Bill,

Thanks for your note!

You wrote:
>On Thu, 23 May 2002, DMC wrote:
>
>> Hi all!
>>
>> I've just recently installed NetBSD 1.5.2 on my PPC 8500 (OFW 1.05) -
>> I think those are all the specs...
>>
>> Anyway, I have no admin experience whatsoever but I have used UNIX
>> for awhile.  Has anyone used a RAR 3.0 application in NetBSD?  I
>
>Nope, but I did just look at their web site.
>
>> downloaded a beta from Rarsoft (I think) that says it's for FreeBSD,
>> but when I try to run it, it says something about not being configured
>> for the platform or something (I'm sorry I didn't write it down).
>>
>> Are FreeBSD and NetBSD significantly different animals that I can't
>> use the new Rar archiver?
>
>First off, did you download source, or a pre-built binary. I'm going to
>guess a binary, as that's what I saw on their web site.
>

It was a binary, tar'd and gzip'd.

>You have two problems:
>
>1) FreeBSD and NetBSD have (slightly) different user<->kernel interfaces.
>Some syscalls have different numbers for instance. We have compatability
>code, so that you can run FreeBSD programs on a NetBSD kernel, but you
>will also need FreeBSD libraries. We have packages in pkgsrc that will
>load them for you (well one pkg for freebsd).
>
>2) FreeBSD's macppc port isn't as widely used as NetBSDs (which is less
>than Linux :-) so chances are you have the i386 binary. That won't work on
>a powerpc. :-|

So, even with all the compatibility code and libraries installed
for FreeBSD, I still won't be able to run an i386 binary - if I read
what you wrote correctly.

How about an OS-X binary?  Can I configure NetBSD somehow to run
an application written for MacOS-X Unix.  I currently can't run OS-X
on my machine, BTW.

Thank you for your help!

Dennis

P.S.  NetBSD is pretty cool in that I would not have expected to
see Unix running on my Mac unless I telnet'd in somewhere.  All I need
now is to get my network setup and then I can use the Internet like
back in the good old days - rn, pine, lynx, etc., etc.  :-)

Good job porting this all you NetBSD.org folks!