scologin disable), I was annoyed at someone thinking that they knew better and that I would ÒnaturallyÓ want it enabled. I want the choice of starting X (using startx) when I go into multi-user mode or not. (Interestingly enough, I almost always go into X. Old habits are hard to break.)

Back on the optional software screen, the next item is the mouse configuration. There is not much to say about this other than you need to know what kind of mouse you have and how it is configured. If you are not sure (you should be sure because you filled out the checklist, right?), then you can defer the installation until later. Once the system is installed, run mkdev mouse to configure it. Note that you cannot start the X-Windowing System without the mouse being configured.

Lastly there is your Email system. The default is MMDF. This is much easier to configure than the alternative, sendmail. However, it is much less configurable. That is, there is less that you can do with MMDF than you can with sendmail. If you are setting up an Internet server and expecting a bit of email, I would suggest sendmail.

Root Password

Until your system is fully configured and on a network, setting the root password is basically a matter of choice. However, the moment that someone can gain unobserved access to your system is the time to use a good password. In the section on security, I go into some details about what makes a good password.

Hard Disk Setup

If you chose an interactive fdisk/divvy, you are brought into a couple of programs to set up the hard disk. If you have a non-SCSI hard disk, you will be first brought into dkinit. This is used to set the parameters of your hard disk. The dkinit program reads it from the BIOS, therefore the parameters you input into the BIOS have to be correct. Many BIOSes will have an automatic setting that can read the hard disk to determine the configuration. However, this only works if supported by the hard disk.

If you are not sure of what the parameters are, do not guess. You may get the system installed, but there are no guarantees as to how long it will last before trouble starts. Many of the hard disk vendors have the specification of their current products on the Web. Since you need the Web to get your license information, you shouldn't have a problem getting the hardware setup.

One thing to watch out for is that the computer BIOS cannot handle more than 1024 cylinders. Larger drives (usually >1GB) may have more. Therefore, the drive will trick the BIOS by changing what it tells the drive its parameters are. For instance, it might tell the BIOS it has half as many cylinders but twice as many heads. This works out to be the same number of bytes on the drive, but you do not run into the 1024 cylinder limitation. Since the hard disk controller is making the translation, you have to make SCO think that the configuration is the same as in the BIOS. If the hard disk controller is in this "translation” mode, it will automatically translate for you.

After dkinit comes the fdisk program, which is used to create your partitions. Note that if you already have an existing system, you can still leave everything the way it is even if fdisk is started. The menu presented is shown in Figure 0-8: Option 1 allows you to display the current partition table (Table 0\3). You will see that the table includes the type of partition and whether it is active or not, along with the starting and ending tracks and the size of the partition.

1. Display Partition Table

2. Use Entire Disk for UNIX

3. Use Rest of Disk for UNIX

4. Create UNIX Partition

5. Activate Partition

6. Delete Partition

7. Create Partition

Enter your choice or 'q' to quit:

Figure 0-8 fdisk menu

There are a couple of things to watch out for. First, the size of the partition is in tracks. In order to convert from tracks to a value that we humans can understand (such as bytes), we need to know how our hard disk is configured. This includes the number of cylinders, heads, and most importantly, sectors per track. By multiplying the number of tracks times the number of sectors per track by 512 (number of bytes per sector) we know how many bytes there are.

At the bottom of the table is the number of total tracks there are for the hard disk. By using the formula above, your can figure out how large your hard disk is. If this does not match what you expect (e.g. you calculate 500MB for a 1GB drive) then the system does not see the drive the way that it should. This is normally the case for new, IDE drives that have not been set up correctly in the CMOS.

To figure out the size of each partition, simply use the formula on the number of tracks listed in the size column. If you wanted to figure out how much free space is available, you could add up all the size entries and subtract that from the total number of tracks for the hard disk. Then use the value in the formula to see how much free space is available.

Although not too common, free space does not necessary mean the largest possible partition. You may have gaps between the partitions and because you can only have four partitions, you might not be able to use all the space. If you have multiple partitions, check the end track of one partition with the start of the next. However, the next partition physically on the drive may not necessarily be the next in the table. For example, fdisk on one of my systems shows a partition table that looks like Table 0\1.

Partition	Status	Type	Start	End	Size
1	Inactive	UNIX	1	25279	25279
2	Inactive	UNIX	62080	74815	12736
3	Inactive	DOS(32)	25280	41535	16256
4	Active	UNIX	41536	62079	20544

Table 0\3 An example fdisk table

If you compare the start and end tracks, the partitions are laid out physically: 1,3,4,2. This is the result of repeated installations of different operating systems, changing partitions sizes and the like. There is nothing inherently wrong with this. However, I need to be careful not to leave gaps myself.

Another thing you need to be careful with is the active partition. In the previous example, partition 4 is active and it is of type UNIX. This is where the system will create the divisions and filesystems. As you can see, I have three UNIX partitions and the system doesn't really care where is installs. Therefore, I need to be sure I am installing to the correct one.

Once you have defined your partitions, you are brought into divvy to create the filesystems and divisions (see Table 0\4). If your partition is large enough, the system will ask you if you want a separate /u filesystem. You will also have the opportunity to make changes to the values that the system suggests.

Name	Type	New FS	#	First Block	Last Block
boot	EAFS	no	0	0	14999
swap	NON FS	no	1	15000	47000
root	HTFS	no	2	47001	327669
	NOT USED	no	3	-	-
	NOT USED	no	4	-	-
	NOT USED	no	5	-	-
	NON FS	no	6	327670	327679
hd0a	WHOLE DISK	no	7	0	328703

327680 1K blocks for divisions, 1024 1K blocks reserved for the system

Table 0\4 Example divvy table

In my case, I did not want a separate /u filesystem and the defaults are usually fine. However, I always say that I want block by block control over the sizes of the filesystems so that I can double check to see that I didn't mis-type anything in a previous screen.

Note that the sizes here are 1KB blocks. Therefore, you do not need to make any new calculations. The system has never made a mistake as far as I have seen. However, I always check to make sure that there are no overlapping blocks. You could input overlapping values by hand, but the system will catch it. The worst case is, like the partitions, you end up with gaps and therefore lose some space.

Another thing to watch if you create new divisions here is that in the column label New FS? It says "yes”. Otherwise, the division will be listed in the division table, but the control structures that make it a filesystem will not be written. Note that for the swap division, you do not need a filesystem.

Hard Disk and Controller

The configuration of your hard disk and hard disk controller are not normally things that are asked during the installation. Unless you have some new type of controller and need a BTLD, the system will recognize it. However, it is still important to have this information handy. First, by collecting it, you can ensure that there are no conflicts and that things are configured the way you expect. For example, you may have two IDE hard disks in you system and they are both configured to be the master. This is not going to work. Having written down this information before you install, you are sure that one is master and one is slave.

Upgrading an Existing System

The fact that your computer contains an existing SCO installation presents its own set of problems. Paradoxically, one of the primary trouble spots is one of the benefits that OpenServer is providing, and that is the new filesystems. As I mentioned in the section on filesystems, the /dev/boot filesystem was introduced to not only prevent the kernel from existing above the 1024 cylinder boundary, but also because the system cannot boot from the new filesystem types. Therefore, an upgrade installation means that you cannot use any of the new filesystems as your root filesystem.

Personally, I am not bothered by this. Although I have had good experience when doing upgrades, I am not an upgrade fan. Personally, I feel that doing a fresh install is safer, particularly when the system has one or more supplements installed. Although I have never had problems, safe is safe. However, you may not have that option. There might be time or other constraints that ÒencourageÓ you to do an upgrade.

One aspect of your system that I am sure you will want to keep track of is your users. ODT provides the ap (account profile) command which allows you to save account information for every user listed in /etc/passwd. For details on this, see the OpenServer Handbook or the ap(ADM) man-page. However, there is much more information about your system that you may want to save. The OpenServer Handbook contains a list of files that may have been changed from their defaults. Keep in mind that the heading ÒFiles likely to be configuredÓ is not entirely accurate (you donÕt configure /etc/wmtp).

If you are doing an install and have third party drivers, the install is smart enough to keep from creating additional problems. Although the upgrade installation does not remove any drivers or device nodes, it does put an ÒNÓ in the /etc/conf/sdevice.d files of the drivers that it doesnÕt recognize. This way any relinks of the kernel during the installation should go smoothly. Later, you can change the Ns to Ys and try to relink. Since the drivers and device nodes are still there, the relink has a good chance of being successful.

The upgrade to OpenServer also preserves other aspects of your system such as printers, network settings, and additional filesystems. However, even if you do ÒneedÓ to do a fresh install, the system is smart enough to pull many configuration settings directly from the old system. These are provided as default values as you go through the install.

After Installation

When you finally get through the installation, the work is not over. OpenServer comes with a very complicated scheme to cut down on software piracy. This is a series of annoying messages that ÒencourageÓ you to register. Although the functionality is not obstructed when you donÕt register, you get a message on your screen every time you boot up and log in, indicating that unregistered software is installed on the system.

Software registration is accomplished in two steps. First you need to fill out the registration card with all the ÒnecessaryÓ information (including the product serial number) and send it to one of the registration centers. A short time later you will receive a registration code that turns off all those annoying messages. This is accomplished in the second step though the License Manager.

There are a couple of things to note here. Every SCO product that you install needs to be both licensed and registered. ItÕs possible to install a product and not license it. This is useful if you wish one machine to be an installation server so you can install software across the network. However, you need to license the software before it will run. It is therefore possible to have several products installed on the license server, none of which work since none of them are licensed. In the case of the FreeSCO, having gotten the license from the SCO Web server, you do not need to register it.

While you are waiting to get back your registration information, you can do something that can save you a lot of hassles later. You can make your first complete backup of the system. While youÕre at it, you can make a boot-root floppy set, just in case.

Making a boot/root floppy set is done either from the command line as mkdev fd or the Floppy Filesystem Manager in SCOAdmin. Option 2 will make both the boot and the root floppy. You can use SCO ARCServer/Open to do your backup. See the description of SCOArcServer in section on the products in FreeSCO for details.

What's Next?

Someday soon, you may decide to upgrade to a full version of the SCO OpenServer product. Maybe your company has decided to implement SCO themselves. You will then need to install the latest versions of SCO OpenServer. During the course of this project, I was able install one of the very last Beta versions of the product and there were a few things of note.

After installing the FreeSCO (or any other version of SCO), you will probably notice that there are some changes to the installation process. There are new screens in which you input new kinds of information, plus the information you previously input is somewhat re-arranged.

The first thing I noticed was that the system language is no longer queried along with the keyboard. Instead, the first piece of information you prompted to input is the keyboard and nothing more. This makes sense since the system needs to know what keyboard you have when inputting the licensing information that comes next.

Although the system insisted that I do a Fresh install, much of the information was read from the old system. The system and domain names, IP address, time zone, and so on were all filled with the previous values. However, once again the system failed to automatically detect my Ethernet card although I could manually select it from the list. (No worries as it worked fined after I rebooted.)

After the screen "Configuring the basic system”, a new screen appears: "Initial System Profile”. This indicates that software will be "pre-selected” based on the type of system you selected. The default is "Standard Enterprise system configuration” which contains all of the graphical software and is "targeted” at workstations or servers. The alternative is a "Lightweight terminal system configuration”. Even with the full version, the Lan Manger Client, SCO Gateway for Novell, and the PC Interface server are not installed, as it was in previous versions.

The screen labeled "Preparing Your Disk and Choosing Software” is something to watch out for. This is a bit different than previous releases. Not only is the screen itself different, but the options provided and the defaults are different, too. In my case, although I was "forced” to do a fresh install, I was given the default whereby the existing layout of the hard disk would be preserved. Since I want to be sure that the system does not make any false assumptions, I always choose Interactive fdisk and divvy.

This is where my first major shock appeared. Unlike previous release, the installation recognized that I had two other SCSI hard disks on the system. I was then given the chance to configure them the way I wanted. In this case, I simply left the layout as it was. However, do not get your hopes up. Even though you can configure these drives when the system installs, I have found no way to install to another disk or even mount these filesystems when the system installs (for example, to create a mountable /usr or /opt filesystem).

The Configuring Optional Software screen is also different and there are a couple of new items. Here is where you configure the system language, instead of with the keyboard. Although the system failed to autodetect my Ethernet card, my IP address, netmask, and so on where all loaded from the previous system.

Unfortunately, none of the other aspects were loaded. Instead, I had to select my video card and monitor manually. Here, I was surprised again in that my video chipset was present. In the previous release, it wasn't and I left it as IBM VGA. Later, when the system was completely installed, the chipset was in the list. This time I didn't have to wait until after I finished.

Another thing that overwhelmed me was the addition of a number of new Mangers in SCOAdmin. In all honesty, I had always thought there were a lot of things missing that should be there. The principles behind SCOAdmin are simple enough and it shouldn't be too hard to add them. Well, SCO heard me and added some very nice tools. For example, there is a Process Manager, which you can use to monitor process and even stop them if necessary. Also, in keeping with the idea of easy Internet access, there are Modem and PPP mangers.

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Copyright 1996-1998 by James Mohr. All rights reserved. Used by permission of the author.

Be sure to visit Jim's great Linux Tutorial web site at https://www.linux-tutorial.info/