Annotation of www/arc.html, Revision 1.25
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1.23 johns 13: <BODY BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#000000" LINK="#23238E">
1.1 deraadt 14:
15: <h2>OpenBSD/arc</h2>
16:
17: <hr>
18: <h3><strong>History and Status:</strong></h3>
19:
20: <p>
21: The early history is not very clear. Apparently the first work was
22: done by CMU as part of their Mach project. The initial hardware was
23: the DEC R2000/R3000-based Decstations. This code was later used by
24: both the Sprite and BSD groups. The 4.4BSD code, known as the `pmax'
25: port, was made freely available in mid '93. It was merged into the
26: NetBSD tree by a variety of people, but has never been very stable,
27: reliable, or complete. Compiler toolkit problems have plagued the
28: port because the standard a.out executable format is an imperfect
29: match to the MIPS architecture.
30: </p>
31:
32: <p>
1.9 niklas 33: Per Fogelström became familiar with the code after porting it to a
1.1 deraadt 34: home-built IDT R3081 based board. Subsequently he added R4400 support
35: when porting it to the MIPS R4400 Acer PICA board. Willowglen
36: Singapore purchased a second PICA board for Theo de Raadt so that he
37: could improve the port for use as a development system for an internal
1.20 imp 38: project. Since then Theo, Per and others have completed the port.
1.1 deraadt 39: </p>
40:
41: <p>
42: The Acer PICA is a dead platform. Acer no longer makes the machine,
43: but even worse the machines are very rare. But the Acer PICA was just
44: one of a whole family of similar machines built by other companies
45: like MIPS, Deskstation, NEC, Olivetti. These machines were known as
46: ARC machines, built according to the "Advanced RISC Computing" specification.
1.15 imp 47: No new ARC BIOS machines for MIPS will likely be manufactured.
48: Microsoft has announced that it will no longer support MIPS after NT 4.0.
1.24 todd 49: OpenBSD/arc provides a good alternative to NT, especially now that no more OS
1.15 imp 50: updates for NT MIPS will happen.
1.1 deraadt 51: </p>
52:
53: <p>
54: As a result, the code has been modified to make it more versatile, and
55: eventually it should support a larger whole range of ARC machines.
56: Hopefully a port will result that can run on the full range of MIPS
1.2 deraadt 57: processors: R3000, R4000, R4400, R46x0, R5000, and R10000.
1.1 deraadt 58: </p>
59:
60: <p>
1.22 johns 61: <h3>Currently the port supports the following:</h3>
1.12 deraadt 62: <ul>
63: <li>Acer Pica: 150MHz R4400PC, ISA, with onboard ethernet, scsi, video,
64: and serial.
65: <li>Deskstation Tyne: 133MHz R4600, ISA and VLB.
1.16 imp 66: <li>Deskstation rPC44: 100MHz R4400PC, EISA bus.
1.25 ! deraadt 67: <li><a href=http://www.algor.co.uk>Algorithmics</a> R5000/R10000 evaluation board
1.12 deraadt 68: </ul>
1.11 deraadt 69: </p>
1.22 johns 70:
71: <p>
72: <h3>Supported devices include:</h3>
73: <ul>
74: <li> graphics:
75: <ul>
1.24 todd 76: <li> built-in S3 VGA graphics adapter on PICA.
1.22 johns 77: <li> Standard VGA graphics adapter on rPC44 and Tyne.
78: <li> Note that X11R6 currently supports only S3 boards.
79: </ul>
80:
81: <li> keyboard:
82: <ul>
83: <li> Standard PC compatible keyboard with optionally driver softloaded keymaps.
84: </ul>
85:
86: <li> mouse:
87: <ul>
88: <li> PS2 mouse on PICA
89: <li> Serial mouse on /dev/tty00 on rPC44 and Tyne.
90: </ul>
91:
92: <li> serial ports:
93: <ul>
94: <li> on-board tty00 and tty01 (PICA. can not yet be used as console)
95: <li> ISA tty00 and tty01 on systems without serial ports on the motherboard (Tyne).
96: <li> ISA tty02 and tty03 on all ISA capable systems.
97: </ul>
98:
99: <li> parallel ports:
100: <ul>
101: <li> parallel ports is supported on-board (PICA) or on ISA (rPC44 and Tyne).
102: </ul>
103:
104: <li> floppy:
105: <ul>
106: <li> floppy is supported on PICA only.
107: </ul>
108:
109: <li> ethernet:
110: <ul>
111: <li> on-board SONIC ethernet controller (PICA only)
112: <li> 3Com Etherlink boards (All ISA capable systems)
113: <li> NE2000 compatible ISA boards.
114: </ul>
115:
116: <li> SCSI:
117: <ul>
118: <li> on-board NCR53C96 SCSI controller (PICA)
119: <li> VLB "Buslogic BT-440C/445C" SCSI controller.
120: </ul>
121:
122: <li> IDE:
123: <ul>
124: <li> IDE disks via wd driver on ISA bus. Bootable only on Deskstation systems.
125: </ul>
126: </ul>
127: </p>
128:
1.17 deraadt 129: <p>
1.22 johns 130: <h3>The following ports are also being worked on:</h3>
1.17 deraadt 131: <ul>
132: <li>NKK Aquarious R4700 PCI machine.
133: <li>A Willowglen R3081 ARC-lookalike board used as an embedded system.
134: </ul>
135: </p>
1.11 deraadt 136:
137: <p>
1.1 deraadt 138: The people working the most on OpenBSD/arc currently consists of
1.13 deraadt 139: Per Fogelström, Theo de Raadt, Niklas Hallqvist, Warner Losh,
140: and a few others. Of course, others are very welcome!
1.1 deraadt 141: </p>
142:
143: <p>
1.22 johns 144: <h3>Recent developments:</h3>
1.1 deraadt 145: <ul>
146: <li>ELF shared libraries throughout
147: <li>ELF executables that page in, unlike NetBSD where they are
148: read into memory.
149: <li>nlist() function that understands a.out, ELF, or ecoff binaries.
150: <li>The kvm utilities work.
1.11 deraadt 151: <li>ISA bus support on the Pica.
152: <li>ISA and VLB support on the Tyne.
1.18 imp 153: <li>ISA bus support on the rPC44.
154: <li>gdb works.
1.19 imp 155: <li>Completely native build.
1.1 deraadt 156: </ul>
157: </p>
158:
1.14 deraadt 159: <p>
160: The ARC port is complete, including basically everything you can expect
161: on any OpenBSD port.
162: </p>
163:
1.1 deraadt 164: <hr>
1.4 deraadt 165: <p>
1.8 deraadt 166: <a href=ftp.html>Snapshots are made available from time to time.</a>
1.1 deraadt 167:
168: <p>
169: Send mail to <a href=mailto:deraadt@theos.com>Theo de Raadt</a> and
1.9 niklas 170: <a href=mailto:pefo@openbsd.org>Per Fogelström</a>.
1.1 deraadt 171: </p>
172:
173: <hr>
1.7 deraadt 174: <a href=plat.html><img src=back.gif border=0 alt=OpenBSD></a>
1.1 deraadt 175: <a href=mailto:www@openbsd.org>www@openbsd.org</a>
176: <br>
1.25 ! deraadt 177: <small>$OpenBSD: arc.html,v 1.24 1997/12/01 10:51:02 todd Exp $</small>
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