Sorry, all, about the long pause before responding. I really would like to kick this problem. In the last few days, I have had a chance to look at things a bit more closely.
One thing I should say is that I am a total newbie to Sun hardware and OpenBoot, so please keep this in mind. In response to Martin's message, before I sent the first message, I didn't really know where to start, so I didn't really DO that much, but I did a lot of poking around. I ran config-debian and reconfigured the X11 settings in an attempt to use a PC104 USB keyboard ("PC104" rules) instead of the Sun (type 6) keyboard ("sun" rules). That did absolutely nothing. Also, I want to be able to use the USB keyboard in runlevel 3, which I intend to make the default once everything is running smoothly. I also poked around in OpenBoot, and I see three entries for the USB board itself, but no devices on the USB bus, so I am skeptical about the prospects of using OpenBoot to remap the keyboard and mouse aliases to the USB devices. I also poked around in the /dev directory (not /proc !), looking for something that looked like the USB KB & mouse, so that maybe I could mention them in XFree86Config-4. Again, nothing useful. With the USB 2.0 CD-RW drive attached, I get "Exhibit #1" below when I run 'cat /proc/bus/usb/devices'. I don't see anything resembling a keyboard or mouse. My kernel version is 2.4.27, compiled from kernel-source-2.4.27_2.4.27-5_all.deb. In response to Blars' message, I find the serial console concept intriguing. Could you point me to a website or two that explain how to set it up, the necessary cabling required (straight-through vs. crossover, DB9-DB9 or DB9-DB25, pinouts would be nice), the comm parameters (I think I saw this in OpenBoot), etc. etc.... In response to Jeremy's message, I re-compiled the kernel 3 times, again, from kernel-source-2.4.27_2.4.27-5_all.deb. The first time, I tried to compile it manually (make xconfig, make dep, make, make install, make modules_install), but that didn't work - I'm not sure how to go about creating the initrd image. The second and third times, I used the "kernel-package" package, and everything went great with the compile and the install. The first time, I set the (relevant) lines in .config (mostly using 'make xconfig', some I had to do manually) as shown in "Exhibit #2". That didn't work. The second time, I used the .config parameters shown in "Exhibit #3" below. That didn't work either. I just noticed, in the "USB HID" section that I didn't have CONFIG_USB_HIDDEV set, but I gather from the explanation of it in xconfig (something about "raw" devices that aren't true HID devices) that it's probably not necessary. If I'm wrong, please let me know. In all future compiles, I will have this flag set to "Y". I also noticed, upon looking at .config in the root source directory after running make-kpkg, that several parameters were automatically set, as if they are not optional or are required by some other flag that I still have set. The parameters that were flipped are shown in "Exhibit #4" below. You might notice that those were the key options that I was TRYING to nix. After noticing this, I looked in the top-level "Makefile" and "Rules.make" for anything which would say that those flags are mandatory. No such luck. Is there something else I need to do to override these flags? Maybe I need to nix CONFIG_SUN_CONSOLE, CONFIG_SUN_AUXIO, and CONFIG_SUN_IO as well? Or maybe just CONFIG_SUN_CONSOLE as it seems to me now? If "flag interdependency" isn't the issue, where else should I look in order to override this rather draconian behavior of auto-setting these flags? BTW, Jeremy, did you do your recompiles on a 2.4 kernel or a 2.6 kernel? I've been trying to avoid 2.6 kernels for several reasons, but if it is NECESSARY for this to work, I might reconsider... Again, all, thanks for bearing with me, and any further info. would be greatly appreciated. -Dan =========================================================== Exhibit #1: 'cat /proc/bus/usb/devices' =========================================================== T: Bus=03 Lev=00 Prnt=00 Port=00 Cnt=00 Dev#= 1 Spd=12 MxCh= 1 B: Alloc= 0/900 us ( 0%), #Int= 0, #Iso= 0 D: Ver= 1.10 Cls=09(hub ) Sub=00 Prot=00 MxPS= 8 #Cfgs= 1 P: Vendor=0000 ProdID=0000 Rev= 0.00 S: Product=USB OHCI Root Hub S: SerialNumber=280a000 C:* #Ifs= 1 Cfg#= 1 Atr=40 MxPwr= 0mA I: If#= 0 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=09(hub ) Sub=00 Prot=00 Driver=hub E: Ad=81(I) Atr=03(Int.) MxPS= 2 Ivl=255ms T: Bus=02 Lev=00 Prnt=00 Port=00 Cnt=00 Dev#= 1 Spd=12 MxCh= 2 B: Alloc= 0/900 us ( 0%), #Int= 0, #Iso= 0 D: Ver= 1.10 Cls=09(hub ) Sub=00 Prot=00 MxPS= 8 #Cfgs= 1 P: Vendor=0000 ProdID=0000 Rev= 0.00 S: Product=USB OHCI Root Hub S: SerialNumber=2808000 C:* #Ifs= 1 Cfg#= 1 Atr=40 MxPwr= 0mA I: If#= 0 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=09(hub ) Sub=00 Prot=00 Driver=hub E: Ad=81(I) Atr=03(Int.) MxPS= 2 Ivl=255ms T: Bus=01 Lev=00 Prnt=00 Port=00 Cnt=00 Dev#= 1 Spd=480 MxCh= 3 B: Alloc= 0/800 us ( 0%), #Int= 0, #Iso= 0 D: Ver= 2.00 Cls=09(hub ) Sub=00 Prot=01 MxPS= 8 #Cfgs= 1 P: Vendor=0000 ProdID=0000 Rev= 2.04 S: Manufacturer=Linux 2.4.27-10.1-dej-usb ehci_hcd S: Product=PCI device 1033:00e0 S: SerialNumber=02:03.2 C:* #Ifs= 1 Cfg#= 1 Atr=40 MxPwr= 0mA I: If#= 0 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=09(hub ) Sub=00 Prot=00 Driver=hub E: Ad=81(I) Atr=03(Int.) MxPS= 2 Ivl=256ms T: Bus=01 Lev=01 Prnt=01 Port=01 Cnt=01 Dev#= 2 Spd=480 MxCh= 0 D: Ver= 2.00 Cls=00(>ifc ) Sub=00 Prot=00 MxPS=64 #Cfgs= 1 P: Vendor=059f ProdID=0202 Rev=11.06 S: Manufacturer=LaCie S: Product=LaCie StudioDrive USB2 S: SerialNumber=11100E00053A4460 C:* #Ifs= 1 Cfg#= 2 Atr=c0 MxPwr= 98mA I: If#= 0 Alt= 0 #EPs= 3 Cls=08(stor.) Sub=06 Prot=50 Driver=usb-storage E: Ad=01(O) Atr=02(Bulk) MxPS= 512 Ivl=125us E: Ad=82(I) Atr=02(Bulk) MxPS= 512 Ivl=0ms E: Ad=83(I) Atr=03(Int.) MxPS= 2 Ivl=32ms =========================================================== Exhibit #2: .config for second compile =========================================================== CONFIG_SBUS=y CONFIG_SBUSCHAR=y CONFIG_BUSMOUSE=m CONFIG_SUN_MOUSE=m CONFIG_SERIAL=y CONFIG_SUN_SERIAL=y CONFIG_SERIAL_CONSOLE=y CONFIG_SUN_KEYBOARD=m CONFIG_SUN_CONSOLE=y CONFIG_SUN_AUXIO=y CONFIG_SUN_IO=y CONFIG_SUN_OPENPROMFS=m # # Input core support # CONFIG_INPUT=y CONFIG_INPUT_KEYBDEV=y CONFIG_INPUT_MOUSEDEV=y CONFIG_INPUT_MOUSEDEV_SCREEN_X=1024 CONFIG_INPUT_MOUSEDEV_SCREEN_Y=768 # CONFIG_INPUT_JOYDEV is not set CONFIG_INPUT_EVDEV=y CONFIG_INPUT_UINPUT=y # # USB support # CONFIG_USB=y # CONFIG_USB_DEBUG is not set # # Miscellaneous USB options # CONFIG_USB_DEVICEFS=y # CONFIG_USB_BANDWIDTH is not set # # USB Host Controller Drivers # CONFIG_USB_EHCI_HCD=y CONFIG_USB_UHCI=m CONFIG_USB_UHCI_ALT=m CONFIG_USB_OHCI=y # # USB Device Class drivers # # CONFIG_USB_AUDIO is not set # CONFIG_USB_BLUETOOTH is not set # CONFIG_USB_MIDI is not set CONFIG_USB_STORAGE=m # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_DEBUG is not set # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_DATAFAB is not set CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_FREECOM=y CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_ISD200=y # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_DPCM is not set # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_HP8200e is not set # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_SDDR09 is not set # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_SDDR55 is not set # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_JUMPSHOT is not set CONFIG_USB_ACM=m CONFIG_USB_PRINTER=m # # USB Human Interface Devices (HID) # CONFIG_USB_HID=y CONFIG_USB_HIDINPUT=y # CONFIG_USB_HIDDEV is not set # CONFIG_USB_AIPTEK is not set # CONFIG_USB_WACOM is not set # CONFIG_USB_KBTAB is not set # CONFIG_USB_POWERMATE is not set # # USB port drivers # # CONFIG_USB_USS720 is not set =========================================================== Exhibit #3: .config for third compile (other entries same as Exhibit #2) =========================================================== # CONFIG_SBUS is not set # CONFIG_SBUSCHAR is not set # CONFIG_BUSMOUSE is not set # CONFIG_SUN_MOUSE is not set # CONFIG_SUN_KEYBOARD is not set =========================================================== Exhibit #4: .config parameters automatically "flipped" after third compile =========================================================== CONFIG_SBUS=y CONFIG_SBUSCHAR=y CONFIG_BUSMOUSE=y CONFIG_SUN_MOUSE=y CONFIG_SUN_KEYBOARD=y