[comp.unix.questions] Virt Mem on V.4

lynn@booboo.SanDiego.NCR.COM (Lynn Hedegard) (06/29/89)

I am working in a kernel group which is porting AT&T's V.4 to our
new  hardware.   I  am  trying  to  understand  the  new Virt Mem
architecture  in  V.4  and  would  appretiate  any  recomendation
regarding  articles  which describe this topic.  I am looking for
papers which describe the data structures and algorithms used.

guy@auspex.auspex.com (Guy Harris) (07/01/89)

>I am working in a kernel group which is porting AT&T's V.4 to our
>new  hardware.   I  am  trying  to  understand  the  new Virt Mem
>architecture  in  V.4  and  would  appretiate  any  recomendation
>regarding  articles  which describe this topic.  I am looking for
>papers which describe the data structures and algorithms used.

Try:

	*Virtual Memory Architecture in SunOS*, from the Summer 1987
	    USENIX proceedings

	*SunOS Virtual Memory Implementation*, from either the most
	    recent EUUG proceedings or the one before that, I think

(V.4's VM implementation is derived from the SunOS 4.0 one, although
there are differences in a few details).  They aren't extremely
detailed, but they do cover a fair bit at a relatively high level.

With any luck, all you'll have to do is write a "hat (Hardware Address
Translation) layer" for your MMU, which'll just plug into the rest of
the VM subsystem.  (If the new hardware uses a 68020+PMMU, or a 68030 or
so - i.e., if it's using a Motorola-style MMU - you might just see if
Sun'll sell you their 4.0 implementation; I have no idea if they will,
but it's worth a try....)  If you *do* have to do more, let AT&T (and
possibly Sun) know, so that with any luck the implementation can be
modified to let the new "hat layer" plug into it in the future.

While you're at it, point the languages people at *Shared Libraries in
SunOS* in the Summer 1987 USENIX proceedings for some information on how
the shared library mechanism works in V.4....

greg@cheers.UUCP (Greg Onufer) (07/04/89)

lynn@booboo.SanDiego.NCR.COM (Lynn Hedegard) writes:

>I am working in a kernel group which is porting AT&T's V.4 to our
>new  hardware.   I  am  trying  to  understand  the  new Virt Mem
>architecture  in  V.4  and  would  appretiate  any  recomendation

"Virtual Memory Architecture in SunOS"

         Robert A. Gingell
          Joseph P. Moran
        William A. Shannon

       Sun Microsystems, Inc.
          2550 Garcia Ave
      Mountain View, CA 94043

This describes the new VM Architecture developed by Sun for
SunOS and adopted by AT&T for ATT System V.4 (As far as I know).

Cheers!greg

hiho@cbnewsl.ATT.COM (paul.ho) (07/04/89)

> With any luck, all you'll have to do is write a "hat (Hardware Address
> Translation) layer" for your MMU, which'll just plug into the rest of
> the VM subsystem.  (If the new hardware uses a 68020+PMMU, or a 68030 or
> so - i.e., if it's using a Motorola-style MMU - you might just see if
> Sun'll sell you their 4.0 implementation; I have no idea if they will,
> but it's worth a try....)  If you *do* have to do more, let AT&T (and
> possibly Sun) know, so that with any luck the implementation can be
> modified to let the new "hat layer" plug into it in the future.

Is region (introduced in SVR3.0) dead? Or does it co-exist with
the VM stuff in SVR4? Thanks.

gwyn@smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn) (07/07/89)

In article <987@cbnewsl.ATT.COM> hiho@cbnewsl.ATT.COM (paul.ho) writes:
>Is region (introduced in SVR3.0) dead? Or does it co-exist with
>the VM stuff in SVR4? Thanks.

From the AT&T BOF at USENIX recently, I'd say that the region approach
was totally replaced by VM.  The implication is that SVR4 will be a
real bitch to port to a system that doesn't have an MMU that conforms
to the VM model.  E.g. some supercomputers..

prc@erbe.se (Robert Claeson) (07/10/89)

In article <10499@smoke.BRL.MIL> gwyn@brl.arpa (Doug Gwyn) writes:

>From the AT&T BOF at USENIX recently, I'd say that the region approach
>was totally replaced by VM.  The implication is that SVR4 will be a
>real bitch to port to a system that doesn't have an MMU that conforms
>to the VM model.  E.g. some supercomputers..

And I guess that we will never see SVR4 (or even SVR3) ported to the
intel 80286 chip...
-- 
          Robert Claeson      E-mail: rclaeson@erbe.se
	  ERBE DATA AB

dwc@cbnewsh.ATT.COM (Malaclypse the Elder) (07/11/89)

In article <10499@smoke.BRL.MIL>, gwyn@smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn) writes:
> From the AT&T BOF at USENIX recently, I'd say that the region approach
> was totally replaced by VM.  The implication is that SVR4 will be a
> real bitch to port to a system that doesn't have an MMU that conforms
> to the VM model.  E.g. some supercomputers..

from what i have seen of the code, at&t's VM code should not be too
hard to port to non-VM machines.  you just have to make sure that you
will never take a page fault and then the hat routines will mostly be
no-ops.  .  then you just make all the segment drivers no-ops (or
define new segment types).  of course, you'll lose all the nice memory
mapping (e.g. mmap()) system calls.

danny chen
att!hocus!dwc