NetBSD QEMU image generation scripts
====================================

These scripts allow generating customizable live disk images for
various NetBSD architectures, bootable in QEMU.  They were originally
intended to facilitate CI on a certain source code hosting website,
but the website decided to go in a different direction instead.

A NetBSD host machine must be used, because the scripts depend on various
NetBSD-specific tools.  You must run the image generation scripts as root
because they use vnd(4) and partitioning tools.

The scripts are useful for:

* quickly provisioning NetBSD systems
* testing and development

Modifying the scripts to suit your needs is encouraged.

You can log in as "root" with no password.

Please refer to the comments at the top of each script for further
information.

amd64/i386
----------

* Boots from GPT on BIOS.
* VirtIO works.
* X11 and headless use work.

aarch64/earmv7hf
----------------

* Boots from GPT on EFI.
* VirtIO works.
* X11 and headless use work.

hppa
----

* Reqires root partition (sd0c) to be manually specified at prompt
  (or specified in custom kernel config).
* Boots from FFS image using -kernel passed to QEMU.
* X11 and headless use work.

alpha
-----

* Reqires root partition (wd0c) to be manually specified at prompt
  (or specified in custom kernel config).
* Boots from FFS image using -kernel passed to QEMU.

mips
----

* Reqires root partition (ld0c) to be manually specified at prompt
  (or specified in custom kernel config).
* Boots from FFS image using -kernel passed to QEMU.
* Headless only.

macppc
------

* Reqires root partition (wd0c) to be manually specified at prompt
  (or specified in custom kernel config).
* Requires hfsutils to be installed.
* Boots from two images, one FFSv2 (NetBSD system),
  and one HFS (bootloader).
* Headless only.

Architectures to add later
--------------------------

* SPARC: Requires a sunlabel to boot.
  How do you create this on a vnd(4) on a non-SPARC system?
* RISC-V: should be easy, base on mips, needs netbsd 11.x
* M68K: should be easy, base on mips, needs netbsd 11.x (virt68k)

Other useful simulators for running NetBSD
------------------------------------------

* GXemul: http://gavare.se/gxemul/ (MIPS, SuperH)
* SimH: http://simh.trailing-edge.com/ (VAX)
* TME: http://people.csail.mit.edu/fredette/tme/ (sun2, sun3, SPARC)
* Can one of the many Amiga emulators run NetBSD/amiga?
* Can NetBSD/sgimips run in MAME?

Anita[1] is an alternative that automates running the installation
process rather than bypassing it.

[1]: http://www.gson.org/netbsd/anita/