Contents

Please note: All Linux sample commands in this section are performed as the root user (prompt = #). This may not be necessary for all commands in all environments depending on the local permission settings. The commands can be executed on the Charon host graphical console or via a non-graphical login (e.g., SSH). However, for accessing the running emulator, the use of PuTTY is strongly recommended because it works best with the MPE/iX environment.

The Charon-PAR/PA3 functionality of Charon-PAR emulates historic PA-RISC systems for MPE/iX. This section shows a sample installation of an MPE/iX guest system

Emulator Licensing Considerations

The emulator needs a valid license to run. The license can be a Sentinel HASP license or a Virtual Environment (VE) license. Please refer to Initial Emulator License Configuration for the basic license configuration steps of both options. The license(s) to be used are defined in the configuration file. If running in a cloud environment, a VE license is strongly recommended (supported from Charon-PAR version 3.0.6).

Downloading and Unpacking the Provided MPE/IX Disk Container

If not already done, please download the image with the preconfigured MPE/IX 7.5 disk container from Stromasys. Contact your Stromasys representative or your VAR for download instructions. The preconfigured LDev1 image allows the emulated system to boot without having to separately install or update MPE/iX.

Once the image has been downloaded, copy it to the Disk directory and unpack it:

After this step, if the image is not needed for other systems, you can delete the compressed image to save disk space.

Adapting the Configuration File Template

The configuration file template must be adapted to the customer environment and the required guest system characteristics. This section describes the minimum number of changes required to configure a Charon-PAR/PA3 emulator instance. Please refer to Configuration File Reference for a detailed description of the configuration file options.

Perform the following steps to create a basic configuration file for a Charon-PAR/PA3 emulator instance:

Starting the Charon-PAR/PA3 Emulator Instance

Please note: The examples in this section assume that a graphical interface is used, on which a PuTTY session can be run. Should this not be possible, you can access the console of the emulated system by using, for example, a telnet client and pointing it to the TCP port on the Charon host defined for the serial console port in the configuration file. The default port is 30000 (sample command to connect to an emulator on the local system: $ telnet localhost 30000). In this case, do not start the PuTTY program automatically from the emulator configuration.

To start the Charon-PAR/PA3 emulator instance, perform the following steps:

If everything works, you will see log output in the current terminal window ending an a pa3> prompt. This is the Charon-PAR emulator console. Please note: the prompt may be obscured by log messages and not be immediately visible. In this case, press the Enter key once to display the prompt.

Should you receive an error indicating that PuTTY cannot load the preconfigured font, open PuTTY as the root user, load the PAR-Telnet profile, select a font that is available on your host system and save the profile.

At the same time, a green PuTTY console window will open. In this green console window perform the following steps:

• Press the Enter key.
• This should produce the prompt Main Menu: Enter command or menu >.
• Enter the command boot and confirm by pressing the Enter key.

• This should produce the prompt Interact with IPL (Y or N)?>

• Press Y.
• The system should stop at the ISL> prompt.
• Type start norecovery and press the Enter key.
• The system will boot. It may prompt you for the correct date/time. 
• After a successful boot you will see the : prompt.

The image below shows sample console interaction:

The image below shows how to use the HELLO command to log into the booted guest system:

Basic Network Configuration

Default configuration

The preconfigured MPE/iX disk also includes preconfigured network settings:

• Hostname: demo.charon.com
• Network interface name: LAN
• IP address: 192.168.111.25

The default network configuration also includes the following configuration files:

• HOSTS.NET.SYS: contains aliases for 192.168.111.25.
• RESLVCNF.NET.SYS: contains the public DNS server IP addresses.
• NSSWITCH.NET.SYS: configures the name lookup to use HOSTS file, followed by DNS.

Changing the default configuration

Stromasys provides a special command file (SETIP.CHARON.SYS) in the preconfigured MPE image. This command file enables the user to configure the network without using a block-mode terminal that would otherwise be required to access the relevant MPE utility (NMMGR).

The command file takes three parameters: host IP address, default gateway address, and netmask. The image below shows a sample:

After changing the configuration, the command file will automatically restart the network to activate the changes.

For cloud environments, please note: in case of a dedicated Ethernet interface, the IP address of the emulator must be set to the value assigned by the cloud provider to the corresponding host NIC.

Stopping the Emulator

In order to stop the emulator in an orderly manner, perform the following steps:

1. Shut down the guest operating system:

a) Go to the console of the emulated system.

b) Press the key combination CTRL+A. This will display the = prompt.

c) At the = prompt, type SHUTDOWN SYSTEM.

d) Wait until the system displays the "Shutdown of operating system complete. (Shut 6)" message.

Please note: The =SHUTDOWN command only works on the system console. The :SHUTDOWN command does not have this requirement. However, it is not as safe a method as the =SHUTDOWN command.

2. Starting with version 3.0.5, the emulator is stopped automatically after the guest operating system shutdown is complete (unless the configuration parameter system.stop_on_halt has been set to false). If the emulator is not stopped automatically after the shutdown of the guest operating system, different methods must be used to stop it in different situations:

• The emulator was started in interactive mode and the Charon-PAR console is available in current terminal: enter the exit command at the pa3> prompt and hit Enter. This will cause the emulator to close the disk images of the emulated system and to exit.
• The Charon-PAR console is available on a local TCP port (emulator started with -c or --console-port parameter): this situation will exist most frequently if the emulator has been started as a daemon or service. To stop the emulator access the Charon-PAR console via telnet to localhost on the port specified when starting the emulator, enter the exit command at the pa3> prompt, and hit Enter.
  Access to the Charon-PAR console via a TCP port is available starting with Charon-PAR version 3.0.1. The CTRL+B key combination has been disabled on the emulator console starting with this version.
• The emulator was started as a daemon or service and the Charon-PAR console is not available via a local TCP port: This situation can occur if you run a version before 3.0.1 or you started the emulator without the -c option.
  • For versions 3.0.1 and higher: the emulator must be stopped using the kill command from the root user on the Charon host system. Perform the following steps to stop the Charon-PAR process:
    
    • Find the PID (process id) of the process: # ps -ef | grep -i charon-par

    • Stop the process: # kill <charon-par-pid>
  • For versions before 3.0.1: on the emulator console, after shutting down the guest operating system, press CTRL+B. After a few seconds, the PDC console prompt (Main menu:) will appear. Type exit to stop the emulator.

For more information about the Charon-PAR console, please refer to Charon-PAR Console. For more information about the Charon-PAR command-line options, please refer to Charon-PAR Command-Line Options.