Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.

Author Topic: NETbsd on Amiga  (Read 17188 times)

Description:

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline MelbourneBenTopic starter

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Join Date: May 2009
  • Posts: 240
  • Country: au
  • Gender: Male
    • Show only replies by MelbourneBen
NETbsd on Amiga
« on: May 28, 2010, 04:22:59 AM »
Hi,

I've noticed that Netbsd still supports the Amiga amongst other platforms...I just wondered if anyone out there actually uses NETbsd on their Miggy? If so, how does it compare to Amiga dos and workbench?

As a linux fan this is something I'd be interested in installing on my Amiga but just wondered if anyone else out there had given it a go?
Amiga 500 user
 

Offline johnklos

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Join Date: Feb 2010
  • Posts: 190
    • Show only replies by johnklos
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #1 on: May 28, 2010, 04:54:45 AM »
NetBSD is very different than GNU/Linux when it comes to updates because the whole OS is the same version for all supported architectures. GNU/Linux, conversely,  has very few distros which support more than a few architectures, and even Debian has trouble keeping m68k up to date. That's not to say they're not working on it, but you can't install a modern Debian right now. People are working on the toolchain to get things up to date presently.

NetBSD's advantage is that the same source code tree is used for all architectures, so all of userland is exactly the same for amd64 as it is for m68k and VAX, for instance. The toolchain is the same version, all of the daemons are the same, et cetera. By not keeping them separate, all the architectures benefit, plus you know if your code runs cleanly on VAX, m68k, Alpha, SPARC, et cetera, then you know it's good, portable code.

NetBSD's pkgsrc is also architecture agnostic as much as it can. You'll never hear pkgsrc developers say something like, "m68k? Who uses that? We don't care about fixing that." I've heard that many other places, though, even though everyone should care about making their code as correct as they can. After all, there were tons of x86 developers who didn't care about correct code who had to go back and fix tons of things when they wanted their code to work on 64 bit x86. Some people never learn.

To summarize, NetBSD is up to date and well supported on Amiga.
 

Offline johnklos

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Join Date: Feb 2010
  • Posts: 190
    • Show only replies by johnklos
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #2 on: May 28, 2010, 05:06:40 AM »
I didn't exactly answer your question - yes, I run NetBSD on two Amigas and I try to help keep things working properly. I try out different hardware whenever I get the chance. For example, I just got an IOblix multiport serial card and I'm trying to get everything working properly with that (and improve 16650 and 16950 support in NetBSD in general).

Next I hope to get a ZorRAM card or two to make sure that NetBSD is fine with larger amounts of memory...

Personally, I think NetBSD is excellent on Amiga hardware. People don't let it get overly bloated and too slow because we really do run it on old VAXen and m68030 Suns and Macs, for instance.
 

Offline Gulliver

Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #3 on: May 28, 2010, 05:14:01 AM »
While I agree NetBSD is great.
 I see it hasnt got support for many Amiga hardware expansions, in the form of drivers. That is the only thing IMHO NetBSD lacks. It just needs more hardware drivers.
 

Offline MelbourneBenTopic starter

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Join Date: May 2009
  • Posts: 240
  • Country: au
  • Gender: Male
    • Show only replies by MelbourneBen
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #4 on: May 28, 2010, 08:06:08 AM »
Thanks for the responses guys.

Does NETBSD have a GUI that can be installed? Also, do you have your Amiga's setup to dual boot either Amiga dos or Netbsd?

:)
Amiga 500 user
 

Offline johnklos

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Join Date: Feb 2010
  • Posts: 190
    • Show only replies by johnklos
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #5 on: May 28, 2010, 08:20:59 AM »
Quote from: Gulliver;561530
While I agree NetBSD is great.
 I see it hasnt got support for many Amiga hardware expansions, in the form of drivers. That is the only thing IMHO NetBSD lacks. It just needs more hardware drivers.


Like what?
 

Offline johnklos

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Join Date: Feb 2010
  • Posts: 190
    • Show only replies by johnklos
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #6 on: May 28, 2010, 08:25:50 AM »
Quote from: MelbourneBen;561548
Thanks for the responses guys.

Does NETBSD have a GUI that can be installed? Also, do you have your Amiga's setup to dual boot either Amiga dos or Netbsd?

:)

Yes, it comes with X Window System, which comes with twm. You can load any of a number of windowing systems if you like. Check out:

ftp://ftp.NetBSD.org/pub/pkgsrc/current/pkgsrc/wm/README.html

No, I don't dual boot those machines. They're colocated and are usually up for months at a time. I have another two Amigas for running AmigaDOS.
« Last Edit: May 28, 2010, 09:01:04 AM by johnklos »
 

Offline bloodline

  • Master Sock Abuser
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Join Date: Mar 2002
  • Posts: 12113
    • Show only replies by bloodline
    • http://www.troubled-mind.com
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #7 on: May 28, 2010, 08:26:45 AM »
Quote from: johnklos;561528
I didn't exactly answer your question - yes, I run NetBSD on two Amigas and I try to help keep things working properly. I try out different hardware whenever I get the chance. For example, I just got an IOblix multiport serial card and I'm trying to get everything working properly with that (and improve 16650 and 16950 support in NetBSD in general).

Next I hope to get a ZorRAM card or two to make sure that NetBSD is fine with larger amounts of memory...

Personally, I think NetBSD is excellent on Amiga hardware. People don't let it get overly bloated and too slow because we really do run it on old VAXen and m68030 Suns and Macs, for instance.
Links please, I fancy firing NetBSD up in UAE.

Offline Daedalus

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Join Date: Feb 2002
  • Posts: 893
    • Show only replies by Daedalus
    • http://www.robthenerd.com
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #8 on: May 28, 2010, 08:39:59 AM »
@johnklos

It's years since I installed it but at the time it didn't support the Mediator PCI bus, which meant no PCI graphics cards or network cards...


@MelbourneBen

It's a totally different beast to AmigaDOS ;-) But "dual booting" when I had it installed basically meant booting Workbench and double-clicking the icon to boot NetBSD. Of course you could edit the startup-sequence and have it boot NetBSD from there if you hold down a certain key or something...
Engineers do it with precision
--
http://www.robthenerd.com
 

Offline johnklos

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Join Date: Feb 2010
  • Posts: 190
    • Show only replies by johnklos
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #9 on: May 28, 2010, 09:04:08 AM »
Quote from: bloodline;561553
Links please, I fancy firing NetBSD up in UAE.


Links for NetBSD? How about http://www.NetBSD.org/?

From the main site, look under Ports for the Amiga port. It's a little bit of work to get going, but you'll get plenty of help on the port-amiga mailing list.

I tried many times to get NetBSD to run under UAE, but never got it working properly. I don't know if UAE emulates the MMU well enough. I'd love to hear how if you succeed. I don't really know much about UAE, so maybe I'm just doing something wrong.
 

Offline johnklos

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Join Date: Feb 2010
  • Posts: 190
    • Show only replies by johnklos
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #10 on: May 28, 2010, 09:06:19 AM »
Quote from: Daedalus;561555
@johnklos

It's years since I installed it but at the time it didn't support the Mediator PCI bus, which meant no PCI graphics cards or network cards...


It'd be nice to see PCI support for Amiga in NetBSD, especially since most of the PCI drivers compile for whatever architecture as-is. We'd need to get a Mediator or two to NetBSD developers...
 

Offline squidbass

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Join Date: Dec 2009
  • Posts: 7
    • Show only replies by squidbass
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #11 on: May 28, 2010, 09:37:33 AM »
I've got netbsd installed on a 1200...the only thing (2 things) that got me stumped was the XFconfig for AGA and getting pcmcia/3c509 to work - can't seem to find any documentation anywhere.
 

Offline Gulliver

Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #12 on: May 28, 2010, 10:27:20 AM »
Quote from: johnklos;561550
Like what?

Okay so I said not enough drivers for hardware. These are the ones that seem to be missing. Please do correct me if I made some mistake on any of them:

CPU (the PPC part):
-BlizzardPPC
-CyberstormPPC

IDE controller (all channels + full features):
-Idefix Express
-FastATA 1200
-FastATA 4000
-Eide99

SCSI:
-BlizzardPPC 603+ (is it unsupported?)

Video Controllers:
-BlizzardVision
-CyberVisionPPC
-All pci based videocards

Audio:
-Delfina

Ethernet controllers:
-All PCI based ethernet cards

IO:
-Subway
-Deneb

BUSBOARD:
-All mediator models
-All G-Rexx models
-All Prometheus models
 

Offline haywirepc

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Join Date: Sep 2009
  • Posts: 1331
    • Show only replies by haywirepc
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #13 on: May 28, 2010, 10:45:53 AM »
Can anyone post screenshots of netbsd running on an amiga?

I'd like to see the desktop...
 
Steven
 

Offline Colani1200

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Join Date: Jul 2006
  • Posts: 707
    • Show only replies by Colani1200
Re: NETbsd on Amiga
« Reply #14 on: May 28, 2010, 11:30:22 AM »
Here is a picture of my A1200 running NetBSD (console only). http://www.amiga.org/gallery/index.php?n=2186

I installed it just for fun, actually you won't really want to use it in a serious manner because it isn't really fast on the miggy... You'll get a better experience running NetBSD on any PC from the junkyard that is 100x faster...

@haywirepc: There is no "the desktop". As usual with Unix, you can choose between a number of desktop environments, like fvwm, icewm and the like. And they'll look about the same on the miggy as on i386 (ok, maybe less colors and lower resolution if you don't have a gfx card).
« Last Edit: May 28, 2010, 11:38:26 AM by Colani1200 »