Hello everyone,
I found a couple postings regarding the NS1000 a number of weeks
ago when I was looking for more information. I tried to find
some downloadable archives of this list to avoid faq-type questions,
but I have not found anything for off-line reading yet.
I wrote the original patches for linux on the NS1000, so here is
some background on where I am at.
Subject: Re: IBM NetStation 1000 Port
To: Okke Wald <okke.wald%ki.comcity.de@localhost>
From: John Gordon <john_94501%yahoo.com@localhost>
List: port-powerpc
Date: 04/12/2003 00:23:53
There is a patch that can be applied to the stock 2.4.19 kernel available from
http://sourceforge.net/projects/networkstation - there is very little
documentation, but there are some posts in the forums for this project that
explain the installation and build process, and some emails in the mailing list
archives.
I pretty much reverse engineered the boot process using a JTAG debugger
and watchpoints on data areas, etc. Most of what I know is in the source
code patches. The single biggest problem for me has been trying to locate
some documentation on the IBM27-82376 ISA bridge. I found some snippets
in a reference design .ps for the 82660 host bridge, and that is it. So
anybody with any information on it, please email!
I have that kernel built and booted, and it worked as far as getting to the
root file system. Then it stopped as I didn't have a root file system that I
could make work (perhaps you'll have more luck with the one on the sourceforge
site - if so, please let me know what you did to get it working ;-).
I use an NFS mount here by now, I don't remember what shape the initrd
root fs was in.
As for VGA and sound support, I believe that both of these are being worked on,
though I don't know about the progress in that area (the kernel I booted
certainly did something with the video system as I got a penguin displayed in
the top left of the screen).
I added a really shaky patch for true color support on the Trio chip
in the box. It works with the 4.1.something fbdev X server up to
1024x768 at 16bpp. Sound and pcmcia works now as well. The latest patch
for linux 2.4.19 is here:
http://networkstation.sourceforge.net/patch-2.4.19-ns1000-20030625.gz
I can't sem to find the message in question, but I read somewhere else
that the GPL in the ncdcs tool is a problem for inclusion in BSD-licensed
sets. I GPL'd the linux version since I would like that to become part
of the mainline code at some point. If someone can point me to a
recommended BSD boilerplate and instructions for submissions etc then I
can produce a BSD-licensed version as well.
Also, if anybody has archives for the ppc-related netbsd lists other
than http://mail-index.netbsd.org, please let me know if there is a way
to obtain a copy.
Regards,
Jochen