NI-KAL 2.0 and openSUSE 11.3?

[Cepera]

Has anyone from NI or avant-guard users on this forum tried NI-KAL 2.0 and VISA 5.0 with openSUSE 11.3 (kernel 2.6.34-12)? I'd like to use v.11.3 because it includes Intel 2009Q4 graphics package which supports the embedded graphics controller on the single-board computer that we want to use for our instrument (prevous openSUSE versions do not recognize it and use the generic VESA driver that does not support the required screen resolution).

As a palliative, if someone knows how to add this set of Intel graphics drivers to openSUSE 11.1, that would be great (sorry, I am a relative newbie).

Thanks,

Sergey

[Cepera]

Guys

Please give me a hint: is it even worth trying NI-KAL 2.0 with openSUSE 11.3 or is it fundamentally hopeless?

Thanks,

Sergey

[anshuljain]

Yes, it is possible to get NI-KAL 2.0 working with Opensuse 11.3. I had tried this a couple of days ago and the installation, though tedious, does work. I believe for all kernels 2.6.32+ you need to patch the nikal installer script to look for some header files in the ~/linux/include/generated folder. The steps I had followed are:-

1. Install kernel-source and kernel-syms. Prepare the kernel the same way as its mentioned in the NI-KAL/NI-VISA notes (Module.symvers, make cloneconfig etc)

2. In the NI-VISA-Runtime 5.0 installer there will be a tar.gz with the name nivisa-runtime-5.0.0b5.tar.gz. Extract it and it will create 2 folders: bin and rpms. Go into the rpms folder

3. Install the nikali rpm:- rpm -ivh nikali-*. This will create a folder in /usr/local/natinst/nikal

4. Now you need to modify 2 files (courtesy: AKHuttel). I've attached the modified files: nikal.c and installerUtility.sh. Replace nikal.c in the /usr/local/natinst/nikal/src folder with the one attached. Do the same for installerUtility.sh. You may have to check the paths as I'm not a 100% sure.

5. Now create symlinks (just to be safe, this *may* not be required) for all of the files in the ~/linux/include/generated to the ~/linux/include/linux folder.

6. Go back to the folder /usr/local/natinst/nikal/bin and follow the steps:-

$> cd /usr/local/natinst/nikal/bin

$> . nikaliInstallerUtility.sh

$> nikaliPostInstall

$> updateNIDrivers

$> modprobe nikal

Make the kernel load the nikal kernel module by adding "nikal" to the /etc/sysconfig/kernel file and look for "MODULES_LOADED_ATBOOT". Add nikal there

7. From this point onwards, you may use the installer script...or you may proceed with a step-by-step installation as what I had documented for Ubuntu Lucid/Karmic at :-  http://decibel.ni.com/content/docs/DOC-11652

The only thing you need to do different is to perform an "rpm -ivh" instead of "dpkg -i" for Ubuntu/Debian installs. Also, install nirpc right after the nikal installation as there are dependencies from it to nipal and nipalk.

I'll try to make this into a document sometime this week as I'm using Ubuntu Lucid and not openSUSE 11.3, but I do plan to use openSUSE soon. Do let me know how it works for you.

-Anshuul

[Cepera]

Anshul,

Your installation procedure worked! The only problem I had was that I still was not able to run the installer script in step 7 (quoted below) - I had to continue by using your step-by-step instructions from your other post:

7. From this point onwards, you may use the installer script...or you may proceed with a step-by-step installation as what I had documented for Ubuntu Lucid/Karmic at :-  http://decibel.sni.com/content/docs/DOC-11652

Thanks a lot for your help!

Sergey

[anshuljain]

Glad to hear that you were able to get it working That method I had outlined for Ubuntu, will work for pretty much *any* distro...including the Gentoos and Arch Linuxes