Date: Wed, 05 May 1999 12:00:05 -0700 From: "Reginald S. Perry" <reggie@lambdawerks.org> To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@zippy.cdrom.com> Message-ID: <199905051900.MAA12568@trane.lambdawerks.org> In-Reply-To: Message from "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@zippy.cdrom.com> of "Fri, 23 Apr 1999 15:18:38 PDT." <33412.924905918@zippy.cdrom.com>
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>"Jordan" == Jordan K Hubbard <jkh@zippy.cdrom.com> writes:
> I just talked with one of our engineers here about the docs/SDK
> etc... for AlphaBIOS. Evidently there is no documentation for AlphaBIOS,
> the docs being the source itself, the problem being that parts of the
> source were written/are copyrighted by Microsoft. So in order to get those
> you'd have to sign an NDA with MS. Not good.
> Grumble. That's quite unfortunate. :( Thanks for letting me know,
> in any case.
I was following this thread and sent some mail to my friend who works
on low level Alpha/NT stuff. I will attach his message. Let me know if
this is useful for you.
-Reggie
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From: Bill Roman <roman@zso.dec.com>
To: "'Reginald S. Perry'" <reggie@lambdawerks.org>
Subject: RE: Is there something that can be done about this?
Date: Wed, 5 May 1999 09:37:32 -0700
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> ----------
> From: Reginald S. Perry[SMTP:reggie@lambdawerks.org]
> Sent: Tuesday, May 04, 1999 11:48 PM
> To: roman@zso.dec.com
> Subject: Is there something that can be done about this?
>
> <<Message: Microsoft Exchange Message>>
> Hi Bill,
> Do you have any contacts that can resolve this issue? I am guessing
>
> that the left hand is tripping over the right hand. :-)
>
I presume "this issue" is the information needed to boot FreeBSD from
ARC/AlphaBIOS?
There are two very useful resources available to the general public at
no cost. The first is the "Advanced RISC Computing Multiprocessor
Standard Specification, Version 1.2", colloquially known as the "ARC
spec". Although it is very dated (it talks about MIPS, and never
mentions Alpha), it provides a lot of useful information. It may be
found at:
http://www.microsoft.com/hwdev/download/respec/riscspec.zip
The second is the "ARC Application Development Kit V1.3" (ADK). It is a
set of tools and libraries that support development of programs that run
in an Alpha ARC firmware environment (including AlphaBIOS). It requires
a Windows NT development environment if you want to make direct use of
the libraries, but the header files and supporting documentation should
prove very useful. There are also some pre-built ARC apps (with source)
that are immediately useful. You can find it at:
ftp://ftp.compaq.com/pub/softpaq/alphant/adkv13.zip
Somewhere on gatekeeper.dec.com is the source code to linload.exe, the
ARC app that acts as the first stage loader for Linux under
ARC-compliant firmware. It shouldn't be too hard to find, and a quick
look at it should provide some hints.
The "EBSDK" that was mentioned is the "Evaluation Board Software
Development Kit". It must be somewhere on the web site, but I can't
find it at the moment. (Compaq has made a real mess of former Digital
web sites.) A careful search by someone with useful bandwidth available
(like you, Reggie!) should turn it up. It includes sources for some
useful tools, like a version of gas for building PALcode, and the
all-important "PALcode violation checker" (PVC). I did stumble on some
useful documentation at:
http://ftp.digital.com/pub/Digital/info/semiconductor/literature/dsc-lib
rary.html
There's one more useful resource available at no cost, but not to the
general public. I'll be glad to answer any specific questions directed
to me at my personal e-mail address concerning the ARC environment on
Alpha systems, to the fullest extent possible without disclosing
proprietary information. I can be reached at:
roman@songdog.eskimo.com
I'd love to work with any developers on the FreeBSD project who have
appropriate skills for such a project. Anyone who can initiate me into
the mysteries of how to generate the appropriate variant COFF binary
format for ARC apps from GNU tools will get my enthusiastic support!
I'd like to be able to boot Linux directly from AlphaBIOS without the
need for MILO.
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