Importance of Bochs (and PearPC)

[Joel Sherrill <joel@OARcorp.com>]

Erwin Rol wrote:
> On Mon, 2004-10-18 at 13:45 -0500, Joel Sherrill  wrote:
> 
>>I just wanted to reiterate the importance of Bochs and PearPC
>>to RTEMS.  Right now, each RTEMS user/developer has access to
>>a limited set of test platforms.  Often those platforms
>>have no networking, disk storage, or graphics at all.
>>
>>As Ralf and I spoke about in Munich, the use of Bochs gives
>>everyone a common high capability reference platform that is
>>easy to use.
> 
> 
> Maybe next time you are all in Munich I should drop by to say "hi", it
> is only 30km from here (Holzkirchen).

It would be nice to get to meet you.  When the next class opportunity
comes around you will have to join us for dinner or at least a beer. :)

>>In that light, I am begging for some help here to get it
>>going.
>>
>>+  If you have knowledge of the ATA subsystem,
>>    please give Bochs a try for the File IO test and
>>    post the complete setup.
>>
>>+ If you have networking experience with RTEMS, try
>>   to setup the NE2000 simulation in Bochs with
>>   RTEMS.  Again post the complete setup.
>>
> 
> 
> I would like to that a try. I don't know to much about ATA so that will
> have to wait, but networking should be doable. I still have a half port
> of the FreeBSD IPX (yep there are still people that mistake IPX with
> networking ;-) that i would like to finish in this way.  

I didn't expect one person to know both the ATA and networking answers
that was why I threw the question/plea out to the list.  If you
can come up with the networking settings, then someone else will
come up with the ATA settings.

Ideally I would like to follow the instructions for putting
the Bochs simulated PC on the network with the IP forwarding.
I think it would be cool to route some requests to a virtual
PC and demonstrate the networking features in RTEMS that way.

>>PearPC has similar capabilities but RTEMS will likely need a
>>special BSP for it.  But it brings similar capabilities on
>>a PowerPC.
> 
> 
> Here i am still trying to figure out how to boot, yaboot isn't really
> doing what i want it to do. 

I thought PearPC might be further along.  Is it a CHRP or Prep
hardware base?  What does it present as a hardware image?
[This might be better as a separate there.]

>>Please, please take a stab at the above and post results.
>>
> 
> 
> I think the first stab would be BSP's for both of them ? Even though
> bochs would not really need a BSP, i think it is better when it does
> have its own BSP. Can anybody give reason why it should or should not
> have its own BSP ?

Bochs is just a PC variant.  It will probably make sense to have a
bochs BSP variant if it requires any special setup.

PearPC is another matter.  I don't know what it clones and suspect
whatever it is cloning, isn't in RTEMS already. :)

>>I am looking forward to the day where the RTEMS webserver can
>>be run in a virtual PC and be demonstrated serving files from
>>the virtual hard disk. :)
>>
>>It would also be an ideal platform to work on an ISO9660 filesystem,
>>port a small web client, etc, etc.
>>
>>Please, please. :)
>>
> 
> 
> - Erwin
> 
> 


-- 
Joel Sherrill, Ph.D.             Director of Research & Development
joel at OARcorp.com                 On-Line Applications Research
Ask me about RTEMS: a free RTOS  Huntsville AL 35805
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