RE: Booting /NetBSD-daily/netbsd-4/200807120002Z on my TT030

[David Brownlee <abs%absd.org@localhost>]

On Sun, 19 Oct 2008, David Ross wrote:

> Thanks, I just added a link on the Links page.
>
> I'm not sure what would happen if you were to replace the kernel as you
> describe.  Those kernels at least boot, so you'd probably wind up with
> something that works...  sort of.  If the entire distribution was built
> around the 1.6.1 kernel, I think there would be problems though.  If I
> get a chance I'll try this out in the future but I'm not really
> optimistic.

        NetBSD has very good backwards compatability. There are
        few few programs from an earlier release which do not run
        fine under a later kernel - usually ipf/pf and some tools
        like netstat are the only problems.

        My usual procedure for upgrading NetBSD is to put a new
        kernel in place, ensure it boots OK, then extract the new
        sets by hand. Of course that was on sparc, arm, alpha and
        i386...

        If you have a spare drive (and time! :) it would be
        interesting to test a NetBSD 1.6.1 install, followed by a
        NetBSD 3.1 kernel.  If that worked, then just extract the
        NetBSD 3.1 sets (except etc.tgz), and run /usr/sbin/postinstall

        If the NetBSD 2.x and 3.x issues you saw were install and not
        kernel related then I would expect it to work...

> I haven't tried any Atari emulators.  It's possible that one might work
> but I'm not even familiar with what's out there.

        Just a thought :)