Sun-Spots-Request@Rice.edu (William LeFebvre) (10/11/88)
SUN-SPOTS DIGEST Sunday, 9 October 1988 Volume 6 : Issue 254 Today's Topics: Re: Problem: SLOW Boot on diskless Suns (2) Re: gettimeofday() bug Re: how to invert a panel text item programatically Re: videoing a sun screen Re: GNUPLOT Re: Voice Recognition Hardware/Software Re: facts for purchase justification SUG Yearly Shindig BITNET mangles source files kermit for sun 4, sun os 4.0? Converting SunOS 3.x dot.o files to SunOS 4.0? Changing Sunview default font? Postscript previewer? Project Planning Software? Send contributions to: sun-spots@rice.edu Send subscription add/delete requests to: sun-spots-request@rice.edu Bitnet readers can subscribe directly with the CMS command: TELL LISTSERV AT RICE SUBSCRIBE SUNSPOTS My Full Name Recent backissues are available via anonymous FTP from "titan.rice.edu". For volume X, issue Y, "get sun-spots/vXnY". They are also accessible through the archive server: mail the request "send sun-spots vXnY" to "archive-server@rice.edu" or mail the word "help" to the same address for more information. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 5 Oct 88 12:37:26 GMT From: ehrlich@blitz.cs.psu.edu (Dan Ehrlich) Subject: Re: Problem: SLOW Boot on diskless Suns (1) Reference: v6n248 Jean-Francois Lamy <lamy@ai.utoronto.ca> said: > >We have 3 3/60s in the same room, on the same DELNI. Oddly enough, one >machine is black and white and has never exhibited the slow TFTP problem. >The colour and the grey-scale ones do it all the time....As I >recall, Sun's answer for the Sun 2 problem was "reboot until it goes >quickly". Sure. Way back when the DELNI was first introduced by DEC (and I was working somewhere else) we tried to determine why we got much lower file transfer rates between machines on the same DELNI. If my memory serves me correctly the final word we got was something like "Well, you have to understand that the DELNI is a multiplexor and not a multiport tranceiver." As this came from 'knowledgeable' people we assumed it was correct, albeit not the answer we wanted to hear. Appearently there is enough shared logic in the DELNI that trying to rapidly pump large amounts of data between two ports results in a large number of 'collisions' being reported. (Can anyone confirm/deny this?) When we put the two machines on seperate DELNIs that where connected by coax the file transfer rates were much closer to the rates we saw when the machines themselves were directly on the coax. Dan Ehrlich <ehrlich@blitz.cs.psu.edu> The Pennsylvania State University Department of Computer Science University Park, PA 16802 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Oct 88 21:12:20 MDT From: tomlin@zia.dspo.gov (Bob Tomlinson) Subject: Re: Problem: SLOW Boot on diskless Suns (2) I believe (first hand, from Sun, and from other sources) that the SLOW boot problem on diskless Sun workstations is caused by receipt of Multicast packets during the boot process. Multicast packets are used by DECnet and XNS (as well as other less used protocols VMTP, etc.). The official Sun bug number is 1013639. The ECO 4022 fixes the problem (new boot proms). (Actually, it doesn't really fix the problem, so much as it kicks the boot process in the pants when it gets stuck.) -- bob tomlin@hc.dspo.gov -- Bob Tomlinson -- tomlin@hc.dspo.gov -- (505) 667-8495 Los Alamos National Laboratory -- MEE-10/Data Systems ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Oct 88 21:24:42 PDT From: jamesa@sun.com (James D. Allen) Subject: Re: gettimeofday() bug The timer resolution of Sun-2 and Sun-3 is 20 milliseconds; for Sun-4 it's 10 milliseconds. gettimeofday() cannot be used for greater accuracy than this. (With some difficulty a finer timestamp *is* available on the Sun-2.) Why then, the non-zero digits in the low-order microsecond value? It's a well-known (though little understood) principle of physics that if event A occurs AFTER event B, its *time* is arithmetically greater than that of event B. gettimeofday() provides this useful feature on its "times" by incrementing the microsecond field on each call. This is not a new idea. The IBM 370/135, for example, had 16 microsecond resolution. The firmware for Store_Clock executed 16 microseconds of NOP's to ensure that the Clock never yielded the same value twice. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Oct 88 07:55:00 EDT From: Chuck Musciano <chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com> Subject: Re: how to invert a panel text item programatically > Normally, when you click on a text panel item, SunView highlights it in > inverse video. How can I make a SunView program do highlighting like this > under program control? You can call panel_begin_preview(panel_item, event) to start the inverting, followed by panel_accept_preview(panel_item, event) to switch to the "hashing" and call the notify proc, and finally, panel_cancel_preview(panel_item, event) to restore things back to normal. Read about these in the panel chapter in the SunView programmer's guide. Chuck Musciano Advanced Technology Department Harris Corporation (407) 727-6131 ARPA: chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Oct 88 11:45:25 CDT From: debrunne%uirvld.csl.uiuc.edu@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu (Christian H. Debrunner) Subject: Re: videoing a sun screen Phill Everson asks: >Has anyone successfully managed to video a sun screen? We have tried but >have had considerable flicker problems with the sun refresh rate of 66Hz >(?) and our video camera's rate of 25 Hz (?). We have video taped directly off a color sun screen (3/160) using an Olympus CCD 8mm camcorder with reasonable results. I actually didn't expect it to work since the frame rates were different, but there were no problems with flicker. I'm not really sure why it works, but my theory is that the CCD sensor integrates the light coming to each pixel over one whole frame time, so it is not critical when during the frame time the corresponding region of the screen is illuminated (scanned), and syncronization is unnecessary. A standard video tube, however, scans the imaging area with an electron beam and if it is out of sync with the monitor the image will flicker. I believe that you could not genlock your recorder to the sun's monitor because they run at different scan rates. There are devices which convert signals between different scan rates and signal formats, but I beleive they are quite expensive. On the other hand, you would probably get better resolution and color with such a device. Chris Debrunner University of Illinois ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Oct 88 00:03:22 EDT From: ufnmr!gareth@bikini.cis.ufl.edu (Gareth J. Barker) Subject: Re: GNUPLOT Gnuplot is available via uucp from 'rpp386.uucp' - put the following line in your 'L.sys' file : rpp386 Any ACU 2400 12142506272 in:--in:--in: anonuucp Send a break to change from 2400 to 1200 baud. >From a recent USENET posting - sorry I've lost the authors name - __________ The archive listing file will give the location of the files. All of the packages are storaged as 16 bit compressed sharchives, except for compress of course, stored in the subdirectory /usr/archive/. Do not attempt to use file wildcards. Pick up ~/snatch if you are lazy ;-). This is a archive of USENET sources I've been able to get running on SCO Xenix(tm). If you aren't running Xenix, you may still be in luck since things seem to work fine if they work on Xenix. However, please note that I am not in any way associated with either Microsoft or The Santa Cruz Operation. Files are stored in /usr/archive, one package per directory, as compressed(1)'d sharchives. Be _very_ careful to get the full path-name. Many people forget the package subdirectory. For example, it is /usr/archive/moria/moria-1.Z. Do not use wild cards. YOU MUST NAME THE COMPLETE PATH YOURSELF!!!! DO NOT FORGET THE /usr/archive/ SUBDIRECTORY OR YOUR REQUEST WILL FAIL!!! For best results, pick up the script /usr/spool/uucppublic/snatch which can be used to setup requests by package name. Description Volume File(s) Blocks =========================================================================== gnuplot - graph and plot tool, part 1 f003 gnuplot/gplot.shar.1.Z 26 gnuplot - graph and plot tool, part 2 f003 gnuplot/gplot.shar.2.Z 52 gnuplot - graph and plot tool, part 3 f003 gnuplot/gplot.shar.3.Z 56 gnuplot - graph and plot tool, part 4 f003 gnuplot/gplot.shar.4.Z 10 gnuplot - graph and plot tool, part 5 f003 gnuplot/gplot.shar.5.Z 30 gnuplot - graph and plot tool, part 6 f003 gnuplot/gplot.shar.6.Z 46 __________ The diffs in the Sun Spot archives are almost, but not exactly, correct for this version - you'll probably have to patch 'term.c' and the Makefile by hand. Gareth J. Barker, University of Florida, Department of Radiology. INTERNET : ufnmr!gareth@BIKINI.CIS.UFL.EDU UUCP : ...gatech!uflorida!ufnmr!gareth ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 05 Oct 88 08:36:08 EDT From: Eric.Thayer@f.word.cs.cmu.edu Subject: Re: Voice Recognition Hardware/Software Andrew S. Gerber asked on Fri, 30 Sep 88: Can anyone give me a pointer to companies that manufacture/distribute voice recognition software and hardware for the Sun? I don't know of any developed systems, but a number of industry representatives have come to see the SPHINX recognition system developed by Kai-fu Lee, Roberto Bisiani, and their groups. You can get in touch by e-mail or phone with Raj Reddy or Kai-fu @ CMU for more details. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 05 Oct 88 09:58:21 -0500 From: "David C. Martin" <dcmartin@cs.wisc.edu> Subject: Re: facts for purchase justification Reference: v6n249 Email: dcmartin@cheddar.cs.wisc.edu or ..!ucbvax!dcmartin Phone: 608/262-6624 (O) In response to Robert Lopez's question about purchasing a Sun4 for LISP development in an VAX/VMS environment. Well, I don't know about the current state of VAX Lisp, but the Lucid Common LISP and SPE from Sun appear to be nice development environments. I don't particularly like Lucid, but SPE appears to be a win (Franz Allegro 3.0 is faster on the Sun4 than Lucid 2.1). Why buy a Sun4 instead of a uVAX 3200 running VMS? Well, you are comparing apples and oranges. If you buy the VMS box then you will be forced to purchase whatever SPE equivalent that DEC produces (when they produce it). A possible alternative might be the rumored DEC/MIPS box running Ultrix. With approx. 13 MIPS of computing power and UNIX with the X Window System you should be able to blow away any Sun product that currently exists. Or you could simply purchase a MIPS box from some other OEM who adds the bigh-res bitmap display and provides support for X11. I think you ought to examine the needs for LISP in your environment and look for a box which provides the highest throughput with the nicest environment - but don't forget response to customer needs - one thing I find a little lacking from Lucid/Sun. Talk to Franz, Inc in Berkeley, CA - I don't remember their number off the top of my head, but it is the 415 area code. dcm ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Oct 88 19:44:44 MST From: bull@noao.edu (Frank Bull CCS/NOAO) Subject: SUG Yearly Shindig What is the status of SUG Conference in Miami in December? I haven't heard from SUG in 6 months nor received README in that long. Anyone care to comment? Frank Bull Central Computer Services National Optical Astronomy Observatories UUCP: {arizona,decvax,ncar}!noao!bull or uunet!noao.edu!bull Internet: bull@noao.edu SPAN/HEPNET: 5355::BULL or NOAO::BULL [[ As far as I know, it's still happening. I plan to be there this year....maybe we could have an informal "sun-spots" gathering or something. It's scheduled for December 4 - 7 at the Fountainebleau Hilton, which (I guess) is on the beach. --wnl ]] ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Oct 88 07:46:51 EDT From: Chuck Musciano <chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com> Subject: BITNET mangles source files It has been my experience that C source sent to some bitnet sits, or to some sites which have to pass through some EBCDIC (!) machines is horribly mangled. Does anyone know of some tools which will massage files into some form which is acceptable to everyone, and then restore them after the mailer gets through with them? If not, I'll gladly write them, and would appreciate it if people would send me any mailer failure modes they have seen so that I can handle the problem. [[ Later that same week.... --wnl ]] Well, I suppose I'm just losing my mind. I just asked about tools which let you ship code across various hosts undamaged, and then realized that uuencode and uudecode do just that. Sigh... I've got to sit further back from my screen... [[ Well, yes and no. Uuencode/decode usually work, but I have encountered EBCDIC machines that change around some ASCII characters in an unexpected way. What have other peoples' experiences been in sending a uuencoded file through Bitnet hosts? What subset of ASCII does uuencode use (I can't find an answer to that in the manual pages)? --wnl ]] Chuck Musciano Advanced Technology Department Harris Corporation (407) 727-6131 ARPA: chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed Oct 5 00:09:32 1988 From: fabscal!dorn@gatech.edu (Alan Dorn Hetzel) Subject: kermit for sun 4, sun os 4.0? I am in desperate need of a version of kermit which will operate on a sun 4 under sun os 4.0 Anyone who can help, please send mail to: gatech.edu!fabscal!dorn ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Oct 88 01:10:46 PDT From: markb@ee.ucla.edu (Mark Bell) Subject: Converting SunOS 3.x dot.o files to SunOS 4.0? Is there a reasonable way to convert 3.x object files to 4.0? I have some commercial libraries (Informix) which I use in my production code. I can compile an executable module on a 3.x system which works fine on the 4.0 SunOS, but I can't use those libraries on the 4.0. Sun told me that they knew of no way and agreed with me that perusing the a.out manual page and include/a.out.h should theoretically allow me to write a converter; there was no Computer Science reason it couldn't be done. I acknowledge that the manual for 4.0 says the library modules won't work. Maybe there is a switch I can give the linker to accept object modules that are non-run-time-dynamic? [[ "-Bstatic" maybe? --wnl ]] I'm not too concerned with execution efficiency since I expect to receive new libraries in a couple of months and this would tide us over. Thanks -- Mark Bell UCLA Engr School (213) 825-6166. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Oct 88 14:10:04 EDT From: Paul Jordan <pj2f@eesun8.ee.virginia.edu> Subject: Changing Sunview default font? I hope there's an easy fix to this problem I'm having with the font setup in Sunview (on a SUN 3/50). I can't seem to change the default font the way described in any of the manuals (i.e. using WIN_FONT in window_create, or calling the pf_default() routine). Thus my application takes the default font of the user. How can it be set to use one font, no matter what the user's font is ? Also, a side-note question (since I'm a new user/reader of sun-spots) : are there any easy fixes to the use of more than one tty subwindow in Sunview, for when I create 2 ttys, the window setup for one or both is lost and applications inside will not work. Is it an environment parameter which limits the number or a system limitation ? Any help would be appreciated ! Paul J. (pj2f@uvaee.ee.virginia.edu) ------------------------------ Date: 6 Oct 88 01:03:32 GMT From: venkat%brand.usc.edu@oberon.usc.edu (V. Venkat) Subject: Postscript previewer? Is anybody aware of a postscript previwer on the SUN to preview postscript files? Thanks for any info. V. Venkat email to venkat@brand.usc.edu ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Oct 88 11:21:36 MDT From: roberts%studguppy@lanl.gov (Doug Roberts @ Los Alamos National Laboratory) Subject: Project Planning Software? I'm looking for project planning software for the sun that does the following: 1. Critical path analysis (PERT algorithm preferred) 2. Calendar bar charts 3. A friendly interface for inputing event/activity info 4. A graphical interface that shows event precedence info (i,j node diagram) would be nice. There is a package called Micro Planner Plus for the Macintosh that does all of the above, and I've seen one or two PC products as well. Anybody know of something like this for the Sun? --Doug Douglas Roberts Los Alamos National Laboratory (505)667-4569 dzzr@lanl.gov ------------------------------ End of SUN-Spots Digest ***********************