Remaining Installation
This part of this process is a little more difficult, because of the limited performance of the PDP-11. Once the operating system is running, the serial ports are much less responsive, making loading files through them more tedious than before.
The first thing needed is Jonathan Engdahl's vtc.zip package, which emulates a virtual tape drive under Unix. The program is encoded as an ASCII hex file, so it can be easily transferred, then it must be converted to a binary file, once on the PDP-11. This requires transferring a couple of source files to the machine, then compiling them.
After unzipping the package, the source files will need to be transferred to the PDP-11, using a terminal emulator with some sort of pacing feature, in order slow the character rate down. After a file is transferred, check its size on the PDP. If the size is smaller than it should be, then slow down the character pacing and try again. The best way to send the files is to use cat, then paste the text to the terminal session.
The fist file is the ASCII hex to binary conversion program.
# cat > cphex.c
<== Send console input directly to cphex.c
Open cphex.c file in a text editor on your computer, such as notepad, select all and paste into the terminal session. After it has completed, enter control-D to close the file. Now, verify the file size. If the size differs, slow the character pacing on your terminal emulator, then go back and and try again.
# ls -l
total 2
-rw-r----- 1 root 913 Feb 20 22:37 cphex.c
drwxr-xr-x 2 root 1024 Jun 8 1995 lost+found
#
Next, send a copy of stdio.h to the PDP.
# cat > stdio.h
<== Send console input to stdio.h
Open stdio.h file in a text editor, select all and paste into the terminal session. After it has completed, enter control-D to close the file. Verify the file size, then compile cphex.
# ls -l
total 4
-rw-r----- 1 root 913 Feb 20 22:37 cphex.c
drwxr-xr-x 2 root 1024 Jun 8 1995 lost+found
-rw-r----- 1 root 2283 Feb 20 22:37 stdio.h
# cc -I. -o cphex cphex.c
# ls -l
total 12
-rwxr-x--x 1 root 7001 Feb 20 22:49 cphex
-rw-r----- 1 root 913 Feb 20 22:37 cphex.c
drwxr-xr-x 2 root 1024 Jun 8 1995 lost+found
-rw-r----- 1 root 2283 Feb 20 22:48 stdio.h
# cat > vtc.hex
<== Send console input to vtc.hex
Open vtc.hex in a text editor, select all and paste into the terminal session. After it has completed, enter control-D to close the file. Verify the file size, then convert it to a binary, using cphex and make it executable.
# ls -l
total 32
-rwxr-x--x 1 root 7001 Feb 20 22:49 cphex
-rw-r----- 1 root 913 Feb 20 22:37 cphex.c
drwxr-xr-x 2 root 1024 Jun 8 1995 lost+found
-rw-r----- 1 root 2283 Feb 20 22:48 stdio.h
-rw-r----- 1 root 19658 Feb 20 22:56 vtc.hex
# ./cphex vtc.hex > vtc
# ls -l
total 42
-rwxr-x--x 1 root 7001 Feb 20 22:49 cphex
-rw-r----- 1 root 913 Feb 20 22:37 cphex.c
drwxr-xr-x 2 root 1024 Jun 8 1995 lost+found
-rw-r----- 1 root 2283 Feb 20 22:48 stdio.h
-rw-r----- 1 root 9531 Feb 20 22:56 vtc
-rw-r----- 1 root 19658 Feb 20 22:56 vtc.hex
# chmod 0700 vtc
Now that vtc is on the PDP, tell it to transfer the /usr file system to the PDP. The best way is to create a shell script that transfers the various files. In my case the script looks like this:
# cat > vtcscript
./vtc 6 >adm.tar
./vtc 7 >bin.tar
./vtc 8 >crash.tar
./vtc 9 >dict.tar
./vtc 10 >doc.tar
./vtc 11 >games.tar
./vtc 12 >guest.tar
./vtc 13 >hosts.tar
./vtc 14 >include.tar
./vtc 15 >ingres.tar
./vtc 16 >lib.tar
./vtc 17 >local.tar
./vtc 18 >man.tar
./vtc 19 >msgs.tar
./vtc 20 >new.tar
./vtc 21 >old.tar
./vtc 22 >pub.tar
./vtc 23 >sbin.tar
./vtc 24 >share.tar
./vtc 25 >spool.tar
./vtc 26 >ucb.tar
./vtc 27 >file7.tar.Z
^D
# chmod 0700 vtcscript
# ./vtcscript
This transfer takes about 14 hours to complete. Once completed the files can be extracted.
# cd /usr
# tar xpf /mnt/adm.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/bin.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/crash.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/dict.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/doc.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/games.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/guest.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/hosts.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/include.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/ingres.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/lib.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/local.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/man.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/msgs.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/new.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/old.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/pub.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/sbin.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/share.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/spool.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/ucb.tar
# uncompress /mnt/file7.tar
# tar xpf /mnt/file7.tar
Now the operating system is ready to be customized.
References
- Installing and Operating 2.11BSD on the PDP-11, by Steven Schultz, June 13, 1995
- Installing (and running) BSD 2.11 on a PDP11, by Dr. Bernd Ulmann, December 28, 2011
