phil@cs.wwu.edu (Phil Nelson) (02/15/91)
Hello Everyone, The distribution of minix 1.5 hybrid (kernel version 1.3) is now ready. It is available for anonymous ftp from willow.cs.wwu.edu (140.160.140.153) in the directory pub/minix532. There are also binaries of gcc-1.37 and patch that will help you in your upgrading. The binaries live in pub/minix532/bin. If you do not have access to ftp, I can mail you the distribution. I presume most of you have access to ftp, so I'll take e-mail requests for those who don't. Send your mail to phil@cs.wwu.edu. For this distribution to be useful you need (a) minix 1.3 version for the pc532 from Bruce and (b) a full source tree for minix 1.5 (pc version). There are upgrade kits available for 1.3 -> 1.5 via anonymous ftp from plains.nodak.edu in the directory pub/Minix/updates. This distribution includes crc listings for the 1.5 source tree used as a reference, the final "reference" source tree that includes Bruce's sources and the final 1.5 hybrid source tree. WARNING: This distribution does not contain full source or executable due to the copyright on Minix. This will take some effort on your part to get it working. Several people have successfully created working versions of the 1.5 hybrid ... (Would you who have working 1.5 hybrid systems please tell of your experiences with it?) Version 1.5 is a major improvement when compared to version 1.3. It has the following major features (or improvements): a) Supports minix 1.5 except the kernel which is still 1.3. 1.5 has many more commands and some of the commands are much nicer and more complete. The 1.5 version is much easier system for porting free programs. (If I remember correctly, bison needed no changes to get it to compile using the SYS_V defs.) b) Kernel does include the 1.5 TTY driver! This TTY driver supports ALL speeds available on the pc532 UARTS. It includes user selectable (at compile time) hardware flow control. The xon/xoff works correctly and you can use both ports on one uart at the same time without hanging the system. (In fact, I don't know of a single hang caused by the 1.5 TTY driver.) c) The local definitions for your disk and its partitions have been extracted from scsi_hi.c into an include file. This allows updates to scsi_hi.c that will not change your partition information. d) The file system supports 64 Meg partitions (up from 32 Megs in version 1.3) e) Signals work a little better. f) Bruce's ranlib and ld have been changed to support the minix ar format. This allows minix532 to have only one ar on the system. g) I have several "quick hacks" that have been useful to me. These include a version of the minix "term" that supports zmodem. (You can run rz and sz without exiting term. Term also connects the communication port to sz and rz.) h) gcc-1.39 has compiled with minimal changes. (The changes were mainly to the minix include tree to add "dummy" include files.) I may be missing some things, but I think any one who is running minix on their pc532 will be pleased with this version. I think it is a much more useful operating system than minix 1.3. There have been reports of many free programs being ported easily to the atari st minix 1.5. They include TeX and GNU emacs. There is also an almost complete uucp package for minix 1.5 and many email systems for it also. I think that there are some minix 1.5 machines running news. I expect to see minix 1.6.? ready for distribution by AST by sometime this summer. It is supposed to have a TCP/IP implementation ready and has a more complete file system (it includes locking which 1.5 does not). Bruce and I are going to be working on getting the kernel up to version 1.5. Work is alread under way, but we have no idea when it will be ready. Until then, the 1.5 hybrid version appears to be stable enough to use. When it is done, we will distribute updates as changes from this minix 1.5 hybrid version. When you get the distribution, I recommend that you read the README file with the distribution and the README file with the pc532 specific programs in the commands directory. I hope this makes many people happy! --Phil phil@cs.wwu.edu (Phil Nelson) Computer Science Department Western Washington University Bellingham, WA 98226
sverre@lev.Seri.GOV (Sverre Froyen) (02/15/91)
> > WARNING: This distribution does not contain full source or executable >due to the copyright on Minix. This will take some effort on your part >to get it working. Several people have successfully created working >versions of the 1.5 hybrid ... (Would you who have working 1.5 hybrid >systems please tell of your experiences with it?) I have been using a prerelease if this hybrid for about 3 weeks. My recommendation: The effort it takes to upgrade is well worth it. The new version is WONDERFUL! Most of the problems porting code in 1.3, like shell scripts failing, makes not working properly, etc., are GONE. There are still bugs no doubt. I sent a description of some to Bruce and I will post the ones that were not fixed to the mailing list once I take a look at new distribution. This brings up the question, once again, of software maintenance. Should we try to find a way to coordinate Minix bug fixes, porting of utilities, etc. One way to do this would be to assign a moderator for each task. A task could be the kernel, another the libraries (or a subset of the libraries), yet anothre gcc, etc. We would send our changes, improvements, or fixes to the moderator, with an optional posting to the mailing list so that others might get immediate benefit. The moderator would incorporate the changes and send out an ``approved'' patch/version and maybe also a new binary. This scheme might avoid some of the duplication of effort that seemed to take place with Minix 1.3. Irrespective of the above, from now on, please indicate for which version your changes, fixes, ports, etc. are meant. Sverre -- Sverre Froyen sverre@seri.gov, sunpeaks!seri!sverre
maniac@convex.convex.com (Jon Buller) (02/17/91)
> If you do not have access to ftp, I can mail you the > distribution. I presume most of you have access to ftp, so I'll take > e-mail requests for those who don't. Send your mail to phil@cs.wwu.edu. Sounds great! Esp. the parts about fixes/upgrades. I (unfortunately) do not have access to any off-site ftp, so could you mail the stuff to me? Thanks, -- Jon Buller jonb@vector.dallas.tx.us ..!texsun!vector!jonb FROM Fortune IMPORT Quote; FROM Lawyers IMPORT Disclaimer;