HMC

If using QEMU directly you can use '-smbios' args. eg

    -smbios "type=0,vendor=LENOVO,version=6FET82WW (3.12 )"
    -smbios
"type=1,manufacturer=Fedora,product=Virt-Manager,version=0.8.2-3.fc14,serial=32dfcb37-5af1-552b-357c-be8c3aa38310,uuid=c7a5fdbd-edaf-9455-926a-d65c16db1809,sku=1234567890,family=Red Hat"

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Installing HMC in VirtualBox
2013-05-01 Josh-Daniel Davis (xaminmo)

The original source of this was AIXWIKI.org.
AIXWIKI is gone, so the WayBack Machine was used to pull the test.
I edited this a little for clarity.
Most of the procedures can be skipped. Just use Bryan’s additions.
Installing HMC in VirtualBox

The instructions below explain how to install the Hardware Management Console Software into a VirtualBox(tm) Virtual Machine. This may also work for VMWare(tm). The instructions are based on HMC v7.7.1 but may work on other versions with minor changes.

NOTE: You don’t “own” the HMC software. You buy a license to use it in specifically the way that IBM says you are allowed to. The HMC code is not licensed for running on anything other than an IBM physical HMC system. Violating the license is at best a guaranteed way to have no support. At worst, it could cause you to have to pay licensing fees and legal penalties. Do not do it for your business unless the penalties would be less than the cost of not doing this. This document is for academic purposes, and might be suitable for use by IBM Internal employee testing depending on management approval.

If you are entitled, download HMC recovery images from Fix Central:

http://www-933.ibm.com/support/fixcentral/
Product Group: System p
Product: Firmware and HMC
Processor type: POWER5 and POWER6 class
Machine Type-Model: 9117-MMA (Power6 – 570, does not really matter.)
Fix Type: HMC Firmware
HMC firmware release levels: V7R7.1.0

Download:
HMC V7R7.1.0M0 – MH01205
HMC V7R7.1.0M1 – MH01213

Do NOT download:
Mandatory efix for HMCV7R710 – MH01214 (Service Pack 1 superceeds this efix)

You should get the following files:
HMC_Recovery_V7R710_1.iso
HMC_Recovery_V7R710_2.iso
HMC_Update_V7R710_SP1.iso
Download latest Knoppix version (v6.2 at the time of writing)
KNOPPIX-ADRIANE_V6.2CD-2009-11-18-EN.iso
ftp://ftp.knoppix.nl/pub/os/Linux/distr/knoppix/
Download & Install 7Zip
You will use this to extract files from an ISO – http://7-zip.org
You can also use WinRAR (Trial or Paid) – http://rarlabs.com
You can also use MagicISO (Paid) – http://magiciso.com
Download and install latest VirtualBox
v3.1.6 at the time of writing
http://www.virtualbox.org/
You may also be able to configure this in VMWare
Create a Linux Profile
Name: HMC
Operating System: Linux
Version: Linux 2.6
Memory: 1024 MB (Recommended, 512 MB minimum)
Harddisk: Dynamic, 160 GB (Installed HMC size is 12-13GB (with SP1))
Controller: IDE (default in this profile)
Network: Bridged, e1000
Extract the file initrd.gz from first HMC install-DVD
Use 7-Zip, WinRAR or MagicISO
CDROM:/isolinux/initrd.gz to a local directory.
Boot VM from Knoppix ISO
Choose Linux 2.6 (or matching for your HMC recovery media)
Enable SSH in Knoppix
Option 10. Open a Shell
Run the following commands to start sshd:

su –
/etc/init.d/ssh start
Check the IP-address of Knoppix:

ifconfig -a
Set root password:

passwd
Enter ‘abc123′ twice.
Modify initrd using Knoppix.
Copy the file initrd.gz using a SCP-client to the IP-address of virtual machine.
Use account login: root with password ‘abc123′.

NOTE: Be aware that you might not be able to connect when the network adapter of the virtualbox is not set to Bridged Adapter or Host-only Adapter. Bridge Adapter is the most useful especially if you want to be able to connect to real POWER-systems.

NOTE: If you did not specify the target directory then your file will be transferred your home-directory.
Gunzip and Mount the initrd:

gunzip /root/initrd.gz
losetup /dev/loop0 /root/initrd
mkdir /mnt/initrd
mount /dev/loop0 /mnt/initrd
cd /mnt/initrd/opt/hmc/bin
Edit the Install file

vi Install
Add the following line
VPDINFO="7042CR4"
Between
CMDLINE=`cat /proc/cmdline`
And
cd /

It should look like this:
FILES="bzImage initrd.gz disk1.img disk2.img disk3.img"
CMDLINE=`cat /proc/cmdline`
VPDINFO="7042CR4"
cd /
case "$VPDINFO" in
Save the file (:wq! in vi) and repack initrd (umount, gzip):

cd
umount /mnt/initrd
losetup -d /dev/loop0
gzip /root/initrd

Then, copy the file back to your workstation using scp/winscp.
Modify first HMC install-dvd using MagicISO
Open HMC_Recovery_V7R710_1.iso
Remove the original initrd.gz: CDROM:/isolinux/initrd.gz
Add the modified version you just copied over from the knoppix-virtualbox.
Use ‘Save As ..’ to save the modified iso (HMC_Recovery_V7R710_1_modified.iso for example)
Boot from the modified dvd and install HMC v7.7.
After the installation you will be prompted for a login.
Enter the default hmc username/password: hscroot/abc123
Now, you can get root access using ‘su -‘. The password is ‘passw0rd’.
Change the start-up check file ‘getHMCVPD’

vi /opt/hsc/bin/getHMCVPD
Comment out line 5:

# /usr/sbin/dmidecode --string bios-version | sed -e 's/-\[//g' | sed -e 's/\]-//g'

And this add line under line 5:
echo "2AKT51A"
Comment out line 31:

# echo "$cmodel$mtype*$sn"

And add under this line:
echo "7042CR4*10-1234A"
Comment out line 34:

# echo "$cmodel$mtype"

And add user this line:
echo "7042CR4"
Save the file and reboot using the command ‘reboot’.
Once your HMC is started, configure it.
Logon using hscroot/abc123.
You can install the service pack (HMC_Update_V7R710_SP1.iso) without any checks.
Sources and Thanks

Special thanks to the pseriestech.org forum and all contributors to thread 1052 “Running HMC in VMWare”.
Without them it would have been more difficult to get HMC v7.7 working in VirtualBox.

What about XF86Config?

It seems not to be needed for VirtualBox.
It is possible that it is needed for VMWare but I did not test this.

Critical Error 1901

For the people who get:
"A critical error has prevented normal HMC startup. Please reboot the HMC and try again. If the problem persists, contact your support personnel. 1901: HMC Startup aborted due to a malfunction of a required module."

For newer builds, VPD check is not only using the script /opt/hsc/getHMCVPD, but in /opt/ccfw/ccfw.jar. ccfw.jar directly calls dmidecode from the java code. GetInfo (com/ibm/hwmca/fw/util/GetInfo in ccfw.jar) class formed file /opt/ccfw/data/pciinfo/sys_info.out, which is used to validate the hardware.

In the log file /opt/ccfw/ccfw.out we see an error

"Java.lang.StringIndexOutOfBoundsException

at java.lang.String.substring (String.java: 1092)
at com.ibm.hwmca.fw.managed.HMC.getVpdInfo (HMC.java: 1358)
at com.ibm.hwmca.fw.managed.HMC.getBiosMachineType (HMC.java: 1088)

... "

indicating that improper handling of type String. This error arises from the fact that the “dmidecode – string system-product-name”/”dmidecode – string bios-version” returns are not what is expected.

The following procedures may work around this:

Move the original dmidecode

cd /usr/sbin
mv dmidecode dmidecode.orig
Create a script named /usr/sbin/dmidecode with this content:

#!/bin/bash
DMIDECODE=/usr/sbin/dmidecode.orig

if "$2" == "bios-version" ; then

echo "1234-123"

elif "$2" == "system-product-name" ; then

echo "1234-123"

else

$DMIDECODE "$@"

fi
Make the script executable

chmod +x dmidecode
Reboot the HMC

This has been tested on VMWare Server, and on an old SuperMicro server.
Alternative Fix for Virtualbox

This was tested in VirtualBox 3.2.8 r64453 with a Windows Host..
Download the in 7.7.2 code from fix central
Create a linux VM in virtualbox (I used generic linux 2.6)
1gb memory, 64bg disk
Halt the virtual machine
Edit the XML file for this VM

In the section add the following to fake out the HMC code. It will think the VM is now a 7310-CR3 :-)

You could probably add more “pcbios” options but less is always better.
You can add a secon dethernet to the VM config after the initial install (for your private LAN).
This procedure doesn’t require messing with the .ISO files.

THANKS TO BRYAN AND LAKSI FOR THIS!
ESX 3.5 limitation

This was tested to work with:
MH01255: HMC Recovery V7R730
MH01256: HMC Update V7R730
HM01257: HMC Mandatory eFix V7R730

Follow Bryan’s procedure above, plus:
Create a VM Profile as type ‘Other 32-bit Linux’
Remove the VM profile from vSphere inventory
Log in as root to the local ESXi console or connect to it via ssh.
cd into the directory where the HMC VM’s files are located and edit the .vmx file with vi.
Edit the ethernet#.virtualDev type to e1000, for instance:

ethernet0.virtualDev = "e1000"
ethernet1.virtualDev = "e1000"
Add the .VMX back to the inventory from Browse Datastore

THANKS TO HENRI FOR THIS!
ROOT ACCESS

Using the InitRD procedure with 7.3.0 works; however, only the Restricted Shell is available.

Access the filesystem from Linux emergency media, and remove the “set -r” command.

cd /opt/hsc/data/ssh/
chmod 755 hmcsshrc
vi hmcsshrc
Add # before “set -r”

THANKS TO MR. TOTH FOR THIS!
EASIER Root Access

I found it’s easiest to just add /usr/bin/su to /hmcrbin so that script updates won’t clobber the access to root.

Newer VirtualBox requires different syntax.
Also, newer HMC (at least 7.7.6) requires additional DMI entries.

Some people use these values instead:
DmiSystemProduct = 7042CR4
DmiBIOSVersion=GFE136BUS-1.09
DmiSystemSerial=068A3BB

-JDSDavis
TRADEMARKS

VirtualBox is Trade Marked by Oracle.
VMWare is Trade Marked by VMWare.
IBM, AIX, pSeries, DownloadDirector, etc are trade-marked by IBM
Anything else is trade marked by whoever owns the product (not me).

HMC

KVM Appliance

HMC as Virtual appliance

My wiki