PS Wireless Support, New Stages, Media, GRP

Wireless support

Well, a bit of good news! We now have a working PS3 wireless driver. To take advantage of it, you will need to have updated your PS3 firmware to the latest driver (~1.70) and grab the new new media and stages. The kernel being used is still a heavily patched version of 2.6.16. We’ll move to 2.6.2x as things firm up.

If you are an existing user, just checkout the cell overlay, emerge ps3-sources, grab the kernel.config from the files dir, and rebuild the kernel. Don’t forget to emerge wireless-tools

New Media

I have rebuilt the minimal install cd to support wireless. If you want to use wireless, here’s how it works. The wired and wireless share the same network devices (eth0) for now. So when you boot the PS3, be sure to have the Ethernet wire unplugged. The CD will make an automatic attempt to configure networking. I f (and likely when) that does not work, simply use the linux tools provided to configure your wireless connection.

You can use a command called net-setup or do a iwconfig eth0 params and then dhcpcd -d eth0.

A word of warning

The new media (iso image) has a known networking bug. There seems to be something busted between a few components where dhcpcd is not being called against network devices. You will have to run dhcpcd against the network device to force autoconfiguration. Or you can run net-setup.

New stages

I have released new 32-bit and 64-bit userland stages. One of the key components of these new stages is they are based on our 2007.0 profiles. In fact it is a based on our 2007.0/32|64bit-userland/desktop/970 profile, which should fit the use of the PS3s a little better.

As always, use the documentation found at http://overlays.gentoo.org/proj/cell .

New GRP

When I drop new stages, I always try to update the GRP repository. This should contain a whole bunch of updated userland applications like KDE, Gnome, gaim, xchat, editors, browsers, mail-clients. Have fun!

Get involved

Remember Gentoo is a community effort. We are still looking for developers who want to join our ppc64 team and be a part of supporting the architecture. You can find us at #gentoo-ppc64 on Freenode.

Gentoo PPC64 PS3 LiveCD is in BETA

I’m pleased to announce that a BETA LiveCD for PS3s and PowerMacs is making it’s way onto the Gentoo mirrors as I write this. The LiveCD can be found on the mirrors in the ppc64 experimental section. You can check out a screenshot from the LiveCD at:

http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/base/ppc64/ps3/beta.jpg

The LiveCD works on PS3s and G5 Apple PowerMacs. It contains a full Gnome desktop as well as:

  • Firefox-2x (Bon Echo)
  • Audacious
  • Xchat
  • Gaim
  • Evolution
  • Gimp-2

Among other things, we plan to add Thunderbird in the near future.

Please feel free to download and test the LiveCD; however, do not, under any circumstances, report bugs via Gentoo’s official bugzilla mechanism. I’d prefer join us on #gentoo-ppc64 to report feedback.

Note to PS3 Users

The LiveCD contains a kboot.conf file which should allow you to boot the LiveCD. Choose the label that most closely matches your TV’s resolution. This is an area where we plan to put some future enhancements.

Sound

Sound should be functional on the LiveCD. You need to unmute the master channel with the alsa-mixer application.

I would like to thank each of the following for their participation in the LiveCD creation: lu_zero, mtb, nickthecook, deadfall, wolf3l02, and mmschnei. Sorry if I missed anyone.

Merry Christmas,

Ranger

Merry Christmas and a ppc64 New Year

I would first like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas, peace on earth, etc. That said, there has been a resurgence of activity with Gentoo for PPC64. We have been actively working on a real livecd which boots into a full Gnome environment ala x86.

However the real motivation behind it is that this cd also supports PS3s. We currently have the CD in beta and have one last hurdle to clear, but as of now the cd works on PS3s as is. The only gotcha is the xorg configuration which can be done by hand. The cd includes firefox-2, gnome, and other things you’d expect including sound sound. You can use the CD for installs as well.

If you are interested in this project, check out the following:

  • http://ppc64.gentoo.org/
  • http://ppc64.gentoo.org/ps3/
  • http://overlays.gentoo.org/proj/cell

We have also built up quite base of folks who are PS3 savy now as well. Drop by on IRC on #gentoo-ppc64 and visit.