Chapter 2 —
Preparing for Installation

2.1 About This Chapter

Before starting the installation procedure in Chapter 3, complete the preinstallation tasks explained in this chapter. This chapter provides the following information to make your installation run smoothly:

You must login as root or become superuser to install the Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX software and register the license PAK.

2.2 Accessing the Release Notes

Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX is delivered with release notes. This document contains information that became available too late to be included in the official product documentation. It is important to read this throughly before attempting to install or use MMS. See Table 1 in the Preface for more information about the various locations where you can find the release notes.

2.3 Registering the Software License

The subsets in the Runtime product do not require a license PAK.

You must register your License Product Authorization Key (License PAK) in the License Database (LDB) in order to use Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX Development Kit on a newly licensed node. The License PAK, MMS-DK might be shipped with the kit if you ordered the licenses and media together; otherwise, they are shipped separately to a location specified on your license order.

To register a license with the DIGITAL UNIX operating system:

Task/Location

Action

Result
Register license via LMF at the UNIX command line
  1. Log in as root. At the superuser prompt, edit an empty PAK template with the lmf register command as follows, and include all the information on your License PAK:

# lmf register

You must enter the license information from the PAK accurately.

 LMF displays a blank template and invokes an editor to allow you to edit the template. LMF invokes the editor that is defined by your EDITOR environment variable. If the environment variable is undefined, LMF invokes the vi editor.
 
  1. When you finish entering the license data and you are sure it is correct, exit from the editor.
 LMF copies it into the license Database. If the license data is incorrect, you can reenter the editor and correct all mistakes.
Load the license into the kernel
  1. After you register your license, use the following commands to copy the license details from the license database (LDB) to the kernel cache:

# lmf load 0 MMS-DK

 For complete information on using the License Management Facility, see the Guide to Software License Management and the lmf(8) manpage.

 

2.4 Requirements

Installing Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX takes approximately 15 minutes, depending on your type of media and system configuration.

Check for the following requirements.

Hardware To install Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX, you need the following hardware:
 
  1. Software distribution device (if installing from media)

Locate the CD-ROM drive for the CD-ROM software distribution media. The CD booklet or the documentation for the CD-ROM drive you are using explains how to load the CD-ROM media.

  1. See the Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX Software Product Description (SPD) for additional hardware requirements.
Software Multimedia Services V2.4 for DIGITAL UNIX requires the DIGITAL UNIX operating system V3.2 C or above, up to and including V4.0C. Future Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX releases might require higher versions.
Subsets You must choose the Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX subsets that you want to load.

See Chapter 7 for a complete listing of each subset and its requirements.

Some subsets will not install or function properly depending on your machine's specific hardware and software configuration.

 

2.4.1 Disk-Space Requirements

Table 2-2 lists the disk space requirements for loading Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX software subsets. These requirements apply to the disks where you load the Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX subsets.

Table -2 — Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX Disk Space Requirements (in Kilobytes)

Category

Subset

/

/usr

/var
Development
  MMEDEV240

0

1542

0

  MMEMANDEV240

0

922

0

 

subtotals

  

2464

  
Runtime
  MMEMANRT240

0

129

0

  MMERT240

10

12029

0

  MMERTCDE240

0

232

0

  MMERTSMPLDAT240

0

6216

0

 

subtotals

10

18606

  
PCI/EISA/ISA
  MMEDRVAV201240

29

382

0

  MMEDRVAV3X1240

28

64

0

  MMEDRVMSB240

28

198

0

  MMEDRVMMSESS240

1

118

0

 

subtotals

86

764

  
TURBOchannel
  MMEDRVAV300240

35

75

0

  MMEDRVBBA240

0

15

0

 

subtotals

35

90

  
Documentation
  MMEDOC240

0

2305

0

  MMEDOCDEV240

0

2446

0

  MMEDOCHW240

0

1874

0

  MMERELNOTES240

0

499

0

 

subtotals

0

7124

  
 

Totals

131

29048

  

 

Using these disk space requirements, total the values for the subsets you will load in each directory.

Compare the space required for subsets with the free space currently on the disks where Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX files will reside.

To check the current amount of free space for a directory path, log in to the system where you will install Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX. To check the total space and the free space for the directories where Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX will reside, enter the df command.

For example:

# df -k /usr

Filesystem 1024-blocks Used Avail Capacity Mounted on

/dev/rz0e: 577143 266656 252772 51% /usr

The display shows there are 252,772 kilobytes available. This free space must accommodate the subset requirements listed in Table 2-2.

2.5 Installation Considerations

Before you install Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX you should consider the following.

 

2.5.1 Configuring the Product for a Particular Installation

MMS contains a daemon program, mmeserver, which can be configured as follows. The mmeserver uses the system.ini file to load the drivers at startup. An alternate file can be specified at the time of mmeserver startup for any of the following reasons:

To create an alternate file, copy the /var/mme/system.ini file into another file and make the changes to that new file. This file can be specified as the one to use during mmeserver startup by modifying the appropriate line in the startup script /sbin/init.d/mmeserver.

Note

Simultaneous audio and video (video capture, video playback, codec) operations on the Sound and Motion J300 option card are not supported on DEC 3000 Models 300, 300X, and 300LX. Enabling both of these components can crash or hang the system, thus requiring a system reboot.

Three separate configuration files are created for DEC 3000 Model 300 systems during installation. The configuration files can be found in /var/mme. By default, only the video portion of the Sound and Motion J300 option is enabled. If a particular installation requires a different configuration, the appropriate file must be specified in the startup script. Refer to the /var/mme/system.ini(4) reference page for information about the file.

2.5.2 Installing from Media or Using RIS

Someone from your site must perform at least one Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX installation from the distribution media. Your site system manager can then decide whether to make a Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX distribution kit available on line so that subsequent installations of Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX can use the Remote Installation Services (RIS). For information on loading Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX subsets to an RIS distribution area, see the Guide to Sharing Software on a Local Area Network.

If you expect to use Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX subsets from the RIS area of a remote system for installation on your local system, first check with your site system manager to ensure the following:

If Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX subsets are available to you on an RIS server system, you must know the name of that system.

For more information about installing Multimedia Services for DIGITAL UNIX from an RIS distribution area, see Section 3.3.2.

2.5.3 Backing Up Your System Disk

DIGITAL recommends that you back up your system disk before installing any software. For information about backing up your system disk, see the DIGITAL UNIX system documentation.