PLAN9.INI(8)PLAN9.INI(8)
NAME
plan9.ini – configuration file for PCs
SYNOPSIS
DESCRIPTION
When booting Plan 9 on a PC, the bootloader program
name=value
each of which defines a kernel or device parameter.
Blank lines and
Carriage Returns
For devices, the generic format of
type=TYPE [port=N] [irq=N] [mem=N] [size=N] [dma=N] [ea=N]
specifying the controller type, the base I/O port of the interface, its interrupt level, the physical starting address of any mapped memory, the length in bytes of that memory, the DMA channel, and for Ethernets an override of the physical network address. Not all elements are relevant to all devices; the relevant values and their defaults are defined below in the description of each device.
The file is used by the kernel to configure the hardware available.
The information it contains is also passed to the boot
process, and subsequently other programs,
as environment variables
(see
The following sections describe how variables are used.
ETHERNET
etherX=value
This defines an Ethernet interface.
Some cards are software configurable and do not require all options. Unspecified options default to the factory defaults.
Known
The Intel 8254X Gigabit Ethernet controllers, as found on the Intel PRO/1000 adapters for copper (not fiber). Completely configurable.
The Intel 8256[36], 8257[12], and 82573[ev] Gigabit Ethernet PCI-Express controllers. Completely configurable.
The Realtek 8169 Gigabit Ethernet controller. Completely configurable.
Netgear GA620 and GA620T Gigabit Ethernet cards, and other cards using the Alteon Acenic chip such as the Alteon Acenic fiber and copper cards, the DEC DEGPA-SA and the SGI Acenic. Completely configurable.
National Semiconductor DP83820-based Gigabit Ethernet adapters, notably the D-Link DGE-500T. Completely configurable.
The VIA Velocity Gigabit Ethernet controller. Known to drive the VIA8237 (ABIT AV8), but at 100Mb/s full-duplex only.
The Myricom 10-Gigabit Ethernet 10G-PCIE-8A controller. Completely configurable. Can’t boot through these due to enormous firmware loads.
The Intel 8259[89] 10-Gigabit Ethernet PCI-Express controllers. Completely configurable.
Cards using the Intel 8255[789] Fast Ethernet PCI Bus LAN Controller such as the
Intel EtherExpress PRO/100B.
Completely configurable, no options need be given.
If you need to force the media, specify
one of the options (no value)
Cards using the Digital Equipment (now Intel) 2114x PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter Controller,
for example the Netgear FA310.
Completely configurable, no options need be given.
Media can be specified the same was as for the
National Semiconductor DP83815-based adapters, notably
the Netgear FA311, Netgear FA312, and various SiS built-in
controllers such as the SiS900.
On the SiS controllers, the Ethernet address is not detected properly;
specify it with an
The Realtek 8139 Fast Ethernet controller. Completely configurable.
The VIA VT6102 Fast Ethernet Controller (Rhine II).
SMC 91cXX chip-based PCMCIA adapters, notably the SMC EtherEZ card.
The 3COM Etherlink III series of cards including the 5x9, 59x, and 905 and 905B.
Completely configurable, no options need be given.
The media may be specified by setting
The 3COM 3C589 series PCMCIA cards, including the 3C562 and the 589E. There is no support for the modem on the 3C562. Completely configurable, no options need be given. Defaults are
port=0x240 irq=10
The media may be specified as
The Linksys Combo PCMCIA EthernetCard (EC2T), EtherFast 10/100 PCMCIA cards (PCMPC100) and integrated controllers (PCM100), the Netgear FA410TX 10/100 PCMCIA card and the Accton EtherPair-PCMCIA (EN2216). Completely configurable, no options need be given. Defaults are
port=0x300 irq=9
These cards are NE2000 clones. Other NE2000 compatible PCMCIA cards may be tried with the option
id=string
where
Not software configurable iff ISA; PCI clones or supersets are software configurable; includes the Realtek 8029 clone used by Parallels. 16-bit card. Defaults are
port=0x300 irq=2 mem=0x04000 size=0x4000
The option (no value)
The AMD PCnet PCI Ethernet Adapter (AM79C970). (This is the Ethernet adapter used by VMware.) Completely configurable, no options need be given.
Includes WD8013 and SMC Elite and Elite Ultra cards. There are varying degrees of software configurability. Cards may be in either 8-bit or 16-bit slots. Defaults are
port=0x280 irq=3 mem=0xD0000 size=0x2000
BUG: On many machines only the 16 bit card works.
Broadcom BCM57xx Gigabit Ethernet controllers. Completely configurable, no options need be given.
Marvell 88e8057 Yukon2 Gigabit Ethernet controller. Completely configurable, no options need be given.
Virtual Ethernet interface provided by QEMU/KVM and VirtualBox.
No options need be given. The MAC address can be changed with the
A
Lucent Wavelan (Orinoco) IEEE 802.11b and compatible PCMCIA cards. Compatible cards include the Dell TrueMobile 1150 and the Linksys Instant Wireless Network PC Card. Port and IRQ defaults are 0x180 and 3 respectively.
These cards take a number of unique options to aid in
identifying the card correctly on the 802.11b network.
The network may be
mode=[adhoc, managed]
and defaults to
essid=string
and defaults to a null string. The card station name is given by
station=string
and defaults to
channel=number
where
If the card is capable of encryption, the following options may be used:
crypt=[off, on]
and defaults to
keyN=string
sets the encryption key
txkey=number
sets the transmit key to use to be
clear=[off, on]
configures reception and defaults to inclusion.
The defaults are intended to match the common case of a managed network with encryption and a typical entry would only require, for example
essid=left-armpit key1=afish key2=calledraawaru
if the port and IRQ defaults are used.
These options may be set after boot by writing to the device’s
echo 'key2 1d8f65c9a52d83c8e4b43f94af' >/net/ether0/0/ctl
Card-specific power management may be enabled/disabled by
pm=[on, off]
PCI Ethernet adapters that use the same Wavelan programming interface. Currently the only tested cards are those based on the Intersil Prism 2.5 chipset.
Intel Wireless WiFi Link mini PCI-Express adapters require
firmware from
echo essid left-armpit >/net/ether1/clone
Scan results appear in the
cat /net/ether1/ifstats
Ad-hoc mode or WEP encryption is currently not supported.
Ralink Technology PCI/PCI-Express wireless adapters require
firmware from
Intel PRO Wireless 3945abg PCI/PCI-Express wireless adapters require
firmware from
wpapsk=password
WPA/WPA2 encryption
is detected automatically and a prompt for the
nora6=
Disable automatic IPv6 configuration from incoming router advertisements.
DISKS, TAPES
(S)ATA controllers are autodetected.
*nodma=
disables dma on ata devices.
*sdXXdma=on
explicitly enables dma on a specific ata device.
scsiX=value
This defines a SCSI interface which cannot be automatically detected by the kernel.
Known
Adaptec 154x series of controllers (and clones). Almost completely configurable, only the
port=0x300
option need be given.
NCR/Symbios/LSI-Logic 53c8xx-based adapters and Mylex MultiMaster (Buslogic BT-*) adapters are automatically detected and need no entries.
By default, the NCR 53c8xx driver searches for up to 32 controllers.
This can be changed by setting the variable
By default the Mylex driver resets SCSI cards by using
both the hard reset and SCSI bus reset flags in the driver interface.
If a variable
aoeif=list
This specifies a space-separated
aoedev=e!#æ/aoe/shelf.slot
This specifies an ATA-over-Ethernet device accessible via the interfaces
named in
ramdiskX=size
ramdiskX=size sectorsize
ramdiskX=address size sectorsize
This reserves physical memory as a ramdisk that will appear as
AUDIO
audioX=value
This defines a sound interface. PCI based audio devices such as Intel HD audio or AC97 are autodetected and do not require any settings.
Known types are
Intel HD audio.
AC97 based card.
Sound Blaster 16.
A Sound Blaster clone.
The DMA channel may be any of 5, 6, or 7. The defaults are
port=0x220 irq=7 dma=5
UARTS
Plan 9 automatically configures COM1 and COM2, if found,
as
eiaX=disabled
This is typically done in order to reuse the IRQ for another device.
unhandled troff command .P
Additional i8250 (ISA) uarts (uart2 to uart5) can be configured using:
uartX=type=isa port=port irq=irq
Perle PCI-Fast4, PCI-Fast8, and PCI-Fast16 controllers are automatically detected and need no configuration lines.
The line
mouseport=value
This specifies where the mouse is attached.
the PS2 mouse/keyboard port. The BIOS setup procedure should be used to configure the machine appropriately.
an Intellimouse on the PS2 port.
for COM1
for COM2
modemport=value
Picks the UART line to call out on.
This is used when connecting to a file server over
an async line.
console=value params
This is used to specify the console device.
The default
console=0 b19200 po
would use COM1 at 19,200 baud with odd parity.
The value
srcip [ !srcport ] [ /devno ] , dstip [ !dstport ] [ /dstmac ]
Srcip, srcport (default 6665), dstip and dstport (default 6666) specify the source IP address, source port, destination IP address and destination port, respectively.
Devno (default 0) specifies which NIC to use, a value of n corresponds to NIC at #ln (see
console=net 192.168.0.4,192.168.0.8 console=net 192.168.2.10!1337/1,192.168.2.3!1337/0ea7deadbeef
PC CARD
pccard0=disabled
Disable probing for and automatic configuration of PC card controllers.
pcmciaX=type=XXX irq=value
If the default IRQ for the
PCMCIA
is correct, this entry can be omitted. The value of
pcmcia0=disabled
Disable probing for and automatic configuration of PCMCIA controllers.
BOOTING
bootfile=value
This is used to direct the actions of
bootargs=value
The
nobootprompt=value
Suppress the
rootdir=/root/dir
rootspec=spec
Changes the mount arguments for the root file server
that was specified by
user=value
Suppress the
service=value
Changes the systems default role. Possible
settings for
debugfactotum=
Causes
cfs=value
This gives the name of the file holding the disk partition
for the cache file system,
bootdisk=value
This deprecated variable was used to specify the disk used by
the cache file system and other disk-resident services.
It is superseded by
fs=address
auth=address
secstore=address
These specify the network address (IP or domain name)
of the file, authentication and secstore server
to use when mounting a network-provided root file system.
When not specified, then these settings are determined via DHCP.
When
PROCESSOR
*e820=type 0xstart 0xend ...
This variable is automatically generated by the boot loader (see
*maxmem=value
This defines the maximum physical address that the system will scan when sizing memory.
By default the PC operating system will scan up to 3.75 gigabytes
(0xF0000000, the base of kernel virtual address space), but setting
*kernelpercent=value
This defines what percentage of available memory is reserved for the kernel allocation pool.
The remainder is left for user processes. The default
*imagemaxmb=value
This limits the maximum amount of memory (in megabytes) the graphics image memory pool can grow. The default is unlimited for terminals and cpu servers.
*nomce=value
If machine check exceptions are supported by the processor,
then they are enabled by default.
Setting this variable to
*nomp=
A multiprocessor machine will enable all processors by default.
Setting
*ncpu=value
Setting
*apicdebug=
Prints a summary of the multiprocessor APIC interrupt configuration.
*nomsi=
Disables message signaled interrupts.
*notsc=
Disables the use of the per processor timestamp counter registers as high resolution clock.
*pcimaxbno=value
This puts a limit on the maximum bus number probed
on a PCI bus (default 7).
For example, a
*pcimaxdno=value
This puts a limit on the maximum device number probed on a PCI bus (default 31).
*nopcirouting=
Disable pci routing during boot. May solve interrupt routing problems on certain machines.
*pcihinv=
Prints a summary of the detected PCI busses and devices.
*nodumpstack=
Disable printing a stack dump on panic. Useful if there is only a limited cga screen available, otherwise the textual information about the panic may scroll off.
ioexclude=value
Specifies a list of ranges of I/O ports to exclude from use by drivers. Ranges are inclusive on both ends and separated by commas. For example:
ioexclude=0x330-0x337,0x430-0x43F
umbexclude=value
Specifies a list of ranges of UMB to exclude from use by drivers. Ranges are inclusive on both ends and separated by commas. For example:
umbexclude=0xD1800-0xD3FFF
*acpi=value
The presence of this option enables ACPI and the export of the
apm0=
This enables the “advanced power management” interface
as described in
USB
*nousbprobe=
Disable USB host controller detection.
*nousbohci=
*nousbuhci=
*nousbehci=
*nousbxhci=
Disable specific USB host controller types.
nousbrc=
Disable
nousbhname=
When defined,
VIDEO
monitor=value
vgasize=value
These are used not by the kernel but by
*bootscreen=value
This is used by the kernel to attach a pre-initialized
linear framebuffer that was setup by the bootloader
or firmware.
The
*bootscreen=800x600x32 x8r8g8b8 0x80000000 0x001d4c00
*dpms=value
This is used to specify the screen blanking behavior of the MGA4xx
video driver.
Values are
NVRAM
nvram=file
nvrlen=length
nvroff=offset
This is used to specify an nvram device and optionally the length of the ram
and read/write offset to use.
These values are consulted by
nvr=value
This is used by the WORM file server kernel to locate a file holding information
to configure the file system.
The file cannot live on a SCSI disk.
The default is
EXAMPLES
A representative
% cat /n/9fat:/plan9.ini ether0=type=3C509 mouseport=ps2 modemport=1 serial0=type=generic port=0x3E8 irq=5 monitor=445x vgasize=1600x1200x8 bootfile=/386/9pc %