published the Mac A1211 article

1 files changed, 69 insertions, 53 deletions

diff --git a/content/blog/archlinux-macbook-a1211.md b/content/blog/archlinux-macbook-a1211.md
index 9fec1fa..b244cfc 100644
--- a/content/blog/archlinux-macbook-a1211.md
+++ b/content/blog/archlinux-macbook-a1211.md
@@ -1,9 +1,8 @@
 +++
 title = "Archlinux on a MacBook Pro 15'' Model A1211"
 categories = [ "Operating System", "Archlinux", "MacBook" ]
-date = "2018-11-06T16:20:39+02:00"
+date = "2018-11-12T16:55:39+01:00"
 thumbnail = "/images/blog/archlinux-macbook-a1211/macbook-A1211.jpg"
-draft = true
 +++
 
 ## History
@@ -12,7 +11,8 @@ I got an old Mac from a collegue at work. Apple decided not to
 support those devices anymore, anyway, they date back to 2006.
 I think, it's a pitty, because this Mac has a solid case, a pretty fast
 64-bit processor (sorry Archlinux32, no test machine for you) and
-a graphic chip which is not melting away like in later models..
+a graphic chip which is not melting away like in later models
+(I don't name brand names here)..
 
 Here the specifications:
 
@@ -21,24 +21,29 @@ Here the specifications:
 * OSX 10.6.8
 * ATI Radeon X1600 256 MB RAM, 1440x900, 32 bit
 
-I didn't try any Sierra OSX hacks on old hardware and besides,
+I didn't try any Sierra OS X hacks on old hardware and besides,
 Archlinux is a better choice for a developer on a Mac. Although
-there are still MacPorts for OSX 10.6.x (no Brew), it can be
+there are still MacPorts for OS X 10.6.x (no Brew though), it can be
 quite painful to get something compiled on a Mac OS that old.
 
-As we will later see, we want to keep OSX around for being able to
-change settings, extract some firmware, etc.
+As we will see later, we want to keep OS X around to be able to
+change some settings, extract some firmware, etc.
 
 ## Installation
 
 ### Prepare for dual installation
 
-TODO: Shrink OSX partition to 64GB, rest to free space
+We have a whooping 120 GB hard disk space, so I shrank the OS X partition to 64 GB.
+This can be done in the *Disk Utility.app*, just leave EFI in peace, set OSX to
+64 GB and assign the rest of the hard disk as free space.
 
-Preapre the USB stick for installation.
+Prepare the USB stick for installation, I had no luck with the standard ISO,
+but a crawfted USB-stick worked:
 
+```
 hdiutil convert -format UDRW -o archlinux-2018.09.01-x86_64.img archlinux-2018.09.01-x86_64.iso 
 dd if=archlinux-2018.09.01-x86_64.dmg of=/dev/disk2 bs=1m
+```
 
 ### EFI boot
 
@@ -47,26 +52,26 @@ somewhat limited EFI environment of an early Mac (don't get me wrong, it's
 pretty impressive that such an old machine already had EFI, but nowadays this
 EFI shows it's age).
 
-The firmware is a 32-bit EFI, causing trouble all along. I didn't take
-ReFind, as I didn't expect 32-bit EFI to be supported, especially as I
-see now Tianocore failing to build with more modern 32-bit binutils and gcc. 
+The firmware is a 32-bit EFI without a proper command line mode,
+causing trouble all along. I didn't take ReFind, as I didn't expect the 
+32-bit EFI to be currently supported, especially as I see Tianocore
+failing to build with more modern 32-bit binutils and gcc.
 
 I installed a 32-bit GRUB onto the EFI partition as a second boot option
 along to OSX. This one then boots ArchLinux. This is easier than to try
-to load a 64-bit kernel from an 32-bit EFI environemnt with grub or
-even systemd-boot.
+to load a 64-bit kernel with kernel EFI stub support from an 32-bit
+EFI environemnt with systemd-boot.
 
 ### ATI VESA BIOS
 
 I didn't want to boot into legacy mode to make the VGA BIOS visible, so
-I got a nice problem during KMS switching in early booting stage: the
+I got a nice problem during KMS switching during early boot: the
 graphical output just froze. The irony here is that modern Linux and Xorg
-don't care at all about the old VGA/VESA BIOS, but for KMS, where they rely
-on 16-bit firmware functions to program the video chip. Wonder, what will
-happen, if the BIOS disappears completly..
-
+don't care at all about the old VGA/VESA BIOS, but for KMS, where the kernel
+has to rely on 16-bit firmware functions in the video BIOS to program
+the video chip for graphics mode.
 
-So, all I got was a missing the following kernel and Xorg error messages:
+So, all I got was the following kernel and Xorg error messages:
 
 ```
 [2.052705] [drm] initializing kernel modesetting (RV530 0x1002:0x71C5 0x106B:0x0080 0x00).
@@ -79,7 +84,7 @@ So, all I got was a missing the following kernel and Xorg error messages:
 ```
 
 So this basically translates into: "I don't have a direct rendering interface,
-because there is no card, because there is no BIOS for the card'.
+because there is no video card, because there is no BIOS for that card".
 
 The idea was to extract the VESA BIOS on a distribution which handles
 the KMS switching correctly (in my case an old Ubuntu 10).
@@ -88,13 +93,14 @@ the KMS switching correctly (in my case an old Ubuntu 10).
 dd if=/dev/mem of=vbios.bin bs=65536 skip=12 count=1
 ```
 
-Verify that indeed you got the right firmware. There is error message:
+Verify that indeed you got the right firmware. There is an error message
+when booting the kernel saying:
 
 ```
 [2.052742] radeon 0000:01:00.0: Invalid PCI ROM header signature: expecting 0xaa55, got 0xa1a1
 ```
 
-so we expect to find that in the *vbios.bin* file:
+so we expect to find that signature in the *vbios.bin* file:
 
 ```
 hexdump -C vbios.bin | head -n 1
@@ -104,12 +110,15 @@ hexdump -C vbios.bin | head -n 1
 This firmware comes into */lib/firmware/radeon/vbios.bin* to be available during
 boot.
 
-The next problem was that the radeon driver didn't know about this firmware
-to load. There is a patch in https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=26891
-for older modules, but it also applies to modern radeon kernel drivers. All
+The next problem was that the radeon module in the Linux kernel doesn't
+know about this firmware. There is a patch in https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=26891
+for older kernels, but it translates easily to last kernel. All
 it does is load the *vbios.bin* file from the right place, when all the other
 options failed.
 
+My version of the module is [here](/text/blog/archlinux-macbook-a1211/radeon_bios.c), check
+out function *radeon_read_bios_from_firmware* and the calling code calling that function.
+
 Now, Archlinux needs the Radeon driver for KMS as early as possible, so
 I thought it's a nice idea to put it into the init-RAM-disk:
 
@@ -120,11 +129,6 @@ MODULES=(radeon)
 FILES=(/usr/lib/firmware/radeon/vbios.bin)
 ```
 
-My version of the module is [here](/text/blog/archlinux-macbook-a1211/radeon_bios.c), check
-out function *radeon_read_bios_from_firmware* and calling code.
-
-TODO: link the code of the module from somewhere.
-
 ### "Total Darkness" after 10 minutes
 
 Everything was running smoothly.. for about 10 minutes. Then my LCD display
@@ -145,8 +149,9 @@ one of the funny Apple brightness modules. In */etc/modprobe.d/radeon.conf* put:
 options radeon backlight=1
 ```
 
-Also handy is the https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/brightd/, thought
-I think also systemd-backlight can nowadays save the brightness.
+Also handy is the https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/brightd/, though
+I think also systemd-backlight can nowadays at least save the brightness
+across reboots and suspends.
 
 ### Function keys or special keys
 
@@ -157,27 +162,29 @@ Fxx function keys, add the following to */etc/modprobe.d/hid_apple.conf*:
 options hid_apple fnmode=2
 ```
 
-TODO: Functions keys or ACPI
-
 ### Camera
 
-Here we come to iSight and why we need OSX around to extract the proper
+Here we come to iSight and why we need OS X around to extract the proper
 firmware.
 
 https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Mac#Webcam has a really nice walkthrough.
 
-Short, you need https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/hfsprogs/ to mount the HFS
+Shortly, you need https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/hfsprogs/ to mount the HFS
 partition. There you will find a file called *AppleUSBVideoSupport* in
 */System/Library/Extensions/IOUSBFamily.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleUSBVideoSupport.kext/Contents/MacOS*.
 
-You will also need https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/isight-firmware-tools/,
-with that one you extract a file *isight.fw* from *AppleUSBVideoSupport*.
+You will also need https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/isight-firmware-tools/.
+It contains tools to extract the file containg the firmware called *isight.fw*
+from *AppleUSBVideoSupport*.
 
-The udev rule in */etc/udev/rules.d/isight.rules* then makes sure the firmware
-is also loaded on startup.
+Finally it contains an udev rule in */etc/udev/rules.d/isight.rules* then makes
+sure the firmware is also loaded on startup during detection of the camera via udev.
 
 ### Wifi
 
+The wireless card was supported without any problems. Just some channels
+were not visible.
+
 Install *wireless-regdb* and make sure to enable the proper regulatory domain in
 */etc/conf.d/wireless-regdom*:
 
@@ -185,8 +192,7 @@ Install *wireless-regdb* and make sure to enable the proper regulatory domain in
 WIRELESS_REGDOM="CH"
 ```
 
-The regulatory domain has to be set properly, otherwise the Wifi works
-perfectly. Put in */etc/modprobe.d/regdom.conf*:
+The regulatory domain has to be set properly, put it into */etc/modprobe.d/regdom.conf*:
 
 ```
 options cfg80211 ieee80211_regdom=CH
@@ -194,33 +200,41 @@ options cfg80211 ieee80211_regdom=CH
 
 (CH is for Switzerland, pick your own country here)
 
-TODO: regdomain for WPA-supplicant, can it be done in userspace?
+Note: I think my method is deprecated and you can also specify the
+regulatory domain directly in wpa_supplicant.conf, but then how
+to use systemd-networkd with that?
 
 ### Fans and sensors
 
-macfanctl from AUR works nicely, lm_sensors no problems
+[https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/macfanctld/](macfanctl) from the AUR works nicely,
+also lm_sensors had no problems to get its data.
 
 ### Power consumption
 
 cpupower seems to work fine.
 
-TODO: issues with powertop and hard disk wake-up?
+Note: I didn't try powertop or other tweaks. I got some worriesome ticking
+noises of the hard disk after a suspend and my battery is not that powerful
+anyway, so I'll run mostly on net power.
 
 ### Mouse buttons
 
-Managers might like to use only one mouse. Also keyboard fanatics may
+Managers might like to use only one mouse button. Also keyboard fanatics may
 be happy by just switching off the mousepad completly.
 
 The one button mouse is a disaster for people being used to Xorg copy-
-paste or Oberon enthusiasts used to three buttons.
+paste or Oberon enthusiasts used to three mouse buttons.
 
 Two finger scrolling is nice, but per default only for up and down.
-I enable it also to left and right. Besides, the keyboard is missing
+I enabled it also to left and right. Besides, the keyboard is missing
 PageUp, PageDown keys, which is a usability nightmare when you want to
 scroll bigger source code files or web pages (yes, I know there is Fn-Page,
 but having Ctrl, Alt, Meta and Fn all on the same spot doesn't make it
 easier to find the right one).
 
+Side note: *Fn* is for page up, *Ctrl* for Wordstar short-cuts, "Alt" for
+Notion shortcuts, and they are really _CLOSE_ together..
+
 Change */etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/50-synaptics.conf* as follows to your likings:
 ```
 Section "InputClass"
@@ -238,10 +252,10 @@ EndSection
 ```
 
 *TabButton1=1* only leads to all kind of frantic behaviour, because I
-touch the touchpad by accident. *ClickButton* and *TapButton* for the
-second and third button are just completly useless. Either no menu
+touch the touchpad by accident too often. *ClickButton* and *TapButton*
+for the second and third button are just completly useless. Either no menu
 appears for TapButton or a menu appears for ClickFinger, but I can no
-longer to copy-pastes.
+longer do copy-pastes.
 
 The default modifiers Ctrl, Alt, Meta don't do anything with the mouse
 or just very weird stuff, like Alt-2-fingers jumps to the beginning of
@@ -250,10 +264,12 @@ my text.
 For now, I choose TapButtons for copy-paste, as this is the function
 I need most often.
 
-TODO: For mouse button 2 and three I changed the modifiers for Ctrl and Alt.
+I might add some Ctrl, Meta modifiers to get 2, 3 mouse button clicks later.
 
 ## References
 
+* https://everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook_pro/specs/macbook-pro-core-2-duo-2.33-15-specs.html :
+  specifications of the A1211 model
 * https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=26891: the patch to radeon.ko,
   enabling loading of file as VESA bios.
 * https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=139511: some discussions about