peter@hydrovax.nmt.edu (02/22/89)
Howdy, We have been toying for some time with the idea of running 4.3 BSD on our RT, being as RT-AIX is not a useful operating system. The IBM reps locally are only aware of a 'Univerisity' package that includes hardware and software. They claim that there are hardware changes in the boxes running 4.3 BSD. Does anyone know of a commercially available 4.3 OS for the RT that do not require hardware changes? Thanks Peter Blemel --
dyer@spdcc.COM (Steve Dyer) (02/25/89)
In article <1966@nmtsun.nmt.edu> peter@hydrovax.nmt.edu writes: > We have been toying for some time with the idea of running 4.3 BSD on >our RT, being as RT-AIX is not a useful operating system. The IBM reps >locally are only aware of a 'Univerisity' package that includes hardware >and software. They claim that there are hardware changes in the boxes >running 4.3 BSD. Hogwash! As far as hardware mods are concerned, they're either morons or liars or perhaps both. I *HATE* creeps like those. IBM should send them back to their "Product Centers" to sell PC Jrs... -- Steve Dyer dyer@ursa-major.spdcc.com aka {ima,harvard,rayssd,linus,m2c}!spdcc!dyer dyer@arktouros.mit.edu
eap@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Eric Pearce) (02/25/89)
In article <1966@nmtsun.nmt.edu> peter@hydrovax.nmt.edu says: >Howdy, > > We have been toying for some time with the idea of running 4.3 BSD on >our RT, being as RT-AIX is not a useful operating system. The IBM reps >locally are only aware of a 'Univerisity' package that includes hardware >and software. They claim that there are hardware changes in the boxes >running 4.3 BSD. Does anyone know of a commercially available 4.3 OS >for the RT that do not require hardware changes? > >Thanks >Peter Blemel > >-- As far as I know, there are no hardware differences that prevent you from running 4.3. If you plan to make it a usable workstation, you need to have a monitor such as the "megapel", as the smaller PS2-like vga ones are just too small for a windowing system like X. It's well worth your ime to switch over to 4.3, as most of the public domain software that I have tried will run with few changes. It also comes with lots of neat software from Project Athena. -e -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Eric Pearce ARPANET eap@bu-it.bu.edu Boston University Information Technology CSNET eap%bu-it@bu-cs 111 Cummington Street JNET jnet%"ep@buenga" Boston MA 02215 UUCP !harvard!bu-cs!bu-it!eap 617-353-2780 voice 617-353-6260 fax BITNET ep@buenga
karish@forel.stanford.edu (Chuck Karish) (02/26/89)
In article <1966@nmtsun.nmt.edu> peter@hydrovax.nmt.edu says: > We have been toying for some time with the idea of running 4.3 BSD on >our RT, being as RT-AIX is not a useful operating system. The IBM reps >locally are only aware of a 'Univerisity' package that includes hardware >and software. They claim that there are hardware changes in the boxes >running 4.3 BSD. Does anyone know of a commercially available 4.3 OS >for the RT that do not require hardware changes? IBM ACIS 4.3 (essentially vanilla 4.3 with extensions for the RT hardware, plus a faster compiler and, now, NFS) runs fine on the same hardware that runs AIX. I've made the changeover from AIX by just plugging in a 4.3 tape and following the instructions on the screen. It's available only for university use, though, except for the 6152. AIX 1.0 wasn't my idea of a solid operating system, but that was what, four years ago? Check out a current version. The quality is good, and there are some nice extensions that aren't available under 4.3. Functional differences between ACIS 4.3 and AIX: - The ACIS driver for its async ports is broken. Flow control support is inadequate except at low speeds. Ethernet communications work very well. The AIX async driver works OK up to 9600 Baud. As of version 2.2, AIX has 4.3BSD networking facilities. I hope the 2.2.1 tty driver strips 8-bit characters properly; this is an annoyance under 2.2. I wind up using kermit instead of cu for dialing out, since it does the stripping itself. - There's no support for emulating any well-known terminal type on the ACIS console, unless you run X, which is not supported on the 6153 console because it's too small to support multiple text windows. It's necessary to export the termcap entry to the remote host, or use it to manufacture a terminfo file. I don't know what I'd do to communicate with a non-UNIX system. The AIX native console is an ANSI terminal emulator. It supports multiple sessions, switchable by a hot key. This makes life tolerable on a system without job control. For that matter, job control is required by the POSIX FIPS, so I expect to see it in AIX some time soon. - ACIS seems to have a better driver for the streaming tape drive. It'll keep the drive streaming on its own. Under AIX, the user has to specify special command line arguments to get reasonable performance. These are just impressions; I haven't made a detailed performance comparison. These comparisons are beside the point for most customers, because IBM won't sell them ACIS. Last year, someone in IBM sales seemed to indicate that there might be some flexibility on this point if a customer really had to have something from 4.3 if he were going to choose to buy RTs. This could have been intended to get feedback on what the drop-dead features were that AIX had to have to be salable in the technical workstation market. Chuck Karish karish@denali.stanford.edu hplabs!hpda!mindcrf!karish
schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu (Scott Schwartz) (02/26/89)
In article <1966@nmtsun.nmt.edu>, peter@hydrovax writes: > We have been toying for some time with the idea of running 4.3 BSD on >our RT, being as RT-AIX is not a useful operating system. The IBM reps >locally are only aware of a 'Univerisity' package that includes hardware >and software. They claim that there are hardware changes in the boxes >running 4.3 BSD. Does anyone know of a commercially available 4.3 OS >for the RT that do not require hardware changes? The product is 4.3BSD, and is called AOS (Academic Operating System) by IBM. If necessary, I can get you the magic product number to feed to your sales people. AOS requires no hardware changes to run. We have it on several 6150's and lots and lots of 6152's. Assert your right to run REAL UNIX on the RT!! -- Scott Schwartz <schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu>
schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu (Scott Schwartz) (02/26/89)
In article <28304@bu-cs.BU.EDU>, eap@bu-cs (Eric Pearce) writes: > As far as I know, there are no hardware differences that prevent you > from running 4.3. If you plan to make it a usable workstation, you > need to have a monitor such as the "megapel", as the smaller PS2-like > vga ones are just too small for a windowing system like X. True, true. The megapel is a really nice display. The 8514a is not as nice, but might cost less or something. Anything smaller: forget it. By the way, IBM has not yet released drivers that work correctly with X11R3 (although I'm told they have them). As shipped, you get X11R2 :-( > worth your ime to switch over to 4.3, as most of the public domain software > that I have tried will run with few changes. It also comes with > lots of neat software from Project Athena. Not to mention all the nifty Andrew stuff from CMU. Now if only they would ship MACH with the RT.... Sigh. -- Scott Schwartz <schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu>
wlm@archet.UUCP (William L. Moran Jr.) (02/27/89)
In article <28304@bu-cs.BU.EDU> eap@bu-it.bu.edu (Eric Pearce) writes: >In article <1966@nmtsun.nmt.edu> peter@hydrovax.nmt.edu says: ... >> We have been toying for some time with the idea of running 4.3 BSD on >>our RT, being as RT-AIX is not a useful operating system. The IBM reps ... > > As far as I know, there are no hardware differences that prevent you > from running 4.3. If you plan to make it a usable workstation, you > need to have a monitor such as the "megapel", as the smaller PS2-like > vga ones are just too small for a windowing system like X. It's well > worth your ime to switch over to 4.3, as most of the public domain software > that I have tried will run with few changes. It also comes with > lots of neat software from Project Athena. > I thought I would contribute my $0.02 to this. If you think that there is any chance that you may want or need to use a serial connection to the RT (i.e. serial line or modem), then don't switch to 4.3. It pains me to say this because I really despise AIX. The problem is that the async support on ACIS RTs is totally broken. This holds true for the 025, 125 and 135 running any version of ACIS. *sigh* So, if you switch you'll be getting into an incredible mess. On the brighter side, the 135 with a megapel running 4.3 is quite a nice workstation. The 4.3 works quite well (with the exception of the async support). Also, the sources are in slightly different form than the generic Berkeley distribution, but that's minor. Bill Moran moran-william@cs.yale.edu uunet!bywater!acheron!archet!wlm
aad@stpstn.UUCP (Anthony A. Datri) (02/28/89)
In article <496@Portia.Stanford.EDU> karish@forel.stanford.edu (Chuck Karish) writes: > The AIX async driver works OK up to 9600 Baud. As of version > 2.2, AIX has 4.3BSD networking facilities. I wish they'd give them normal names, though. ftp becomes xftp, and I just discovered lpr lurking as lprbe. It'd also be nice to find the binaries in expected places, instead of /usr/lpp. I imagine these things would be clearer if we had documentation. > - There's no support for emulating any well-known terminal > type on the ACIS console Is it still an ibm3101? Certainly not a well-known terminal. I found, oddly enough, that setting the terminal type to "owl" on a DEC-20 produced results that were acceptable for occasional use. > The AIX native console is an ANSI terminal emulator. Thanks for the info. I hadn't suspected that "ibm5081" was an ansi terminal. > It supports multiple sessions, switchable by a hot key. > This makes life tolerable on a system without job > control. I go insane because of the things that aren't there, like more, head, tail, whoami, clear, strings. Microemacs compiles and executes just fine with the termcap routines, which are hidden in some non-obvious library (curses, I think) > - ACIS seems to have a better driver for the streaming tape > drive. It'll keep the drive streaming on its own. I remember 4.2 ACIS as being pretty wretched on the tape -- is 4.3 better? It used to take me 45 minutes to do a tar cf of a Scribe distribution (5 or 6 meg) onto a cartridge. -- @disclaimer(Any concepts or opinions above are entirely mine, not those of my employer, my GIGI, my VT05, or my 11/34) beak is@>beak is not Anthony A. Datri @SysAdmin(Stepstone Corporation) aad@stepstone.com stpstn!aad
dyer@arktouros.MIT.EDU (Steve Dyer) (02/28/89)
In article <45@archet.UUCP> wlm@archet.UUCP (William L. Moran Jr.) writes: >I thought I would contribute my $0.02 to this. If you think that there >is any chance that you may want or need to use a serial connection to >the RT (i.e. serial line or modem), then don't switch to 4.3. It pains >me to say this because I really despise AIX. The problem is that the >async support on ACIS RTs is totally broken. This holds true for >the 025, 125 and 135 running any version of ACIS. *sigh* So, if you >switch you'll be getting into an incredible mess. Let me point out that this may be true for the planar serial ports and the original 4-port async card, but it is certainly NOT true for the newer buffered 4-port async card (and presumably for the 8-port card which is also buffered.) These newer cards use versions of the NS16--- (I forget the chip name) UART which incorporate input and output FIFOs on a per-line basis. The Sep 88 and later releases of AOS 4.3 have an async driver which knows about the FIFO (and is backwardly compatible with older cards.) Anyway, the older ports were a disaster as reported. However, with the new card, I have a 19.2kb (!) SLIP line and 3 Telebits (1 dial out, 2 dial in which range from 1200b-19.2kb) attached to my Model *25*. Approximately once a day when the system is VERY loaded, I'll get a flurry of "asy0: overrun error" messages (describing the SLIP line) but the TCP traffic is unaffected, as you'd expect. (I wouldn't run NFS over SLIP without setting udpcksum to 1, however!) Having this happen once a day, it's essentially a non-problem in my eyes. I expect it to disappear completely with the APC upgrade once/if it arrives. I hope anyone who is shying away from using AOS 4.3 because of purported serial line problems should consider the low cost of the buffered 4-port card (< $500). It's a nice hardware solution to the problem. (Hey, I'd prefer a buffer along with bidirectional DMA, but you take what's offered.) >On the brighter side, the 135 with a megapel running 4.3 is quite a >nice workstation. The 4.3 works quite well (with the exception of the >async support). Also, the sources are in slightly different form than >the generic Berkeley distribution, but that's minor. Even with the enhanced mono card and a Moniterm monitor, it makes a nice workstation. An APC certainly is more than the equal of a Sun 3/60, and when I see how poorly it's been marketed (and how AOS 4.3 has been generally unavailable) it makes me want to cry. --- Steve Dyer dyer@arktouros.mit.edu dyer@spdcc.com aka ...!{harvard,linus,ima,m2c,rayssd}!spdcc!dyer
aad@stpstn.UUCP (Anthony A. Datri) (02/28/89)
>True, true. The megapel is a really nice display. The 8514a is not as >nice, but might cost less or something. Anything smaller: forget it. It bothers me though that the megapel leaves those wide stripes of uselessness on the sides, though. The viking was decent, although only about 1000 x 750. -- @disclaimer(Any concepts or opinions above are entirely mine, not those of my employer, my GIGI, my VT05, or my 11/34) beak is@>beak is not Anthony A. Datri @SysAdmin(Stepstone Corporation) aad@stepstone.com stpstn!aad
dyer@spdcc.COM (Steve Dyer) (03/01/89)
In article <2852@stpstn.UUCP> aad@stepstone.com writes: >> - ACIS seems to have a better driver for the streaming tape >> drive. It'll keep the drive streaming on its own. >I remember 4.2 ACIS as being pretty wretched on the tape -- is 4.3 >better? It used to take me 45 minutes to do a tar cf of a Scribe >distribution (5 or 6 meg) onto a cartridge. You have to use the block device to write the tape and the raw device to read the tape to get the proper (i.e. reasonably fast) behavior. I've never timed it, but writing to the block device is MUCH faster than writing to the raw device. You get some degree of asynchronicity with the block device, presumably enough to keep it streaming a greater percentage of the time (it ain't perfect.) Presumably the concept of a "tape record" is artificial on these cartridge tapes (which is why this isn't a solution for reel-to-reel.) -- Steve Dyer dyer@ursa-major.spdcc.com aka {ima,harvard,rayssd,linus,m2c}!spdcc!dyer dyer@arktouros.mit.edu
schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu (Scott Schwartz) (03/01/89)
In article <2853@stpstn.UUCP>, aad@stpstn (Anthony A. Datri) writes: >It bothers me though that the megapel leaves those wide stripes of uselessness >on the sides, though. The viking was decent, although only about 1000 x 750. I understand that the hardware can drive the "stripes", but X doesn't do it. Complain to IBM when you get a chance; I did :-) -- Scott Schwartz <schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu>
karish@forel.stanford.edu (Chuck Karish) (03/01/89)
In article <2852@stpstn.UUCP> aad@stepstone.com wrote: >I wish they'd give them normal names, though. ftp becomes xftp, and I >just discovered lpr lurking as lprbe. It'd also be nice to find the >binaries in expected places, instead of /usr/lpp. >I imagine these things would be clearer if we had documentation. ftp is called 'ftp' in 2.2.1. lprbe is closer to lpd than it is to lpr, I think; there's a separate 'lp' program that just puts jobs on the queue. >I go insane because of the things that aren't there, like more, head, tail, >whoami, clear, strings. This is a System V issue, not an AIX issue. 'tail' is there. 'head' is a trivial macro or sed script; the simplest version is 'sed 10q'. 'whoami' is a one-liner in C: main() { printf("%s\n", getlogin()); } 'clear' should be easy to do with curses. 'more' and 'strings' are available as PD clones. If it's really driving you nuts, spend an hour or two and fix it. One report from the preview meetings about SysVR4 was that "they weren't bridging the gap between SysV and BSD; they were filling it in". I'm just as happy that IBM isn't going quite that far. Chuck Karish karish@denali.stanford.edu hplabs!hpda!mindcrf!karish
njs@scifi.UUCP (Nicholas J. Simicich) (03/01/89)
In article <4327@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu> schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu (Scott Schwartz) writes: >In article <2853@stpstn.UUCP>, aad@stpstn (Anthony A. Datri) writes: >>It bothers me though that the megapel leaves those wide stripes of uselessness >>on the sides, though. The viking was decent, although only about 1000 x 750. > >I understand that the hardware can drive the "stripes", but X doesn't do it. >Complain to IBM when you get a chance; I did :-) >-- >Scott Schwartz <schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu> The megapel adapter can drive the stripes, but it is still 1024x1024 pixels, which results in pixels that aren't square, circles that aren't round, and so forth under X. Probably not a goodness. There is a third party adapter available that is something like 1200x1024 that will drive the stripes and give you square pixels, at least under AIX. A driver is also available. Talk to your salesman. -- Nick Simicich --- uunet!bywater!scifi!njs --- njs@ibm.com (Internet)
njs@scifi.UUCP (Nicholas J. Simicich) (03/01/89)
In article <559@Portia.Stanford.EDU> karish@forel.stanford.edu (Chuck Karish) writes: >In article <2852@stpstn.UUCP> aad@stepstone.com wrote: (.....) >>I go insane because of the things that aren't there, like more, head, tail, >>whoami, clear, strings. (.....) >'clear' should be easy to do with curses. 'more' and 'strings' are >available as PD clones. If it's really driving you nuts, spend an >hour or two and fix it. (.....) For a clear command, try: #!/bin/sh tput clear From the tput man page: PURPOSE Queries the terminfo file. SYNOPSIS tput [ -Ttype ] capname -- Nick Simicich --- uunet!bywater!scifi!njs --- njs@ibm.com (Internet)
sauer@auschs.UUCP (Charlie Sauer) (03/05/89)
In article <559@Portia.Stanford.EDU>, karish@forel.stanford.edu (Chuck Karish) writes: > In article <2852@stpstn.UUCP> aad@stepstone.com wrote: > >I wish they'd give them normal names, though. ftp becomes xftp, and I > >just discovered lpr lurking as lprbe. It'd also be nice to find the > >binaries in expected places, instead of /usr/lpp. > >I imagine these things would be clearer if we had documentation. > > ftp is called 'ftp' in 2.2.1. lprbe is closer to lpd than it is to > lpr, I think; there's a separate 'lp' program that just puts jobs on the > queue. lprbe really is more like lpr than lpd. It is used "under the covers" by print to talk to an lpd on another machine. > >I go insane because of the things that aren't there, like more, head, tail, > >whoami, clear, strings. > > This is a System V issue, not an AIX issue. 'tail' is there. 'head' > is a trivial macro or sed script; the simplest version is 'sed 10q'. > 'whoami' is a one-liner in C: > > main() { printf("%s\n", getlogin()); } > > 'clear' should be easy to do with curses. 'more' and 'strings' are > available as PD clones. If it's really driving you nuts, spend an > hour or two and fix it. I find these satisfactory, though not exact in the case of more alias clear tput clear alias more 'pg -n -s -p "---More---"' In any case, all of the cited BSD commands and many more are coming in the future. (See "Convergence of AIX and 4.3BSD" from this week's Uniforum proceedings for general discussion, and the "AIX Family Definition Overview" GC23-2002-0, July 1988, for lists correlated to products.) Many BSD commands can be compiled from the 4.3 source today by using cc -DBSD_INCLUDES. Charlie -- C.H. Sauer IBM Advanced Workstations Div. !'s: cs.utexas.edu!ibmaus!sauer 11400 Burnet Road, D75/802 @'s: @CS.UTEXAS.EDU:sauer@ibmaus.uucp Austin, Texas 78758-2502 !&@: ibmaus!sauer@CS.UTEXAS.EDU (512) 823-3692 vnet: SAUER at AUSVM6
kriso@northstar5 (Kris Olander) (03/07/89)
In article <4320@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu> schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu (Scott Schwartz) writes: >In article <1966@nmtsun.nmt.edu>, peter@hydrovax writes: >> We have been toying for some time with the idea of running 4.3 BSD on >>our RT, being as RT-AIX is not a useful operating system. The IBM reps >>locally are only aware of a 'Univerisity' package that includes hardware >>and software. They claim that there are hardware changes in the boxes >>running 4.3 BSD. Does anyone know of a commercially available 4.3 OS >>for the RT that do not require hardware changes? > >The product is 4.3BSD, and is called AOS (Academic Operating System) >by IBM. If necessary, I can get you the magic product number to feed >to your sales people. AOS requires no hardware changes to run. We >have it on several 6150's and lots and lots of 6152's. > >Assert your right to run REAL UNIX on the RT!! >-- >Scott Schwartz <schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I hope the higher up folks at IBM's Advanced Workstation Development Group noticed the "lots and lots of 6152's" mensioned above. Our 6152 systems running AOS (release 2) here are used extensively. The overall opinion has been 'thumbs up' for this type of UNIX box solution. We have 6152s in professor's and system administrator's offices (the most particular of users). CS/23 students have been programming using X11R3 (emphasis on the R3) in vivid color for the past three months now. Not a bad report card for the ACIS group who developed these beauties. ############################################################## # Kris Olander ---- ---- arpa: kriso@northstar.dartmouth.edu # # ---------------------------------------------------------- #