I wonder if there is some weird skew between the anoncvs repository and the
master repository, or a recent (since 20000127) breakage in the release
branch for sparc. Here's what I know:

1. Thursday night I checkout release src, xsrc, pkgsrc from anoncvs.netbsd.org
    with a date tag of -D 20000225-UTC. Was previously running a build from
    -D 20000127-UTC sources, with no problems other than the crashing install
    kernels (due to them being just a little too big for the boot loader).
2. My Sparc IPX was able to build everything (base, X11, secr, inst) with one
    minor glitch: it got an mi_switch panic while putting one of the vnd0
    disk images together. I restarted it where it left off and it finished.
3. After it was done, I tested the syboot floppy and found that it still dies
    while being loaded, probably because the new alternate boot blocks aren't
    actually being used by the bootfs stuff.
4. My sparc now consistently crashes while populating vnd0 filesystems in
    distrib/sparc/* with either the classic mi_switch panic, or a lockmgr
    locking against myself panic. The machine seems to operate totally
    normally except for this problem.

This sparc IPX is running a GENERIC_SCSI3 kernel with options INSECURE added
so that the vnd0 stuff may run /usr/mdec/binstall without getting an error.
The running kernel was freshly built from the latest checkout sources. Other
than the 64 megs and a 2gig barracuda, this is a basic IPX configuration.

I am now unable to build any kind of boot floppies for sparc, even broken
ones. Any & all ideas welcome.

When I get some more free time tomorrow I will upload what I currently have
-- I've every reason to expect the miniroot to be usable. Theoretically this
could be 1.4.2 if no serious problems are found and the boot floppies can be
fixed.

Todd Whitesel
toddpw @ best.com