Subject: Linux-Development Digest #180
From: Digestifier <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 16 Sep 94 01:13:09 EDT

Linux-Development Digest #180, Volume #2         Fri, 16 Sep 94 01:13:09 EDT

Contents:
  Re: Alpha Linux (Timothy J. Kordas)
  Re: Why I cannot mount a PhotoCD on Mitsumi ? (Jeff Tranter)
  Cirrus 6440 chip (Steven Carter)
  Re: Survey: who wants f77,cc,c++,hpf for linux? (Dan Pop)
  Re: VHDL for Linux...? (Don Hiatt)
  Re: /proc/mtab progress (Stephen F. Rothwell)
  Re: DOSEMU and mount msdos conv=auto AUTOEXEC.BAT problem (Rob Janssen)
  Re: IR remote control for CD?? (Rob Janssen)
  Re: Developing Distributed Filesystems for Linux? (Rob Janssen)
  Re: Login USERID length bug? (Rob Janssen)
  Re: Login USERID length bug? (Rob Janssen)
  Re: inb(),outb()--help? (Rob Janssen)
  Re: Don't use Linux?! (ACC Corp.)
  Re: IP encapsulated in IPX can linux extract IP  (R.H. Hall)
  Re: need developer! ([email-masked])

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Timothy J. Kordas)
Subject: Re: Alpha Linux
Date: 14 Sep 1994 18:28:38 GMT

Eelco H. Essenberg ([email-masked]) wrote:

: I don't want to start any language feuds here, but of course there is a
: language that already allows you to do exactly this: it's called ADA.
: The notation is a little different, but basically you can tell it what
: range (and what precision!) you want for a certain type, and it will figure
: out how to handle that according to your platform. Of course if you specify
: something your platform is unable to handle the compiler will spit at you :-)

no feud here...but *YOU* get to be the one to rewrite the kernel in ADA...

-Tim
--
Timothy J. Kordas                              |  [email-masked]
Electrical Engineering and Applied Physics     |
Case Western Reserve University                |  PGP public key available
Cleveland, Ohio 44106                          |  via finger

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Jeff Tranter)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
Subject: Re: Why I cannot mount a PhotoCD on Mitsumi ?
Date: 14 Sep 1994 15:52:22 -0400

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Tamas Badics) writes:
>
>OK, it is all nice to know, but how can I read a PhotoCD on a Mitsumi drive?
>(My MS-DOS driver can read them without problems.)

Currently under Linux only the Panasonic/SoundBlaster kernel driver
supports PhotoCD. Someone needs to enhance the kernel driver for
Mitsumi.
-- 
Jeff Tranter                                      [email-masked]
Software Technology, Mitel Corporation

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Steven Carter)
Subject: Cirrus 6440 chip
Date: 14 Sep 1994 03:09:45 GMT

Are there any plans to support the cirrus 6440 VGA chip in any upcoming
SVGA servers in XF86? 

-- 
---
  Steven M. Carter
  [email-masked]
  Golden Triangle Linux Users Group

------------------------------

Crossposted-To: comp.lang.fortran
From: [email-masked] (Dan Pop)
Subject: Re: Survey: who wants f77,cc,c++,hpf for linux?
Date: Thu, 15 Sep 1994 22:48:34 GMT

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (James Davies) writes:

>In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Alan Cox) writes:
>:
>:You don't do anything so daft as to include OS calls in a benchmark. You are
>:trying to test the compiler not the OS. You also unplug the network and
>:serial ports so you don't have streams of (eg mouse) interrupts disturbing
>:the raw code throughput.
>
>Did you somehow disable the timer interrupts that occur every 1/18th second?
>And do these have to do processor mode switching?

Could you predict how many tenths of a second will the DOS extenders
spend dealing with timer interrupts during one second? Remember: during
one second they have to handle _18_ timer interrupts. Get a clue.

Dan
--
Dan Pop 
CERN, CN Division
Email: [email-masked]
Mail:  CERN - PPE, Bat. 31 R-004, CH-1211 Geneve 23, Switzerland

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Don Hiatt)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.misc,comp.lsi.cad,comp.lang.vhdl
Subject: Re: VHDL for Linux...?
Date: 13 Sep 1994 22:13:36 -0500

ADA ([email-masked]) wrote:

: I have been playing (or trying to play) with both magic and ocean.  I
: was wondering if there are any free VHDL simulators available or being
: worked on for Linux.  If so, what about synthesis tools?

Yes there is. Get the Alliance-2.0 package. You can ftp the source
from: ftp.ibp.fr
You will find it in /ibp/softs/masi/alliance

Alliance is aimed at VLSI synthesis but if that is not your goal
you can still use the VHDL simulator.. BTW, it is a great package.

don

: While I'm on the subject, and I know this isn't the proper group but I
: know there are a lot of hardware weenies out there like me, is there
: an emacs major mode for VHDL floating around?

I would like to know this :)

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Stephen F. Rothwell)
Subject: Re: /proc/mtab progress
Date: Thu, 15 Sep 1994 04:20:30 GMT

[email-masked] (Davor Jadrijevic) writes:

>: Somebody else is working ona directory /proc/mtab, with subdirectories for
>: each mount point. Much nicer since you can get the path by chdir()/getpwd().

>True, it's Stephen Rothwell <[email-masked]>. CDrom people prefer 

Just a small point, its not me :-)

I am (sometime) working on a complete rewrite of the proc file system
to make it on-the-fly extensible so that (for example) a loaded module
can create nodes in there.

I don't know who is working on /proc/mtab ...

Cheers,
Stephen
=======
Stephen Rothwell                                 [email-masked]
NEC Information Systems Australia                Phone: +61-6-2508747
Software Development Centre, Canberra, Australia Fax:   +61-6-2508746

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Rob Janssen)
Subject: Re: DOSEMU and mount msdos conv=auto AUTOEXEC.BAT problem
Reply-To: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 14 Sep 1994 22:20:49 GMT

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Stefan Markgraf) writes:

>Hi there!

>There are problems with DOSEMU when using a mounted MS-DOS partition
>with the conv=auto flag (conversation CRLF<->LF on ascii files)
>turned on.

>command.com reads the AUTOEXEC.BAT with removed CR and gets confused.

>Is there a possibility to make dosemu telling the filesystem-driver
>not to convert the data?
>Of course, remounting the msdos-partition without conv=binary is the
>simplest solution for this problem, but then you have the strange 
>^M (CR) characters when editing MS-DOS-files from the LinuX-system.

I think conv=auto is completely useless for any continuous use, especially
the way it is implemented now...  (some recognized extensions are treated
as binary and the rest is assumed to be text...  should have been the other
way around!)

It may be useful when you read a file from a floppy or so, but when you
want to mount a harddisk partition I think it is best to use conv=binary
and live with the ^M...

DOSEMU accesses the filesystem just like any other process.  It is not
good to have it communicate more directly, as that would fail e.g. when
using it over a network.
(I use DOSEMU to access a disk via NFS that is a mounted DOS partition
on another machine.  DOSEMU cannot control the DOS filesystem at the
other end!)

Rob
-- 
=========================================================================
| Rob Janssen                | AMPRnet:   [email-masked]           |
| e-mail: [email-masked]     | AX.25 BBS: PE1CHL@PI8UTR.#UTR.NLD.EU     |
=========================================================================

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Rob Janssen)
Subject: Re: IR remote control for CD??
Reply-To: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 14 Sep 1994 22:27:18 GMT

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Humenberger Edmund) writes:

>Is there any hardware that my linux box can
>understand my standard cd player remote control?

The RC-5 remote control sequences used by Philips (and related makes)
equipment are quite well documented, and not difficult to generate
with a computer.
Other makes can be more tricky, as info about the remote control is
often difficult to get.  The method used by "universal remotes" to
handle this situation is to "record" a transmission by the original
remote control, and play that back.

I think some circuits for doing such things have been published in
various electronics magazines...  (e.g. "Elektor"?)

Rob
-- 
=========================================================================
| Rob Janssen                | AMPRnet:   [email-masked]           |
| e-mail: [email-masked]     | AX.25 BBS: PE1CHL@PI8UTR.#UTR.NLD.EU     |
=========================================================================

------------------------------

Crossposted-To: alt.filesystems.afs
From: [email-masked] (Rob Janssen)
Subject: Re: Developing Distributed Filesystems for Linux?
Reply-To: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 14 Sep 1994 22:31:20 GMT

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Daniel Tauber) writes:

>I'd like to see a ftp based file system for Linux. What I have in mind will
>allow you to mount devices like

>mount -t ftpfs myaccount:[email-masked]/path mnt

>and the directory specified by path on the remote machine will appear at the
>mount point. I know it will not be the fastest distributed file system, but
>it will work with existing machines.

>I've heard that someone wrote a similar file system for NextStep. Anyone
>have any comments?

Get the "userfs" package.

Rob
-- 
=========================================================================
| Rob Janssen                | AMPRnet:   [email-masked]           |
| e-mail: [email-masked]     | AX.25 BBS: PE1CHL@PI8UTR.#UTR.NLD.EU     |
=========================================================================

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Rob Janssen)
Subject: Re: Login USERID length bug?
Reply-To: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 14 Sep 1994 22:35:50 GMT

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Brian Watts) writes:

>It seems that people are missing the point with respect to
>this... i.e. That it works *inconsistently*.  Anything that works
>inconsistently is a bug imho.  I have pinned down the
>inconsistency exactly -- if you type : login longusername
>it will WORK -- i.e. when the parameter is passed to login, it
>does NOT truncate the name -- however, when you type:
>login <Enter>
>login: longusername
>the longusername is truncated to longuser.  This HAS to be a bug
>because it is inconsistent.

I agree that is not good.  But you won't have this problem
when you limit your userids to 8 characters.

>With respect to the argument that 8 characters is enough for a
>user id, this sounds very much like what people were saying 10
>years ago: "why would you need a file name > 8 characters in
>length".  With respect to the argument that userids > 8
>characters mess up your nicely tabbed  'ls's -- why don't we
>then be consistent and restrict all file names to 8 characters
>mmm?  do I hear anyone say that that sounds like MSDOS??

I don't think "8 characters is enough", but it is the practical
limit right now.  The decision to do it like this was probably
made more than 20 years ago...

Note that the filename is the rightmost column in "ls -l" and is
therefore not so badly affected by this problem.

Rob
-- 
=========================================================================
| Rob Janssen                | AMPRnet:   [email-masked]           |
| e-mail: [email-masked]     | AX.25 BBS: PE1CHL@PI8UTR.#UTR.NLD.EU     |
=========================================================================

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Rob Janssen)
Subject: Re: Login USERID length bug?
Reply-To: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 14 Sep 1994 22:37:37 GMT

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Brian Watts) writes:

>BTW, a point I forgot to mention -- with regard ls -l... try it and you
>will see that long userids are trunacted at 8 characters, so the
>display is not screwed up.

Depends on what you call "screwed up"...  When you have multiple userids
that are unique only after the 8th character they are truncated to the
same id, which I would think is "screwed up"...

>Another point... what about the 'postmaster' ID -- should that
>also be disallowed? and is it ridiculous to have such a long ID?

"postmaster" is normally not a user-id on a UNIX system, but is aliased
to the ID of some administrator, like "root" or "mail".

Rob
-- 
=========================================================================
| Rob Janssen                | AMPRnet:   [email-masked]           |
| e-mail: [email-masked]     | AX.25 BBS: PE1CHL@PI8UTR.#UTR.NLD.EU     |
=========================================================================

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Rob Janssen)
Subject: Re: inb(),outb()--help?
Reply-To: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 14 Sep 1994 22:51:37 GMT

In <slarsen.779548988@gonix> [email-masked] (Steve Larsen) writes:

>Hi:
>  I would like to write a modem diagnostic program for Linux of the sort
>I used to write for DOS in assembler.  But I don't want to write in assembler.
>I want to use C, and am admittedly no wiz. Anyway, I 'ioperm' the correct
>ports, then go to use inb(), and get the "undefined reference to __inb_p()"
>message, or something to that affect, so I know it's tracing it back to
>asm/io.h. Am I leaving out an include file, or do I have to fill out the
>port call w/some sort of define? A one or 2 line example of code would
>be greatly appreciated!
>                      Thanks for yer time.

You have to compile with optimization ("-O2") to be able to use the
I/O macros from <asm/io.h>...  May sound funny, but it is true :-)

Rob
-- 
=========================================================================
| Rob Janssen                | AMPRnet:   [email-masked]           |
| e-mail: [email-masked]     | AX.25 BBS: PE1CHL@PI8UTR.#UTR.NLD.EU     |
=========================================================================

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (ACC Corp.)
Subject: Re: Don't use Linux?!
Date: Wed, 14 Sep 1994 03:00:22 GMT

In Article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked]
(Michael Schumacher) wrote:
>4. I'm the author of tgdb,
>   a graphical user interface for gdb. I like the idea of free software,
>   not even a *single* person has paid the nominal shareware
>   fee of US$30!

We resell a bunch of Linux CD's.  None have as catchy a name (for marketing
purposes) as your "Dream Linux" CD.  So how does someone who has such a
knack for marketing end up calling his own product "tgdb"?  :-)

>5. On the other hand, I can tell you how to make lots of money with Linux: 
>   simply download the archives of tsx-11, sunsite, nic.funet.fi,
>   prep.ai.mit.edu and ftp.x.org, put them on a CDROM, call it "Dream Linux"
>   or similar, and sell if for US$35 per copy. It's that easy. Let's say,
>   an average user is looking for "the better OS" and wants to try out
>   Linux. He buys a "Dream Linux" CD - and is lost. Nothing works "out of
>   the box", no reasonable documentation is available, nor hotline support. 
>   What will happen? I'm quite sure that most of these desperated people
>   will close the Linux chapter - forever.

Surprisingly, this is not so.  Most of our customers who end up striking out
on their first Linux CD end up calling us back and ordering a different one
hoping for better luck.  In some cases we can help, eg Slackware
Professional from Morse is much easier to install than the Linux Quarterly
(also from Morse).  In others we refund their purchase as their problem
often is incompatible hardware which they are not willing or able to change.

>There are a lot more things which speak against Linux as a platform for
>commercial products. If an operating system is successful or not depends
>on the availability of qualified (commercial) software for end-users. 
> If we *really* want Linux to succeed, we *need* the companies and their
>commercial products!

The old vicious cycle.  In Linux's case this cycle is not operating.  The PC
world has been waiting for the last dozen years with growing anticipation
for a "real" operating system to run on their increasingly powerful
machines.  The catch for home users and the self employed has been the cost
of the current alternatives such as SCO and OS/2.  The cost of these OS's,
tools, and applications are much higher than their dos equivalents.  

The use of Linux is not growing exponentially because it is "beautiful"
"fast" "has a great sense of community" or is otherwise socially acceptable.
It is simply because dos users who have been looking for more functionality
are now finding that they can get it without bankrupting themselves.

I would not fret about the lack of commercial software packages.  They are
coming.  Where four months ago there were virtually none, there are now
several dozen commercial packages, and the rate of new introductions is
increasing rapidly.  Sure there are a bunch of potential clouds on the Linux
horizon, but meantime enjoy the ride.

Cheers,  Bob.

ACC Bookstores
"Home of the PC UNIX - Linux Catalog"
1 (800) 546-7274
[email-masked]

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (R.H. Hall)
Subject: Re: IP encapsulated in IPX can linux extract IP 
Date: Thu, 15 Sep 1994 00:53:07 GMT

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] writes:
>In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Norm Walker) writes:
>
>
>>I have been setting up a linux machine to act as an internet host
>>on a novell network and got ip and tcp up sharing the ethernet
>>now we have several segments on different hardware that we
>>would also like to have access to the linux box.
>>the problem is that the packets reach the novell server 
>>and it does not know that they are for the linux box on the other
>>network card so it tosses it.
>
>Then you just need to setup IP routing on your Novell server.
>It is described in the red books.  It is like:
>
>load tcpip
>bind ip to card addr=a.b.c.d gateway=e.f.g.h mask=mm.nn.oo.pp
>
>do this for all cards you want to run IP on, and the server will route
>the packets.

   Except you have to add forward=yes to the load line.  Also, be
careful with the gateway part of the bind... I've had better luck
without it, esp. on the segment with the router.  Then just make sure
you're subnets are legal (tcpip.nlm 1.01 allowed illegal class c
subnets.  I didn't even know they were illegal till I upgraded to 1.87
& they suddenly didn't work :^(

Rob

------------------------------

From: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: need developer!
Date: Wed, 14 Sep 94 14:25:51 PDT

In article <[email-masked]>, 
<[email-masked]> writes:
> Path: 
news.onramp.net!news.sprintlink.net!redstone.interpath.net!ddsw1!news.kei.com!y
eshua.marcam.com!usc!howland.reston.ans.net!EU.net!Austria.EU.net!newsfeed.ACO.
net!alijku06!cxmeta.edvz.uni-linz.ac.at!k3076e5
> From: [email-masked] (Humenberger Edmund)
> Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.development
> Subject: need developer!
> Date: 13 Sep 1994 14:13:19 GMT
> Organization: Technical University Vienna/Austria
> Lines: 7
> Distribution: world
> Message-ID: <[email-masked]>
> NNTP-Posting-Host: cxmeta.edvz.uni-linz.ac.at
> 
> You should implement for a phone interface card
> an device driver.
> You will get the card, all support from the
> manufactor and money from me. the driver will
> be free.
> 
> email your answer. ed
> 
I've done driver development for the dialogic voice cards under dos and would 
be interested in undertaking your commission to do them for Lunix (for any card 
you can get complete technical specs for)

I've been programming voice applications off and on for about 8 years now and 
have 4 years experience with Unix. To date I have not had occasion to write a 
Unix device driver.... However.... with the wealth of driver source code 
available for Linux, I do not percieve this as being a serious problem.

        Thank you for your consideration

                John Barrett <[email-masked]>
                Shadetree Software

------------------------------

** FOR YOUR REFERENCE **

The service address, to which questions about the list itself and requests
to be added to or deleted from it should be directed, is:

    Internet: [email-masked]

You can send mail to the entire list (and comp.os.linux.development) via:

    Internet: [email-masked]

Linux may be obtained via one of these FTP sites:
    nic.funet.fi				pub/OS/Linux
    tsx-11.mit.edu				pub/linux
    sunsite.unc.edu				pub/Linux

End of Linux-Development Digest
******************************