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Release notes for Gavare's eXperimental Emulator (GXemul), 0.4.4 |
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================================================================ |
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Copyright (C) 2003-2007 Anders Gavare. |
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GXemul is an experimental instruction-level machine emulator. Several |
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emulation modes are available. In some modes, processors and surrounding |
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hardware components are emulated well enough to let unmodified operating |
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systems (e.g. NetBSD) run as if they were running on a real machine. |
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Processors (ARM, MIPS, PowerPC, SuperH) are emulated using dynamic |
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translation. Unlike some other dynamically translating emulators, GXemul |
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does not need to generate native code, only a "runnable intermediate |
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representation", and will thus run on any host architecture. |
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The documentation lists the machines and guest operating systems that can |
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be regarded as "working" in GXemul. The best working guest operating |
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systems are probably NetBSD/pmax and NetBSD/cats. |
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Changes between release 0.4.3 and 0.4.4 include, among other things: |
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o) The interrupt subsystem has been redesigned. This means two things: |
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x) Internal code cleanup, which makes the whole emulator more |
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maintainable. Instead of using magically encoded integers |
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for interrupts, strings are now used. These strings are in |
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the form of "paths", so that devices and busses can more |
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easily be connected to other busses, devices, or CPUs. |
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x) Some machine types which happened to work in release 0.4.3, |
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but were not listed in the documentation as working, may |
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have stopped working now. As always, the documentation should |
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indicate the combinations of machine modes and guest OSes that |
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are supposed to work. |
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o) SuperH (SH4) emulation is now somewhat more stable, enough to let a |
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NetBSD/dreamcast Live CD be usable. |
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o) PowerPC "G4" emulation is now stable enough to let NetBSD/macppc |
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run from a disk image. (Installing actually worked before, but the |
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NetBSD/macppc GENERIC kernel uses AltiVec instructions which were |
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not implemented correctly.) |
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o) The PICA-61 (arc) and i80321 (evbarm) emulation modes now have their |
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timers fixed at 100 Hz. A hardcoded speed like this is very ugly, but |
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it is at least better than before (when the timer wasn't really |
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running at any specific speed at all). |
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Please read the HISTORY files for more details. |
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Files included in this release are: |
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HISTORY Detailed revision history / changelog. |
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LICENSE Copyright message / license. |
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README Quick start instructions, for the impatient. |
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RELEASE This file. |
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TODO TODO notes. |
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configure, Makefile.skel sh and make scripts for building GXemul. |
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demos Tutorial-like demos of testmachine functionality. |
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doc Documentation. |
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experiments Experimental code. (Usually not needed.) |
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src Source code. |
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To build the emulator, run the configure script, and then run make. This |
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should work on most Unix-like systems. |
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Regarding files in the src/include/ directory: only some of these are written |
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by me, the rest are from other sources (such as NetBSD). The license text says |
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that "All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software" |
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must display acknowledgements. Even though I do NOT feel I mention features or |
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use of the header files (the "software") in any advertising materials, I am |
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still very grateful for the fact that these people have made their files |
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available for re-use, so regardless of legal requirements, I guess thanking |
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them like this is in order: |
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This product includes software developed by the University of |
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California, Berkeley and its contributors. |
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This product includes software developed for the |
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NetBSD Project. See http://www.netbsd.org/ for |
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information about NetBSD. |
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This product includes software developed by Jonathan Stone for |
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the NetBSD Project. |
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This product includes software developed for the NetBSD Project |
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by Matthias Drochner. |
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This product includes software developed by the NetBSD |
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Foundation, Inc. and its contributors. |
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This product includes software developed by Christopher G. Demetriou. |
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[for the NetBSD Project.] |
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This product includes software developed by Adam Glass. |
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This product includes software developed by the PocketBSD project |
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and its contributors. |
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This product includes software developed by Peter Galbavy. |
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Carnegie Mellon University (multiple header files, |
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no specific advertisement text required) |
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This product includes software developed by Charles M. Hannum. |
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This product includes software developed under OpenBSD by Per Fogelström. |
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This product includes software developed by Per Fogelström. |
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This product includes software developed at Ludd, University of |
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Luleå, Sweden and its contributors. |
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This product includes software developed by Hellmuth Michaelis |
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and Joerg Wunsch |
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The font(s) in devices/fonts are Copyright (c) 1992, 1993, 1994 |
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by Hellmuth Michaelis and Joerg Wunsch. ("This product includes software |
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developed by Hellmuth Michaelis and Joerg Wunsch", well, the font |
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is maybe not software, but still...) |
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impactsr-bsd.h is Copyright (C) 2004 by Stanislaw Skowronek. |
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This product includes software developed for the NetBSD Project by |
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Wasabi Systems, Inc. [by Simon Burge] |
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arcbios_other.h is Copyright (c) 1996 M. Warner Losh. |
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This product includes software developed by Marc Horowitz. |
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This product includes software developed by Brini. |
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This product includes software developed by Mark Brinicombe |
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for the NetBSD Project. |
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This product includes software developed by TooLs GmbH. |
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This product includes software developed by Manuel Bouyer. |
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This product includes software developed by the Alice Group. |
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This product includes software developed by Ichiro FUKUHARA. |
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This product includes software developed by Marcus Comstedt. |
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Also, src/include/alpha_rpb.h requires the following: |
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Copyright (c) 1994, 1995, 1996 Carnegie-Mellon University. |
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All rights reserved. |
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Author: Keith Bostic, Chris G. Demetriou |
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Permission to use, copy, modify and distribute this software and |
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its documentation is hereby granted, provided that both the copyright |
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notice and this permission notice appear in all copies of the |
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software, derivative works or modified versions, and any portions |
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thereof, and that both notices appear in supporting documentation. |
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See individual files for license details, if you plan to redistribute GXemul |
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or reuse code. |
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If you have found GXemul useful in some way, or feel like sending me comments |
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or feedback in general, then mail me at anders(at)gavare.se. |
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