Subject: Re: What I did on a snowy day in DC.
To: None <port-alpha@netbsd.org>
From: Thomas Weyergraf <thomas@gwsystems.com>
List: port-alpha
Date: 01/31/2000 13:42:01
> On Thu, 27 Jan 2000, HerbalGypsy/justbob wrote:
> 
> I was just about to write a NetBSD/alpha install story for the list
> myself.
> [...]
> creative wire wrap solved that problem.  Another problem is the board does
> not come with an ATX I/O plate for its unusual arrangement of ports.  
> Since this is just cosmetic, I let it go.  Unless you have official Axxion
> DL-17 case or some tin snips, you will have a big opening around your I/O
> ports.
AFAIK, the PC164 uses the "VENUS" type I/O Shield - which is quite "standard"
as of ATX. I just called this off from my memory - it happens to be quite
some time ago since I set up this machine. But it *is* possible to find
some ordinary ATX-case with the proper I/O shield.

> 
> I put a 3Com Etherlink III (ISA) card in it and hooked up the serial port
> as the console.  The upgrade from ARC to SRM 5.5 and the installation of
> NetBSD/alpha 1.4.1 went well.
> 
> It is a great improvement over the i486DX4-100 I have been using!  Now the
> i486 is an X workstation (soon to be diskless) with all the X clients run
> on the Alpha.
> 
> I was a little disappointed that I couldn't run any version of Netscape on
> it without a copy of the OSF/1 libraries.  Mozilla 1998 works, but has a
> number of severe quirks and usability issues.  Mozilla M12 compiles with
> some configuration changes, spewing out thousands of warnings about casts
> from integers to pointers of different size.  But it won't link - it
> complains about unresolved references in the various Mozilla library
> files.  nm shows "U" for those symbols in the .so files, but shows "T" in
> the .o files.  Probably an issue with the way the .so files are built, but
> I'm not enough of a link format expert to know.

Why not use a Netscape off your x86 box ? I happen to use a much similar
setup, with an Athlon doing X/GL stuff running Linux and a UP2000 running
NetBSD or Linux. I use all normal apps ( like netscape and the average
office stuff ) on the x86.

> // My compliments to the 1.4.1 team.
> // My compliments to the alpha port team!!
> 
> Add mine to that.  It is a really well built, well thought out, rock solid
> operating system.

Like to add my $0.02 here. I love NetBSD. It was stunning for me to
see how far the BSD's have evolved since my first 386BSD days :-)

Anyway, does anybody managed to run the Compaq's C 6.2 Compilers on
NetBSD Alpha ? Likewise, using the CPML fro EV6 ?
Any pointers to infos welcome. I haven't given it a try yet, due to limited
time. I *very* much like the Compaq compilers under Linux and would really
like to use the on NetBSD.


Sincerely,
thomas Weyergraf