<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML ><HEAD ><TITLE >What does PALO?</TITLE ><META NAME="GENERATOR" CONTENT="Modular DocBook HTML Stylesheet Version 1.7"><LINK REL="HOME" TITLE="PA-RISC/Linux Boot HOWTO" HREF="index.html"><LINK REL="UP" TITLE="PALO, the PA/Linux kernel loader" HREF="palo.html"><LINK REL="PREVIOUS" TITLE="What is PALO?" HREF="whatispalo.html"><LINK REL="NEXT" TITLE="PALO management tool usage" HREF="paloappusage.html"></HEAD ><BODY CLASS="sect1" BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#000000" LINK="#0000FF" VLINK="#840084" ALINK="#0000FF" ><DIV CLASS="NAVHEADER" ><TABLE SUMMARY="Header navigation table" WIDTH="100%" BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="0" CELLSPACING="0" ><TR ><TH COLSPAN="3" ALIGN="center" >PA-RISC/Linux Boot HOWTO</TH ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="10%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="bottom" ><A HREF="whatispalo.html" ACCESSKEY="P" >Prev</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="80%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="bottom" >Chapter 3. <B CLASS="command" >PALO</B >, the PA/Linux kernel loader</TD ><TD WIDTH="10%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="bottom" ><A HREF="paloappusage.html" ACCESSKEY="N" >Next</A ></TD ></TR ></TABLE ><HR ALIGN="LEFT" WIDTH="100%"></DIV ><DIV CLASS="sect1" ><H1 CLASS="sect1" ><A NAME="whatdoespalo" ></A >3.2. What does <B CLASS="command" >PALO</B >?</H1 ><P > The main idea is to boot a kernel, passing it all needed parameters. This is what the <EM >boot loader</EM > part of <B CLASS="command" >PALO</B > does (see <A HREF="paloearlyboot.html" >Section 3.4</A >). Once it has been called by the <EM >firmware</EM >, it will load the Linux Kernel in memory, passing to it the given arguments, and tell the processor to branch to its entry point. This will begin the execution of the kernel on the PA-RISC computer. </P ><P > The <B CLASS="command" >PALO</B > management tool can transform the usual <TT CLASS="filename" >vmlinux</TT > into a PA-RISC bootable <EM >lifimage</EM >, including or not <TT CLASS="literal" >RAMDISK</TT > or <TT CLASS="literal" >NFSROOT</TT > support. However, it can also make a hard disk drive bootable, specifying the console output and the root device. We are going to see all these points precisely. </P ><DIV CLASS="important" ><P ></P ><TABLE CLASS="important" WIDTH="100%" BORDER="0" ><TR ><TD WIDTH="25" ALIGN="CENTER" VALIGN="TOP" ><IMG SRC="../images/important.gif" HSPACE="5" ALT="Important"></TD ><TD ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="TOP" ><P > What must be kept in mind is that <TT CLASS="filename" >vmlinux</TT > is the kernel alone, which is not bootable as is. It needs <B CLASS="command" >PALO</B > to be turned into a bootable <TT CLASS="filename" >lifimage</TT > for CD or network boot, or to be loaded at boot time from a prepared hard disk drive. Have a look at <A HREF="gloss.html" ><I >Glossary</I ></A > about these words. Quoting a well known PA/Linux hacker: <A NAME="AEN578" ></A ><TABLE BORDER="0" WIDTH="100%" CELLSPACING="0" CELLPADDING="0" CLASS="BLOCKQUOTE" ><TR ><TD WIDTH="10%" VALIGN="TOP" > </TD ><TD WIDTH="80%" VALIGN="TOP" ><P ><EM > People often try to put a lifimage in /boot, or a vmlinux on the network boot server. </EM ></P ></TD ><TD WIDTH="10%" VALIGN="TOP" > </TD ></TR ><TR ><TD COLSPAN="2" ALIGN="RIGHT" VALIGN="TOP" >--<SPAN CLASS="attribution" >Richard Hirst</SPAN ></TD ><TD WIDTH="10%" > </TD ></TR ></TABLE > Which is obviously wrong. </P ></TD ></TR ></TABLE ></DIV ></DIV ><DIV CLASS="NAVFOOTER" ><HR ALIGN="LEFT" WIDTH="100%"><TABLE SUMMARY="Footer navigation table" WIDTH="100%" BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="0" CELLSPACING="0" ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="whatispalo.html" ACCESSKEY="P" >Prev</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="34%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="index.html" ACCESSKEY="H" >Home</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="paloappusage.html" ACCESSKEY="N" >Next</A ></TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" >What is <B CLASS="command" >PALO</B >?</TD ><TD WIDTH="34%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="palo.html" ACCESSKEY="U" >Up</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" ><B CLASS="command" >PALO</B > management tool usage</TD ></TR ></TABLE ></DIV ></BODY ></HTML >