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LinuxPPC unleashes LinuxPPC 1999 Q3
haaz writes "LinuxPPC Inc. took the wraps off their newest release, LinuxPPC 1999 Q3, today. It's got RAGE 128 video card drivers, and a whole gaggle of fixes for iMacs and Blue G3s, plus new glibc, GNOME and gcc packages. Bochs is thrown in for good measure, along with an updated graphical installer. "
I use paul's rsync and the snooze util from ftp://devel.linuxppc.org/pub/users/paulus/
LinuxPPC boots at startup via an BootX OS chooser, just choose Mac or Linux and boom your good to go
They use the frame buffer device for ATI RAGE128. Currently it works on PPC only, but work for other architectures should be underway.
Maybe not in the States, but I just got an R5 CD from EverythingLinux in Australia, took two days to arrive. Tonight's the big install night :-)
it took them a long time to get mine shipped too. They need to speed up
It probably could... I am using Logitech Mouseman Wheel USB on LinuxPPC now by using mouse protocol IMPS/2, which is the protocol for Intellimouse IIRC. After compiling kernel 2.2.10, even the wheel works!
And what to think of Office 98 or Office 2001 for the Mac?
You can't turn it off. The PMU does a lot more than sleep mode, it replaces Cuda (ADB controller) which manages the keyboard and the trackpad, and it handles the nvram on those machines.
What you did probably turn off is the compile option for Power Management. This option enables the sleep code and should be harmless unless you actually try to sleep. For sleeping, there is the snooze command, and there's a little daemon (pmud) written by Paul, which monitors your machine and can excute scripts when the Power cable is connecter or disconnected. pmud also handles sleep when the lid is closed.
The driver will definitley have nothing to do with X but rather the framebuffer.
People were complaning about the OS on macs. Many thing were said, _still_ no preemptive multitasking... single user... no memmory managmennt... no shell... I don't remember people complaning about the hw that much, other than that it wasn't modular. Now that it seems that macs are hw modular and run Linux, theres not so much to complain about... Well... PRICE! Those god damn things are way too expensive!!! |)
LINUX stands for: Linux Inux Nux Ux X
FRA: STFU GTFO
Anyone have any experince with one. I wonder what other uses it could have, and what other OS's could be ported.....maybe Mac OS X along with Linux?
Who is the master of foxhounds, and who says the hunt has begun? -Pink Floyd
The chip is not that much faster than the P3. Steve Jobs lies.
They LinuxPPC team has done a helluva job on it and I would personally recommend it. I have it on my personal machine plus another machine sitting next to me that I was building last night to be a nice linux distros mirror at Kansas State University. Its very sturdy and well worth your time. You can get the Q3 CDs for only $20 too since you are a previous owner. Highly recommended. Good luck!
I ordered R4, back when it was "buy R4 and we'll ship you R5 for free when it comes out."
I had the R4 disc within a week, and I got my copy of R5 (LinuxPPC 1999) a few days after they announced it.
You can check on your order online right now.
https://order.linuxppc.com/status/
Put in your email address, and the system will send you an email with the status of your order.
Best,
-- haaz.
The manual is on the CD in PDF format.
-- haaz.
It's Bochs, the x86 emulator.
-- haaz.
How about sending them to me, instead of the ng, which I don't have much time to read? :)
-- haaz.
Shine on, you crazy diamond.
bochs is commercial software that you can get source for. $25.
I love apple. I really want a G4. I just don't like ATI. The cards are just a little too weak for me, but it seems that the ATI is a staple for apple now. Oh well... I applaud LinuxPPC for including drivers for the "only" class of video card shipped w/ apple computers that I have seen.
Oh BTW I know you can put another video card in an apple I just don't wanna deal with paying for a dump video card then removing it and have it sit in a corner while I order a nicer card. I just don't want to pay for 2 video cards when I order my new G4.
Adobe Illustrator '88 followed Illustrator 1.0 What was really nasty though was that they didn't
ship Illustrator 3.0 until late '91 or '92, which is the reason I suspect they went back to standard version numbers...
Where's the tired "Macs are closed and proprietary!" rant? Where's the "Macs cost too much!" or the eternal classic "Apple screws their customers/developers!"? What...not even the old standby, "d00d! Maks suk!"?
Something must surely be wrong here.
I pre-ordered mine and got the R4 distrobution. I had my copy of R5 within 3 days or so of it coming out. It worked out pretty quickly for me. Interesting...... Keep in mind that they have a small crew over there; which means that most of their workers probably have to double or triple up on the jobs that each one does.
Is OF booting working on the iMac/B&W G3s yet? I've a couple of G3s here that I'd like to be able to netboot using the "Hold down the N key" feature which makes OF send TFTP requests. Last time I tried, this didn't work with Linux because the code needed to be updated to work with the newer firmware. As a result, we've ended up with them running NetBSD. Has this been fixed yet?
If the computer hangs, it's a kernel issue. ;)
The year numbering scheme was first tried by Adobe if memory serves for Illustrator 88. Needless to say that was the only year versioning attempted by Adobe that I remember.
I think Microsoft likes it because it makes your software feel old more readily. Still using Windows 95? Who can remember 4.00b.3128.032-SR2b anyhow?
Not as an installer, it wouldn't work for me. But it does mean you can start up linux from the CD and run fsck to repair those corrupted filesystems - not need to make yourself a boot floppy! A
Q3 as in 3rd quarter? or Q3 as in Quake 3.
I think it's the second one.
This year based numbering scheme is dumb... Wasn't it Microsoft's idea in the first place? They have some good ideas sometimes, especially in the area of marketing, but this one is for the birds. Why emulate it? The only other industry that uses year based systems is the auto industry which is hardly a model for dynamic, forward thinking companies in most cases.
DrLunch.com The site that tells you what's for lunch!
are these 3d cards? will it be possible to play quake 3 on a powerbook?
Does this mean there is a Rage 128 driver available for us i386 users too? It bites not having an XFree86-supported video card.
It's nice to see lilypond is included. Lilypond is the main program I run on my home computer (which happens to be running linuxppc).
Are they using XFree86? or some other X Server? If it is XFree86, will their server for the Rage 128 be usable on the PC? cause alot of folks i know have that card now.
Now that there's the Rage 128 support, I'm gpoing to have to get one... I wonder if I can get a MacOS rebate (like the wintel rebate scheme)... or else try to get someone who is building those boards that IBM laid out the spec for.
I've always liked the PowerPC architecture(s), but this actually makes it worth my trouble. Whoo-hoo!
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
Now I *really* want one of those G4's with the flatpanel displays...
i have a linuxppc4 install on my computer that is somewhat messed up, mostly because i made the mistake of trying to download the whole damn thing over a modem instead of buying the CD. I need to reinstall it, and I'm considering grabbing a copy of the linuxppc 5 CD. However i was curious about maybe switching to debian instead.
i n/binary-powerpc/
i was wondering if anyone could tell me what the status of the port of the Debian distribution to the PPC platform is? is it usable yet? The page at
http://www.debian.org/ports/powerpc/
says almost nothing.. and the documentation listed there in the docu/ directory returns 404 not founds. there's some powerpc binaries at
ftp://ftp.us.debian.org//debian/dists/potato/ma
but i have no idea how to install them, and no clue where the documentation is.
Has anyone actually used this, or can anyone tell me how it's going? Are there installation instructions somewhere i missed? Is the Potato thing there really a full, complete distribution?
I've never used debian, and I'm not totally certain how the debian distribution would be different (especially since i never get to use RPM anyway, so the package manager doesn't matter much to me..) but i'm curious. Is it worth checking out, or should i just go with the Linuxppc 5/1999?
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
I'm all for making interfaces more appealing, but in the case of the LinuxPPC graphical installer, I think they totally screwed up.
My biggest problem is that they present a sequential task as a non-sequential task (by allowing you to click on any step of the install process in any order you like). You cannot install linux into a partition you haven't created yet.
It's also confusing to start-up into x-windows with lot's of visual clutter (mouse eyes, task bar, logo windows) as opposed to going into a modal install program where you can do *one* thing: install the software.
and I must say that its very nice. I was in the market to get a laptop to run linux, and after I did some research on linux ppc I decided to get a 99 powerbook g3. I have *not* been disapointed :-). It has snooze (sleep), hot swapable media bays, usb, all kinds of great stuff supported by linux. I highly recommend it. The linux ppc guys have done a great job. The era of intel is coming to an end :-)
Kirk
Has anyone had this problem, everything is rock stable w/ running X on LinuxPPC on iMac rev C. However, once I run XMMS, it will lock up the whole computer (no keyboard,mouse,telnet) in anywhere from one to ten hours. Do I need the latest kernel or their updated "bootup" programs that fixes sound and video problems? Anyone experience the same thing?
Find and share links to celebrity profiles on MySpace! http://www.myspacecelebrities.com
Have they done anything to improve their installer? Or their documentation? I seem to remember their last release documentation was very heavy on self-back-patting but kind of light on real info.
Still waiting for my copy of YellowDog.
That's all I wanna know. If it does, I'm getting one, pronto. It's cheap, it looks cool, it's power efficient. That's good enough for me.
Does anyone know if you can use a Voodoo3 flashed with the Macintosh ROMs under LinuxPPC? I know there is support in XF86, but I thought that just might be for Intel ROM V3s.
--"In dreams begin responsibilities" - Delmore Schwartz
Will I be able to use my Microsoft (ugh) Intellimouse USB on my iMac now?
I'm a linux newbie, so maybe it was possible before, but I couldn't figure it out. If anyone would care to point me to a source that could help me...
Does anyone distribute a cheap version of
:(
LinuxPPC on CD? I wrote to a few guys, asking if
they were planning to release one, and got
the following answers:
LinuxMall - No, we do not have a single-CD
version of it and I do not know of
any plans to have one in the near future.
LinuxCentral - Probably not
CheapBytes - If you are referring to a low cost
version, we have been planning on doing
that for awhile. We have a power mac
sitting here just for the task. No
definite date of availability at this
time.
Any ideas? anyone wants to start a business?
-- Slef
I'm not to keen on Apple itself, but I like their products, especially the PowerBook G3. Being able to run Linux on it is great. So no flames from me...
A lot of people may have missed the news that LinuxPPC is now offering a quarterly subscription model. For $99, you get CDs for a year, with promised releases every quarter. Under this scheme, having the quarter of release be the version name makes an awful lot of sense, as the most unambiguous way of identifying what version a user has.
This is rather nice even if one doesn't intend to update every three months, as R5 was pushed back from its release date for about half a year (two current releases-worth of time).
It probably won't be "easy". The iBook uss the new United Motherboard Architecture (UMA) and the new UniNorth controller chip. This support will have to be added before LinuxPPC will work with it. However, since the new "Sawtooth" G4s, the new "Kihei" iMac on the way, and the upcoming G4 Powerbooks in January all are basd on the UMA, adding support for the iBook will make it easier to get it working on these other machines.
I spoke to Jason Haas at LinuxPPC and basically he said it would take some time, but that it would work eventually.
- Vincit qui patitur.
cmd-option-o-f
I suggest taking them to comp.os.linux.powerpc
;o)
Lots of knowledge in there... if you got a question, search through the newsgroup with deja.com's engine or get right on that comp.os.linux.powerpc link
-nicole
I forgot to add this in my previous post: I might have not actually booted the Debian kernels, but I definitely booted the Debian ramdisk images. I probably booted the Linux kernel that came with LinuxPPC.
Another important tip: www.linuxppc.org has _excellent_ installation documentation. Give it a good read even if doing a Debian install. It filled me in on lots of the little details I was completely ignorant to before I started.
Even though I'm a big Debian fan, I would recommend giving LinuxPPC an install if you're new to the PPC scene. The LinuxPPC guys have done an excellent job of getting together a great installation program and distribution in such (comparitively) little time (well, compared to Intel Linux). I also find the LinuxPPC lists to be full of really skilled and friendly people always adding cool new features to the Linux kernels and the programs they maintain. Don't forget to search the LinuxPPC mailing list archives, lots of questions you have can be answered there.
--
Will I be able to use my Microsoft (ugh) Intellimouse USB on my iMac now?
:-)
Maybe, but I think it's unlikley. If it doesn't work under Mac OS, it probably wont work under linux.
I got a cheap USB three button from Belkin in March. It worked on the Mac OS, and did the same under LinuxPPC R4. Cool thing was, I didn't have to do any fiddling with config files; all three buttons functioned just like they would on a PC right off the bat.
HOWEVER, Linux doesn't support USB plug and play, AFAIK. I found this out the hard way when I unplugged one of the mice from my iMac and spent the next half hour fscking my partitions.
Linus is threatening to improve USB support in 2.4, maybe P&P will work then.
They were doing the year based version scheme a decade ago, then switched over to standard numbers. Hmm... Now if everyone wasn't so panicky about Y2k, we'd probably still be running with the original decimal version increases.
Course, Microsoft always has to find some nifty gimic to capture attention. I still feel those year-based versions are for internal use, like an absolute deadline for software release... otherwise their stuff would be permanently delayed.
That's all I can find at the moment. But I can swear I remember seeing some unfinished installation docs while poking around a mirror of their ftp site. But I can't find it now. Enjoy,
Ben
Maybe it's that dumb head up your ass thing.
Why don't you pull your head out of your ass and tell ROSIE to let go!
;P
Elephant: a mouse built to government specs
Getting Linux to run on the iBook will probably be easy, although it might be a while before Airport works and the advanced power saving features may never be used to thier full extent. Unless Apple releases that stuff in Darwin.......
OTOH, the PPC guys don't have to worry about hot swaping drives or infra-red support.
Lots of the problems with the installer have been fixed and many people have testified to being able to actually install and get linux up and running for the first time. You probably used one of early versions.
:) New installer 2.6.5 should have this feature.
The non-sequential nature of how the installer wasn't ever straightened out. But hey, guess what I did today
jcarr
There's also updated packages and x86 emulation software.
Really? I didn't know there was any sort of x86 emulation for Linux on the Mac. Does anybody know more about this? What sort of emulation? Is it just for Linux binaries, or could one boot up Win98? What license is it under? Is it just like ibcs, or something more? If anybody has any more info about this, I'd like to know!
Thanks,
Ross
You need to load a portion of the MacOS before the BootX control panel pops up and you can begin the boot procedure for LinuxPPC
I asked this in the SAP discussion, but it fits in more in this one.
Any word on when/if Linux/Beowolf will will run on one of these?
--The more you know, the less you know.
Well I'm glad to see they are busy selling more CD's. I'm just sort of curious where the CD that I ordered over two months ago is!
I've called once and written 4 emails. Guy on the phone was clueless whether it had shipped or not. I haven't gotten a single response from any of my emails. (Sent the email to three different email addresses.)
Arrrrgh!
LinuxPPC maybe cool but if they can't get organized then they are going to flop.
bootx is only one way to boot linuxppc. It is the one the linuxppc.com people push because it is the simplest if you already have a macos installation (which almost everyone with lppc does).
It is completely possible to not even have macos on the drive-- just boot into the Open Firmware prompt (cmd-ctrl-o-f i think) and type in a couple quick commands, and it will start up in linuxppc every time after that until you boot into macos (which will reset your OF stuff.. although you can set it back from there with this convenient program called Boot Variables.)
This is all very clearly documented in the linuxppc.org installation instructions, which i guess you've never had reason to read.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts