| 1 |
Release notes for Gavare's eXperimental Emulator (GXemul), 0.4.0 |
Release notes for Gavare's eXperimental Emulator (GXemul), 0.4.2 |
| 2 |
================================================================ |
================================================================ |
| 3 |
|
|
| 4 |
Copyright (C) 2003-2006 Anders Gavare. |
Copyright (C) 2003-2006 Anders Gavare. |
| 10 |
systems (e.g. NetBSD) run as if they were running on a real machine. |
systems (e.g. NetBSD) run as if they were running on a real machine. |
| 11 |
|
|
| 12 |
The documentation lists the machines and guest operating systems that can |
The documentation lists the machines and guest operating systems that can |
| 13 |
be regarded as "working" in GXemul. The best supported guest operating |
be regarded as "working" in GXemul. The best working guest operating |
| 14 |
systems are probably NetBSD/pmax, NetBSD/cats, and OpenBSD/cats. |
systems are probably NetBSD/pmax, NetBSD/cats, and OpenBSD/cats. |
| 15 |
|
|
| 16 |
|
|
| 17 |
The most important change between release 0.3.8 and 0.4.0 is: |
Changes between release 0.4.1 and 0.4.2 include, among other things: |
| 18 |
|
|
| 19 |
o) The emulation of MIPS processors has been completely rewritten; |
o) The NetWinder emulation mode now works well enough to let |
| 20 |
it now uses the same portable dynamic translation system as the |
NetBSD/netwinder run from a disk image. |
|
ARM and PowerPC emulation modes. |
|
| 21 |
|
|
| 22 |
On Alpha and i386 hosts (and AMD64 hosts running in 32-bit mode), |
(NetBSD/netwinder has to be installed manually, though, because |
| 23 |
GXemul previously used translation into native code. This release |
there is no installation ramdisk kernel. The GXemul documentation |
| 24 |
will perform worse than 0.3.8 on those host architectures. |
has an example of how to install NetBSD/netwinder using an emulated |
| 25 |
|
NetBSD/pmax machine.) |
| 26 |
|
|
| 27 |
On all other hosts (including AMD64 running in native 64-bit mode), |
o) Algorithmics P5064 emulation works well enough to let NetBSD/algor |
| 28 |
0.4.0 is likely to be faster than 0.3.8, when emulating MIPS, at |
run from a disk image. (Similar to NetBSD/netwinder, it has to |
| 29 |
least for R3000 emulation. |
be installed manually, using another emulated machine.) |
| 30 |
|
|
| 31 |
I think that in the long term, moving towards full portability like |
o) PCI configuration register writes can now be handled, which allows |
| 32 |
this is a good idea. |
NetBSD/Malta (evbmips) 3.0.1 and NetBSD/cobalt 3.0.1 to run from |
| 33 |
|
PCI IDE harddisk images. (Previously, only NetBSD 2.1 worked for |
| 34 |
|
the Malta and Cobalt emulation modes.) |
| 35 |
|
|
| 36 |
(Since the MIPS emulation mode has been rewritten from scratch, and I have |
o) Some performance increases: |
|
not really had much time over for debugging, there are most likely new |
|
|
bugs in 0.4.0 that were not present in 0.3.8. However, I feel that it is |
|
|
better to make a quick release now than to wait even longer.) |
|
| 37 |
|
|
| 38 |
There have also been many other changes, including, but not limited to: |
The virtual translation table update routine has been simplified |
| 39 |
|
to work the same way for 32-bit and 64-bit emulation, and this |
| 40 |
|
apparently results in a speedup for all 64-bit modes. |
| 41 |
|
|
| 42 |
o) The "test machine" functionality is more well-defined than before, |
For 32-bit MIPS, some more instruction combinations have been added. |
|
and some tutorial-like demos have been added. These could be useful |
|
|
e.g. in operating system construction courses. |
|
|
|
|
|
o) NetBSD/sgimips 3.0 works now. This is most likely due to the rewrite |
|
|
of the MIPS emulation mode. Previous releases of GXemul only worked |
|
|
with NetBSD/sgimips 2.1. |
|
|
|
|
|
o) I have begun implementing rudimentary support for GDB remote serial |
|
|
protocol connections. This means that you can run e.g. the Data |
|
|
Display Debugger, and connect it to a GXemul instance. |
|
|
|
|
|
No advanced GDB functionality is working yet, but starting and |
|
|
stopping the emulated machine and single-stepping should work. |
|
| 43 |
|
|
| 44 |
Please read the HISTORY files for more details. |
Please read the HISTORY files for more details. |
| 45 |
|
|
| 46 |
|
|
| 47 |
Files included in this release are: |
Files included in this release are: |
| 48 |
|
|
|
BUGS List of known bugs for this release. |
|
| 49 |
HISTORY Detailed revision history / changelog. |
HISTORY Detailed revision history / changelog. |
| 50 |
LICENSE Copyright message / license. |
LICENSE Copyright message / license. |
| 51 |
README Quick start instructions, for the impatient. |
README Quick start instructions, for the impatient. |
| 159 |
Juan Romero Pardines, Alec Voropay, Göran Weinholt, Alexander Yurchenko, and |
Juan Romero Pardines, Alec Voropay, Göran Weinholt, Alexander Yurchenko, and |
| 160 |
everyone else who has provided me with feedback. |
everyone else who has provided me with feedback. |
| 161 |
|
|
|
Special thanks to Alec Voropay for testing this release with Linux |
|
|
kernels, and on Cygwin, and also thanks to Ondrej Palkovsky for testing |
|
|
with HelenOS. |
|
|
|
|
| 162 |
If you have found GXemul useful in some way, or feel like sending me comments |
If you have found GXemul useful in some way, or feel like sending me comments |
| 163 |
or feedback in general, then mail me at anders(at)gavare.se. |
or feedback in general, then mail me at anders(at)gavare.se. |
| 164 |
|
|
Parent Directory
| 
Revision Log
| 
Patch