Release notes for hal-i386-pc-19991022.tgz

Introduction

This release updates the packages/hal/i386/pc for use with the 'current' source tree; the previous version worked with the v1_2_1 release. Use 'cvs checkout' (see http://sourceware.cygnus.com/ecos/anoncvs.html for instructions for installing the current source tree), then uncompress ftp://sourceware.cygnus.com/pub/ecos/contrib/hal/i386/hal-i386-pc-19991022.tgz on top of it. See ftp://sourceware.cygnus.com/pub/ecos/contrib/hal/i386/i386-pc-0.1.html for tool and OS configuration instructions.

Enhancements and fixes

This release adds one important feature: vectors.S has been rewritten to look more like the MIPS release, special thanks to Nick Garnett for this suggestion (see http://sourceware.cygnus.com/ml/ecos-discuss/1999-10/msg00053.html).

File list

Here are the components in the archive:

packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/pkgconf/mlt_i386_pc_ram.ldi
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/pkgconf/hal_i386_pc.h
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/pkgconf/mlt_i386_pc_floppy.ldi
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/pkgconf/mlt_i386_pc_ram.mlt
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/hal_diag.h
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/var_intr.h
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/plf_intr.h
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/plf_stub.h
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/variant.inc
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/plf_misc.h
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/include/platform.inc
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/ChangeLog
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/src/PKGconf.mak
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/src/hal_diag.c
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/src/hal_startup.c
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/src/var_misc.c
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/src/plf_misc.c
packages/hal/i386/pc/current/src/plf_stub.c
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/include/arch.inc
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/include/i386_stub.h
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/src/i386_stub.c
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/src/hal_intr.c
packages/packages
packages/targets
packages/hal/common/current/src/stubrom/PKGconf.mak
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/include/hal_arch.h
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/include/hal_intr.h
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/src/PKGconf.mak
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/src/hal_misc.c
packages/hal/i386/arch/current/src/vectors.S
packages/hal/mips/arch/current/include/hal_arch.h
packages/pkgconf/makevars

The system currently doesn't save the state of the floating point coprocessor during a task switch;

- GDB stub needs to be completed; compiling just the stub by itself works fine, but some of the processor exceptions aren't handled properly. There currently isn't kernel support for GDB, meaning that the thread support needs to be implemented;

- The var_... and plf_... files are currently stored in the same directory. We need to separate these into the 'pc' and add a 'basicpc' platform for the system-specific stuff. The user would copy the 'basicpc' package and tweek it for their configuration.

- I'm pretty sure that my copy of makevars will break Linux configurations; hopefully someone can help me with a better suggestion for this.