On Sat, 4 Aug 2001, Nathan Mahon wrote:

> Perhaps I'm just being an asshole, but I don't think the topic of this
> list is how to save a little money by not buying the right equipment.
>
	I maybe would not have phrased it quite like that.
	Its not _the_ topic, but I do not see why it cannot be _a_ topic.

> Perhaps people think that we're trying to put NetBSD on a Dreamcast
> because we're too poor to buy a real computer.  And I'm sure that some
> people look at it that way.  The real reason for the effort is to give the
> ability to make a NetBSD based gaming console.  Not to make a cheap
> firewall or an inexpensive Distributed.net client.  Granted these are
> possibilities, but you might consider that the dreamcast is a very crappy
> network device, with very little ram and minimal processing power, execept
> for the powervr2 graphics engine.  It's made to be a gaming console. The
> Dreamcast Port is to put things like FreeCiv into a new home.  To give
> amatuer graphics programmers a good home.

	The point of NetBSD/dreamcast is to enable people to run NetBSD
	on the dreamcast. That could be towards making it an mp3 player,
	playing games, as a hardware project, a 'pine' terminal, or just
	about anything else they want. These goals are not exclusive.

> That aside, everything involved in getting to that point requires a lot of
> software and hardware engineering.  So we get hacks like BitMASTER's IDE
> controller.  IMHO, the controller isn't on topic.  A driver for it might
> be.
>
	If the discussion is related to designing or using extra
	hardware under NetBSD/dreamcast I would consider it pretty
	much a perfect topic for this list.

> I don't really care who posts what to the list.  But don't start getting
> indignant when your OT post gets little helpful response.  If you're
> wanting to save $10 on using a homemade ps2/maple dongle, checkout the
> dcdev list.  I think that's a topic for that list.

	I seem to recall some mention of an option which would require
	adding a standard pckbd driver for the Dreamcast - once again
	that lands squarely in the 'on topic' box.

	Personally I would love to see more hardware options and NetBSD
	drivers for NetBSD/dreamcast, but I'm sure everyone has gathered
	that by now :)

-- 
		David/absolute		-- www.netbsd.org: No hype required --