Annotation of www/arc.html, Revision 1.1
1.1 ! deraadt 1: <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//IETF//DTD HTML Strict//EN">
! 2: <html>
! 3: <head>
! 4: <title>OpenBSD/arc</title>
! 5: <base href=http://www.openbsd.org/>
! 6: <link rev=made href=mailto:www@openbsd.org>
! 7: <meta name="resource-type" content="document">
! 8: <meta name="description" content="the OpenBSD/arc page">
! 9: <meta name="keywords" content="openbsd,arc">
! 10: <meta name="distribution" content="global">
! 11: <meta name="copyright" content="This document copyright 1996 by OpenBSD, Inc.">
! 12: </head>
! 13:
! 14: <body>
! 15:
! 16: <h2>OpenBSD/arc</h2>
! 17:
! 18: <hr>
! 19: <h3><strong>History and Status:</strong></h3>
! 20:
! 21: <p>
! 22: The early history is not very clear. Apparently the first work was
! 23: done by CMU as part of their Mach project. The initial hardware was
! 24: the DEC R2000/R3000-based Decstations. This code was later used by
! 25: both the Sprite and BSD groups. The 4.4BSD code, known as the `pmax'
! 26: port, was made freely available in mid '93. It was merged into the
! 27: NetBSD tree by a variety of people, but has never been very stable,
! 28: reliable, or complete. Compiler toolkit problems have plagued the
! 29: port because the standard a.out executable format is an imperfect
! 30: match to the MIPS architecture.
! 31: </p>
! 32:
! 33: <p>
! 34: Per Fogelstrom became familiar with the code after porting it to a
! 35: home-built IDT R3081 based board. Subsequently he added R4400 support
! 36: when porting it to the MIPS R4400 Acer PICA board. Willowglen
! 37: Singapore purchased a second PICA board for Theo de Raadt so that he
! 38: could improve the port for use as a development system for an internal
! 39: project. Since then Theo and Per have had ethernet and a few other
! 40: small projects working.
! 41: </p>
! 42:
! 43: <p>
! 44: The Acer PICA is a dead platform. Acer no longer makes the machine,
! 45: but even worse the machines are very rare. But the Acer PICA was just
! 46: one of a whole family of similar machines built by other companies
! 47: like MIPS, Deskstation, NEC, Olivetti. These machines were known as
! 48: ARC machines, built according to the "Advanced RISC Computing" specification.
! 49: </p>
! 50:
! 51: <p>
! 52: As a result, the code has been modified to make it more versatile, and
! 53: eventually it should support a larger whole range of ARC machines.
! 54: Hopefully a port will result that can run on the full range of MIPS
! 55: processors, from R3000 to R10000.
! 56: </p>
! 57:
! 58: <p>
! 59: The people working the most on OpenBSD/arc currently consists of
! 60: Per Fogelstrom, Theo de Raadt, and a few others. Of course, others are
! 61: very welcome!
! 62: </p>
! 63:
! 64: <p>
! 65: Recent developments:
! 66: <ul>
! 67: <li>ELF shared libraries throughout
! 68: <li>ELF executables that page in, unlike NetBSD where they are
! 69: read into memory.
! 70: <li>Almost native build. Very soon all the utilities needed will be in the
! 71: source tree.
! 72: <li>nlist() function that understands a.out, ELF, or ecoff binaries.
! 73: <li>The kvm utilities work.
! 74: </ul>
! 75: </p>
! 76:
! 77: <hr>
! 78: <h3><strong>Where to get it?</strong></h3>
! 79:
! 80: Old pica Snapshots are available at:<p>
! 81:
! 82: <ul>
! 83: <li><a href=ftp://ftp.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD/snapshots/pica>
! 84: ftp://ftp.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD/snapshots/pica</a><br>
! 85: located at Rutgers University, eastern USA.
! 86: <!-- davem@openbsd.org -->
! 87: <li><a href=ftp://ftp.ibp.fr/pub/OpenBSD/snapshots/pica>
! 88: ftp://ftp.ibp.fr/pub/OpenBSD/snapshots/pica</a><br>
! 89: located in France.
! 90: <!-- ftpmaint@ftp.ibp.fr -->
! 91: <li><a href=ftp://hal.cs.umr.edu/pub/OpenBSD/snapshots/pica>
! 92: ftp://hal.cs.umr.edu/pub/OpenBSD/snapshots/pica</a><br>
! 93: located in University of Missouri-Rolla, mid-western USA.
! 94: <!-- johns@cs.umr.edu -->
! 95: </ul>
! 96: You should also read the <a href=snapshots.html>
! 97: general description about OpenBSD snapshots</a>.
! 98: </p>
! 99:
! 100: <p>
! 101: Send mail to <a href=mailto:deraadt@theos.com>Theo de Raadt</a> and
! 102: <a href=mailto:pefo@openbsd.org>Per Fogelstrom</a>.
! 103: </p>
! 104:
! 105: <hr>
! 106: <a href=/><img src=icons/back.gif border=0 alt=OpenBSD></a>
! 107: <a href=mailto:www@openbsd.org>www@openbsd.org</a>
! 108: <br>
! 109: <small>$OpenBSD: arc.html,v 1.5 1996/06/11 08:13:48 deraadt Exp $</small>
! 110:
! 111: </body>
! 112: </html>