This document describes common elements of Version 3 Release 1 of IBM NetVista Thin Client with TurboLinux for Linux servers and Windows servers. Shown here are product limitations, tips and information, problems under investigation, and the available readme files.

TurboLinux - Product Limitations

Downloading rpms

When downloading, for example the ICA rpm, from citrix.com to a Caldera distribution or an NT 4.0 server, the result is an attempt to start Real Player. This causes an error message stating that the .rpm file is not a Real Player audio or visual file. To work around this problem before downloading, do a right mouse click and choose save as which allows the download to occur without launching Real Player.

RAM size

We create /dev entries using a ram disk. The boot monitor currently has a problem creating device entries when using the maximum amount of memory in the thin client. The maximum memory is 160MB (32MB + 128MB DIMM) for an N2200 and 256MB (2 * 128MB DIMM) for an N2800. We recommend that you use up to 92 MB RAM in your N2200 thin client and up to 196 MB of RAM in your N2800 thin client.

TurboLinux - Tips and Information

NS Boot version should be 10/04/00 - IMPORTANT

• IBM NetVista Thin Clients ship from manufacturing with an NS Boot version, also called boot prom, dated 7/17/00. To use IBM NetVista Thin Client with TurboLinux on your thin client, you will need to upgrade to the 10/04/00 boot prom. This prom is included in the installation on your server.
• While you are booting you may encounter the following set of messages. At this point we recommend that you reboot and use the NSBoot Setup Utility to upgrade to the 10/04/00 prom.
"WARNING: Serial, Modem, printer devices were not added - Not enough space in /dev
If you do not need them, its OK

If you need them, upgrade the boot code to the current version included in this package

To upgrade the bootcode change kernel.2x00 to bflash.2x00:

For Model 2200 - bflash.2200

For Model 2800 - bflash.2800

Press <ENTER> to continue"

NOTE: If you do not upgrade, your results with the 7/17/00 prom can be unpredictable.

• You may find that while booting, your thin client does not get beyond the "Loading Linux" window.
• Booting from a flash card that you have created using CFBuilder may not boot successfully.

• HOW TO UPGRADE

To upgrade to the 10/04/00 prom use the NSBoot Setup Utility. From the Advance Configuration select the menu option to "Change boot file server settings". Set the first Boot file server IP address to your server IP. Change the boot file server directory and file name by paging down to a blank field and entering "/nstation/linux/bflash.2200" or "/nstation/linux/bflash.2800", using NFS as the protocol. Rebooting will cause your boot version to be updated. Follow the instructions during this process. Do not power off your thin client while the boot version is being updated.

Note that after the upgrade use NSBoot Setup Utility and for the boot file server directory and file name you will be able to page down and select "nstation/linux/kernel.2x00" (with 'x' being 2 or 8) for the boot file server directory and file name, in order to boot the a server.

Booting from a server

When configuring your thin client to boot to the server, be sure to select the correct kernel name. In the NSBoot Setup Utility select the menu option to "Change boot file server settings". For the boot file server directory and file specify:

• nstation/linux/kernel.2200
• nstation/linux/kernel.2800
• nstation/linux/kernel.2200.tr - for ethernet thin clients with a token ring PCI card
• nstation/linux/kernel.2800.tr - for ethernet thin clients with a token ring PCI card
• NOTE: kernels ending in .tr must be typed in. They are not predefined.
If you happen to select the wrong kernel, then when you reboot, your thin client may attempt to download the wrong kernel. It will fail with a kernel panic. At that point reboot, go into the NSBoot Setup Utility and change to the correct kernel name.

CFBuilder

• CFBuilder is the tool used to build flash card images. It is located in /IBM/CFBuilder_2.5 along with a helpful CFBuilder Tutorial in /IBM/CFBuilder_2.5/Tutorial. The first time you use CFBuilder, you will be lead through a wizard which includes the functions described in the steps that follow.

1. In preparation for building your flash card image, you should install your flash card in your thin client prior to building the image. Using an xterm window, change to the /IBM/CFBuilder_2.5 path and enter ./CFBuilder to access the tool. In CFBuilder select the Utilities menu, then Format..., Mount... or Partition.... This will bring up the Initialization window. Press the Initialization button to prepare your flash card for an image.
• 96 MB is the suggested flash card size.
2. Select the Build menu, then Package..., and choose the components that you want to build into packages.
• The components , Base OS and FVMWM2, are required. Note that building the Base OS may take approximately 9 minutes. A "Build complete" message will appear when it has finished.
• Highlight the component, then press the Help button for information on where to located the rpm needed to build the component into a package.
3. Next select the Build menu, then Image..., and select the packages to become part of the flash image. When you select to "Build" the image, it is built directly onto your flash, .
• If you build a flash image to be used on token ring thin clients you need to copy the token ring kernel to the image.
• cp /kernel.2x00.tr /mnt/hd1

• After an image has been built, it can not be modified or updated by the CFBuilder program. However, you could modify it by booting to a server, mounting the flash card and making your desired changes.
• After successfully building the image on the flash card you may see the message, "Error in Tcl script: Error: Tar archive contains a future time stamp". This message is caused by an error in your time server setup. When you resolve the error with your time server, the "Error in Tcl script" message will go away.
• From the menu option, Configure, the Display and Management functions are not supported at this time.

ICA Client

To access this function enter the command "wfcmgr" from a terminal session. This command will present the Remote Application Manager through which ICA client sessions can be opened.

User IDs on server booted thin clients

• Deletion of user IDs on uninstall

Users added to a thin client that has been booted to a server installed with Thin Client with TurboLinux will be deleted if the product is uninstalled.
• User passwords

User password changes made on a thin client apply when booting from all thin clients that are logging in with that user ID, but not when logging in to the server with that user ID.


Case sensitivity

Be aware that Windows NT file naming is case insensitive whereas Linux file naming is case sensitive. Therefore, on Linux the files, ProjectExpansion and Projectexpansion are two separate files whereas Windows NT would treat these two files as though they were the same file.

Contents of IBM NetVista Thin Client with TurboLinux CD's

• IBM NetVista Thin Client with TurboLinux install CD

Installs for both Windows servers and Linux servers are on this CD.
• Turbo Linux Workstation 6.07 Build 93 CD

This CD is requested while installing on a Linux server.
• Turbo Linux Workstation 6.07 Build 93 Source CD

This CD is used with Linux servers.


Flash kiosk boot

1. Build an image with CFBuilder that contains the application you want to come up in kiosk. For Netscape your package would include Base OS, FVMW2 and Netscape. In the Build Image window, locate the "Installing to" field in the upper right. In this field enter the path of the directory where you want to build the image, for example, "/images". Press the Build button to build the image in the directory specified.

2. If you are using ethernet thin clients with token ring PCI cards, copy 2200.kernel.tr or 2800.kernel.tr (whichever type of thin client you are using) from the root directory "/" to your new /images directory.

3. Bring up xterm and export the directory that contains the image:

• vi /etc/exports
• at the end of the document add the line: /images
• :wq to save and close the file
4. Stop and start NFS:
• go to the directory /etc/rc.d/init.d
• type nfs.sav stop
• type nfs.sav start
5. Reboot specifying /nstation/linux/images/kernel.2x00.tr as the boot file server directory and file name in the NSBoot Setup Utility.
6. To come up in kiosk mode, you must edit a file. Start an xterm by right clicking anywhere on the screen. A menu will come up and select "Run". You are in the /nstation/linux/images directory.

7. Edit the fvwm2rc file:

• cd /etc/X11/fvwm2
• vi fvwm2rc
• at the end of the section headed by:

############## Initialization Functions ##############
add the line:
exec netscape&
( or any other application that you want to use for the kiosk booting)
Next, comment out all lines inside the section headed by
################# Menus #################
with a # at the begining of each line, so that
the user won't have any of the pop-out menus and
only netscape will come out as he/she boots.
• :wq to save and close the file

8. Reboot to be in kiosk mode

TurboLinux - Problems under Investigation

CFBuilder

Building packages

After clicking the Build button, if you accidentally select the wrong rpm file with which to build your package, you will not be able to browse and select the correct rpm. Instead you should press the "X" to close this window. Then select the Build button again on the Packages window and when the window pops up to enter the rpm, browse and select the correct rpm.

Flash Booting
 
• The first time you boot your thin client using your flash image created using CFBuilder, the IBM Network Station Setup wizard will appear. After filling in the network information in this wizard, the final window says to press the Done button to reboot. It is necessary to manually reboot the thin client after pressing the Done button.

• When opening Netscape, the editing preferences, through a flash booted thin client, the following message may appear, "Warning: The program is an suid-root program or is being run by the root user. " Clicking OK will remove the message. No further action needs to be taken.

 

 

Netscape

When opening Netscape you may encounter a disk caching message which says there should be one disk cache per user, so using a shared directory (such as/tmp) is not advised. Access the Advanced Cache options in the Netscape Edit, Preferences menu to change the caching values.

Password and adduser commands

Using the passwd and adduser commands does not work consistently when booted from an NT server. If you receive a "Critical error - immediate abort" error after attempting to use the passwd command or "adduser: unable to lock password file" message when attempting to use to the adduser command, you may be seeing this problem. Use the KDE User Manager, where you should not see these intermittent problems.

If you do receive either of those error messages after using either passwd or adduser, there will be lock files created in your /etc directory. As root, you may delete those files. There are five different potential lock files:

• passwd.lock
• shadow.lock
• pwd.lock
• spwd.*
• pwd.%d.*
• Note: Both the spwd.* and pwd.%d.* files are created with the process id (*) as part of the file name, so you would see names like spwd.317 and pwd.%d.317.

TurboLinux - Readme Files and Tutorials

IBM NetVista Thin Client with TurboLinux - for Linux installs
• This install readme includes prerequisites and information about installing on Linux servers.
• Linux location - nstation/linux/IBM/README.html

IBM NetVista Thin Client with TurboLinux - for Windows installs
• This install readme includes prerequisites and information about installing on Windows servers.
• Windows location on the CD - [drive:]\Linux\Windows\products\nvTCLinux\readme.txt
• Windows install location - [drive:]\{float}\NetVista_Linux\readme.txt

IBM TurboLinux Thin Client Readme
• This readme file contains information and tips that is common between the Linux servers and the Windows servers.
• Windows location - [drive:]\{float}\NetVista_Linux\Linux\IBM\ReadmeClient.html
• Linux location - nstation/linux/IBM/ReadmeClient.html

Kernels for NetVista Thin Client
• The readme file contains information about the available kernels.
• Windows location - [drive:]\{float}\NetVista_Linux\Linux\README.kernel
• Linux location - nstation/linux/IBM/README.kernel

Compact Flash Builder Tutorial
• This tutorial describes how to create flash images by combining base Linux components with customized applications into "packages" that can be loaded onto a flash card to create a customized local client environment.
• Windows location - Linux\IBM\CFBuilder_2.5\Tutorial\CFBuilder_Tutorial
• Linux location - nstation/linux/IBM/CFBuilder_2.5/Tutorial/CFBuilder_Tutorial