Date: Tue, 16 May 2006 14:30:30 +0100 From: "Phil Brennan" <phil.brennan@gmail.com> To: "Rafael Ruiz" <gandano@gmail.com> Cc: alpha@freebsd.org Subject: Re: HEADSUP: Alpha support is being retired in 7.0 Message-ID: <ff0f76e00605160630w7cda0bc2s182a9f9b6fa725ef@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <b9e283430605150756w60f95406iad130bc317ccce1f@mail.gmail.com> References: <E1Ffbck-0004C9-Ba@webmail03.yourhostingaccount.com> <b9e283430605150756w60f95406iad130bc317ccce1f@mail.gmail.com>
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Please read that article carefully. Note the use of "unless" before that paragraph, and "imaginary" afterwards. On 5/15/06, Rafael Ruiz <gandano@gmail.com> wrote: > Hi! > In this paper says that Chinese military works on their own cloned Alpha = EV8 > / EV9 processors, and they running COSIX (Chinese Tru64 UNIX whose source > code Compaq gave to the China sometime ago, plus EV8 etc plans that might > have leaked out of the US). > > Please, see http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=3D4266 > > Rafa > > 2006/5/15, Paul V. Bolotoff <walter@alasir.com>: > > > > That's sad very much. However, the architecture may be revived sooner o= r > > later. The instruction set is free, and most original patents of DEC ar= e > > expired by this moment. Thanks to DEC, the architecture and its hardwar= e > > implementations are well-documented. There are open-source operating > > systems, compilers, assemblers and other development tools available, s= o > > it's a matter of time for some enterprise to pick everything up and blo= w a > > new life into the architecture. We'll see what we shall see. > > > > By the way, the Alpha processors have never had integer division > > implemented in hardware. Not a drawback though, because it's a relative= ly > > complicated instruction. It takes an advanced computational logic and d= ozens > > of cycles to complete execution anyway (about one bit per clock cycle).= To > > throw an example in, Athlon64-family processors can do that in 42 cycle= s for > > 32-bit operands or in 74 cycles for 64-bit ones. Finally, it isn't an e= asy > > task for hardware engineers to get it pipelined properly... > > > > PVB > > > > On Thu, 11 May 2006 14:24 , John Baldwin <jhb@freebsd.org> sent: > > > > >Alpha was the first non-x86 port that was added to FreeBSD, and as suc= h > > it has > > >greatly aided the efforts to keep FreeBSD from being too i386-centric. > > >However, recently the Alpha port has not had any active development or > > >maintenance. As a result, the quality of the Alpha releases that the > > Project > > >provides are not on par with other supported architectures and is in f= act > > >degrading. Unfortunately, as an architecture it has also been killed = by > > its > > >creator. > > > > > >After considering all of this, it is time to part with Alpha for 7.0 a= nd > > >beyond. At this time it is still planned to provide 6.x releases for > > >FreeBSD/alpha. The code will still be around in CVS history if someon= e > > >suddenly shows up and fixes a bunch of bugs and/or the architecture is > > >revived. Users with Alpha systems are welcome to use existing release= s > > of > > >FreeBSD/alpha or another BSD such as NetBSD/alpha. We would still lik= e > > to > > >see bug fixes for FreeBSD/alpha on 6.x so that the final release is > > solid. > > > > > >-- > > >John Baldwin jhb@FreeBSD.org> http://www.FreeBSD.org/~jhb/ > > >"Power Users Use the Power to Serve" =3D http://www.FreeBSD.org > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > freebsd-alpha@freebsd.org mailing list > > http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-alpha > > To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-alpha-unsubscribe@freebsd.org= " > > > > > > -- > -- > > Rafa. > Alpha back to life. > _______________________________________________ > freebsd-alpha@freebsd.org mailing list > http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-alpha > To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-alpha-unsubscribe@freebsd.org" >
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