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Yellow Dog Linux 2.3 Released

Posted by michael on from the smack-oh-ess dept.

pinqkandi writes "Yesterday, TerraSoft Solutions announced its next generation of its PowerPC Linux, Yellow Dog 2.3. New in this version is Kernel 2.4.19, KDE 3.0.1, CUPS printing, and OpenOffice 1.0, among other updates of included applications. It is available immediately from TerraSoft's online store for $30, or $60 if you want personal support for 60 days."

2 of 173 comments (clear)

  1. YDL vs. OSX by conan_albrecht · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I purchased a titanium powerbook just for the purpose of running YDL 2.2 on it. (I liked the style of the powerbook--still do). I purchased YDL and found it very well put together. I was very impressed with it.

    However, after a few weeks of playing with OS X (I left a small OSX partition), I erased YDL and now I work exclusively in OS X. The Linux desktops just don't compare to it, and MS Office runs on OS X as well. I don't personally use it Office, but it's nice to have when I working with others.

    In sum, YDL would be great for older Apple hardware that won't run OS X. If you have newer hardware, OS X is wonderful for a desktop machine.

  2. PPC Can do Debian too by Juhaa · · Score: 5, Informative

    This is my experience with installing Potato Debian on my iBook DVD, using the
    rev0 CDs. I know this story is about YDL, but a lot of people do not realize that Debian and Mandrake works just as fine on Apple hardware. And thus this walkthrough, hope it's helpful, give it a try.

    This is not a Guide to Debian installation, rather a step-by-step
    guide (doh!). And write down what you're doing (especially partition numbers,
    that the reason why I'm writing this and reinstalling everything from scratch
    for the second time)
    Enjoy.

    Instructions
    ------------

    1. Boot the laptop with the iBook install, by pressing "C" during the chime
    sound
    2. Launch the Drive Setup, on the CD, in the Utilities directory
    3. I created 2 partitions. First one is the Linux Place Holder, one big fat
    partition that we'll split into all your Linux partitions during the Debian
    install process. The second one is for MacOS. You might want to create 3
    partitions (respectivily for Linux, MacOS, and an HFS one for sharing files
    between Linux and MacOS). I'm only using MacOS to play DVDs, so it's no big
    deal for me.
    4. Install MacOS on the MacOS drive (don't install on the place holder for
    Linux!)
    5. Reboot the 'puter, it should work, otherwise bring your iBook back to the
    shop and jump off a cliff.

    6. Now that we're sure that the iBook and MacOS works, reboot up, and press
    Option-Apple-O-F during the chime to access the Open Firmware.
    7. type in "boot cd:\\yaboot". Try "boot cd:\install\powermac\yaboot" if the
    former fails.
    8. On the yaboot prompt, enter "debian video=aty128fb:vmode:10:depth:8:" where
    debian is the name of the image you're gonna be using to boot (hit to
    list the available ones).
    9. Select your keyboard, and Partition your HD, following Ethan Benson's
    mac-fdisk-basics.txt (see at the bottom for URL).
    11. At this point I have this kind of partitioning:
    hda1 to hda8: MacOS crap
    hda9: Apple_Bootstrap partition
    hda10: / (root)
    hda11: swap
    hda12: /home (home)
    hda13: /opt (opt)
    hda14: MacOS

    (...Later...)

    10. When asked if you want to "Make Linux Bootable Directly From Hard Disk",
    get to another console and get a shell (on the iBook, it's a bit dodgy,
    keep pressed in this order Apple-fn-F2).
    11. Run this line to get your bootstrap partition initialized:
    mkofboot --boot /dev/hda9 -m /target/etc/ofboot.b --root /dev/hda10 --partition 10
    12. In the present state, you wouldn't be able to boot Linux because of the
    (lack of) novideo option in the default yaboot.conf
    Edit the /target/etc/yaboot.conf. Here is what it looks like after all the
    editing:

    boot=/dev/hda9
    device=hd:
    timeout=20
    install= /boot/yaboot
    magicboot=/boot/ofboot.b

    image=/vmlinux
    label=Linux
    root=/dev/hda10
    read-only
    partition=10
    append = "video=aty128fb:vmode:10:depth:8:"

    13. Run that to be able to run Linux:
    ybin -C /target/etc/yaboot.conf -m /target/etc/ofboot.b
    14. Reboot the system, and get into the Open Firmware again
    15. To boot your linux system, type in:
    boot hd:9,yaboot

    (...Later...)

    16. Voila, you still need to configure your computer (X-Window, dial-up,
    desktop...), but at least it will boot up normally =)
    17. to boot up by default with Linux, run "setenv boot-device hd:9,yaboot"
    within the Open Firmware. Press the Option key during the chime to boot
    MacOS.