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Today

Indiana: VESA if you need it

Over the past week, as we kept reassembling the distro constructor, image packaging, and slim install, we tested installs on a bunch of laptops. This manual operation let me rehearse how to get things working if the Preview LiveCD doesn't have a graphics driver that will work. So: here's the VESA workaround.

Boot text mode. One of the non-default lines in the GRUB menu should say "text"—pick that one.
Login as jack. User is "jack", password is "jack".
Generate a representative xorg.conf. Become root and have Xorg generate an initial configuration. The root password is "opensolaris". (Enjoy that `root`'s default shell is 'bash' for a bit.)
```
$ su
Password:
# /usr/X11/bin/Xorg -configure
...
```
This procedure should create /jack/xorg.conf.new.
Change the driver. As root, you'll continue by editing that xorg.conf.new file in vi(1). Search for the Device section, and modify the Driver line to
```
    Driver  "vesa"
```

Make it go. Stay root and hand-launch GNOME.

# /usr/X11/bin/xinit /usr/bin/dbus-launch gnome-session -- \
        /usr/X11/bin/Xorg -config /jack/xorg.conf.new :0

Launch the installer. Bring up a terminal, and invoke the installer, by typing install-lan &.

If your install fails, please file a bug report at defect.opensolaris.org. If it succeeds, but graphics doesn't work, you can follow the same steps, but you'll have to edit the GRUB entry. (Roughly, type 'e', add "-s" to the end of the line with kernel/unix, and log in with the new root password you set during install. I haven't tested this portion—let me know if it fails.)

Last night, I had to do this for my trusty VAIO T370P, but tonight it's fine:

Please let us know how it goes.

[ T: OpenSolaris Solaris indiana pkg ]

(2007-10-31 21:26:36.0) Permalink Comments [5]