swift 11/08/15 19:58:08
Modified: gentoo-alpha-faq.xml
Log:
Bug #379317 - Updated Gentoo Alpha FAQ thanks to Matt Turner (mattst88) and armin76
Revision Changes Path
1.8 xml/htdocs/doc/en/gentoo-alpha-faq.xml
file : http://sources.gentoo.org/viewvc.cgi/gentoo/xml/htdocs/doc/en/gentoo-alpha-faq.xml?rev=1.8&view=markup
plain: http://sources.gentoo.org/viewvc.cgi/gentoo/xml/htdocs/doc/en/gentoo-alpha-faq.xml?rev=1.8&content-type=text/plain
diff : http://sources.gentoo.org/viewvc.cgi/gentoo/xml/htdocs/doc/en/gentoo-alpha-faq.xml?r1=1.7&r2=1.8
Index: gentoo-alpha-faq.xml
===================================================================
RCS file: /var/cvsroot/gentoo/xml/htdocs/doc/en/gentoo-alpha-faq.xml,v
retrieving revision 1.7
retrieving revision 1.8
diff -u -r1.7 -r1.8
--- gentoo-alpha-faq.xml 20 Jan 2008 12:25:01 -0000 1.7
+++ gentoo-alpha-faq.xml 15 Aug 2011 19:58:07 -0000 1.8
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
-<!-- $Header: /var/cvsroot/gentoo/xml/htdocs/doc/en/gentoo-alpha-faq.xml,v 1.7 2008/01/20 12:25:01 yoswink Exp $ -->
+<!-- $Header: /var/cvsroot/gentoo/xml/htdocs/doc/en/gentoo-alpha-faq.xml,v 1.8 2011/08/15 19:58:07 swift Exp $ -->
<!DOCTYPE guide SYSTEM "/dtd/guide.dtd">
<guide link="/doc/en/gentoo-alpha-faq.xml">
@@ -14,6 +14,9 @@
<author title="Editor">
<mail link="nightmorph"/>
</author>
+<author title="Author">
+ <mail link="mattst88">Matt Turner</mail>
+</author>
<abstract>
This FAQ is intended to answer some of the most frequently asked questions
@@ -24,8 +27,8 @@
<!-- See http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5 -->
<license/>
-<version>1.5</version>
-<date>2008-01-20</date>
+<version>2</version>
+<date>2011-08-15</date>
<faqindex>
<title>About this Document</title>
@@ -59,20 +62,6 @@
</body>
</section>
-<section id="status">
-<title>What is the current status of the Gentoo/Alpha Project?</title>
-<body>
-
-<p>
-You can find out about the current status of the Gentoo/Alpha project via
-status reports. These reports inform the public about what we've been up to.
-New status reports will be posted about once every 6 months. Current and past
-status report can be found on the <uri
-link="/proj/en/base/alpha/status/index.xml">Status Reports Project page</uri>.
-</p>
-
-</body>
-</section>
</chapter>
<chapter>
@@ -82,10 +71,10 @@
<body>
<p>
-Not quite! HP stopped taking orders for new Alpha systems on April 27, 2007.
-They will take orders for Alpha options and upgrades until April 25, 2008. See
-their <uri link="http://h18002.www1.hp.com/alphaserver/evolution.html">planning
-page</uri> for more details.
+Kind of, yes. HP stopped taking orders for new Alpha systems on April 27, 2007.
+and for Alpha options and upgrades on April 25, 2008. See their <uri
+link="http://h18002.www1.hp.com/alphaserver/evolution.html">planning page</uri>
+for more details.
</p>
</body>
@@ -107,8 +96,8 @@
<body>
<p>
-All Alpha systems support both little and big endian. However, Linux only uses
-little endian.
+Alpha systems are little endian. A large Cray system using Alphas was big
+endian, but Linux will never support it.
</p>
</body>
@@ -118,12 +107,12 @@
<body>
<p>
-No, not without a full x86 system emulator like <uri
-link="http://bochs.sourceforge.net/">bochs</uri>. In the past DEC/Compaq/HP
+No, not without a x86 emulator like <uri
+link="http://wiki.qemu.org/Main_Page">qemu</uri>. In the past DEC/Compaq/HP
maintained a program called <c>em86</c> which allowed Linux/x86 applications to
be run on Linux/Alpha systems. However, the program is closed source and no
longer maintained upstream. There are no <c>em86</c> binaries available that
-are compatible with gcc3's ABI.
+are compatible with gcc-3's ABI.
</p>
</body>
@@ -156,12 +145,10 @@
<body>
<p>
-Alpha hardware generally isn't available at your local computer store. If you
-want a new Alpha you're going to have to contact <uri
-link="http://h18002.www1.hp.com/alphaserver/">HP</uri>. If you want a used
-Alpha (more economical), <uri link="http://ebay.com">eBay</uri> is usually a
+Alpha hardware generally isn't available at your local computer store.
+<uri link="http://ebay.com">eBay</uri> is usually a
good option, assuming that the shipping doesn't cost you too much. There are
-several used equipment dealers that can be found via google, however most of
+several used equipment dealers that can be found via Google, however most of
them charge too much.
</p>
@@ -291,7 +278,7 @@
<c>-msmall-data</c>. This will cause <c>gcc</c> to take advantage of some
features of the Alpha architecture by storing heavily used pieces of data in
specific sections called the small memory sections. The sections are limited to
-64kb which means accessing anything stored in them will only take one
+64KiB which means accessing anything stored in them will only take one
instruction.
</p>
@@ -303,7 +290,7 @@
<p>
This flag should probably not be used in your global <c>CFLAGS</c> as some
-objects require more than 64kb to be stored, and this will cause a gp_overflow
+objects require more than 64KiB to be stored, and this will cause a gp_overflow
ld error.
</p>
@@ -395,13 +382,13 @@
supports both SRM and ARCs (ARC, AlphaBIOS, ARCSBIOS), then you should follow
<uri link="http://www.alphalinux.org/faq/x31.html">the SRM Firmware Howto</uri>
for switching to SRM and use aboot. If your system can only use ARCs (Ruffian,
-nautilus, xl, etc.) then you will need to choose milo.
+xl, etc.) then you will need to choose milo.
</p>
</body>
</section>
<section id="abootfs">
-<title>Can aboot boot kernels from xfs, reiserfs, or jfs partitions?</title>
+<title>Can aboot boot kernels from EXT4, XFS, ReiserFS, or JFS partitions?</title>
<body>
<p>
@@ -412,9 +399,11 @@
</p>
<p>
-Support for reiserfs and xfs is planned. In fact, there are patches floating
-around that add support for those two file systems. However, the use of those
-patches is unsupported.
+Support for ext4 is planned. In fact, there are patches floating
+around that add support for <uri
+link="https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=106855">ReiserFS</uri>, <uri
+link="https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=107103">XFS</uri>, and <uri
+link="http://alphalinux.org/wiki/index.php/Aboot_EXT4_support">ext4</uri>.
</p>
</body>
@@ -428,10 +417,9 @@
<body>
<p>
-There was only one option for Java VM and Java SDK on Gentoo/Alpha. The
-packages were called <c>compaq-jre</c> and <c>compaq-jdk</c>. Sadly, Compaq/HP
-stopped all support and the packages were removed from Gentoo on October 11,
-2006.
+Compaq/HP offered binary packages, called <c>compaq-jre</c> and <c>compaq-jdk</c>.
+They stopped all support, and the packages were removed from Gentoo on October
+11, 2006. Since then, we haven't supported Java.
</p>
</body>
@@ -442,9 +430,9 @@
<body>
<p>
-We really hope so. We are following the development of the jdk from <uri
-link="http://sablevm.org">SableVM</uri>. It isn't ready yet, but we hope with
-time that it will be a full drop in replacement jdk.
+It's possible to use <c>icedtea</c> on Alpha, but we have no plans to
+support it, due to the high maintenance costs involved with testing hundreds of
+additional packages.
</p>
</body>
@@ -466,7 +454,7 @@
<body>
<p>
-Bringing .NET to alpha isn't a simple task. It requires coding all of the
+Bringing .NET to Alpha isn't a simple task. It requires coding all of the
assembly language code generation macros for the JIT (just in time) compiler
and coding architecture specific functions (register allocators, etc).
</p>
@@ -502,7 +490,7 @@
</p>
<p>
-Gentoo/Alpha will review all bug reports about non working 2.6 systems and
+Gentoo/Alpha will review all bug reports about non-working 2.6 systems and
will try to help as much as we can.
</p>
@@ -515,7 +503,7 @@
<p>
Short answer is no. They were supported some time ago, but we lost the hardware
-and the maintainer so right now they are not supported. If you are interested
+and the maintainer so now they are not supported. If you are interested
and want to continue the initial work, please let us know.
</p>
@@ -526,12 +514,8 @@
<body>
<p>
-There were some times in the past when it was broken. However, <c>2.6.15.1</c>
-and <c>2.6.16.19</c> are both known to work well. If you find that SMP is
-broken and want SMP support you will need revert to the one of the versions
-mentioned above or use a 2.4 kernel. If you really need to run the latest 2.6
-kernel on an SMP box and you don't care that only one of your processors is
-getting used, then you could configure the 2.6 kernel without SMP support.
+There were some times in the past when it was broken. However, modern kernel
+versions are known to work well.
</p>
</body>
@@ -593,7 +577,7 @@
<chapter>
<title>Troubleshooting</title>
<section id="tshoot-xorg">
-<title>Why is my Xorg locking up my Alpha?</title>
+<title>Why is Xorg locking up my Alpha?</title>
<body>
<p>
@@ -647,8 +631,8 @@
<body>
<p>
-<uri link="http://alphalinux.org/">AlphaLinux.org</uri> is a central repository
-for all things Alpha/Linux.
+<uri link="http://alphalinux.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page">AlphaLinux.org</uri>
+is a central repository for all things Alpha/Linux.
</p>
</body>
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