[TUHS] Re: 4.3 BSD version in the Unix Archive

[jmbw@nather.com (Markus Weber)]

Thanks for the help.

So far I managed to uncompress the files with the custom version of compress
on NetBSD/simh. I then created a .tap file according to the reference in
FORMAT.

I'm using the following config file for simh 3.0.1:

load -r ka655.bin
set rq0 ra82
at rq0 ra82.dsk
set tq tk50
at tq0 quasijarus0a-dist.tap
boot cpu

Here's a transcript of the very first attempt of booting off the tape:

$ ./vax 43cfg

VAX simulator V3.0-1


KA655-B V5.3, VMB 2.7
Performing normal system tests.
40..39..38..37..36..35..34..33..32..31..30..29..28..27..26..25..
24..23..22..21..20..19..18..17..16..15..14..13..12..11..10..09..
08..07..06..05..04..03..
Tests completed.
>>>boot mua0:
(BOOT/R5:0 MUA0



  2..
-MUA0
  1..0..

=

Clearly, stand boots. I'm hopeful that 4.3-Quasijarus0a will indeed run on
simh.

For some follow-up questions... Standalone format supports hp and up disks,
but simh only emulates RL and RQ controllers - which means that the Ultrix
utilities to label a cold disk must be ported or recreated to the simh host
platform. Of course, it may well be that applying a hex editor to the disk
image will suffice.

Am I correct that Quasijarus supports RA82 disks (using the ra type) and the
TK50 tape (as a tms)?

Markus

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Sokolov [mailto:msokolov@ivan.Harhan.ORG]
Sent: Friday, September 26, 2003 6:47 AM
To: jmbw at nather.com; tuhs at tuhs.org
Subject: Re: [TUHS] Re: 4.3 BSD version in the Unix Archive


Warren Toomey <wkt at tuhs.org> wrote:

> The 4.3BSD-Quasijarus dists were compressed with a compression format
> that's not compatible with either gzip nor old compress(1). Michael
> Sokolov should be able to send in some notes on the tools required.

Yes, for political reasons I needed to make the 4.3BSD-Quasijarus compressor
a
version of compress, not gzip (can't have any GNU), but I wanted to have the
higher compression ratio of deflation, so I created a new version of
compress
that supports deflation in addition to the original LZW algorith.  You can
find
the new compress in components/compress.tar either on my FTP site or in
Warren's
archive in the 4BSD area.

> > Is there a set of 4.3BSD-Tahoe Vax distribution files that's complete?
>
> Not that I know of.

"4.3BSD-Tahoe Vax distribution" is an oxymoron.  Berkeley released the Tahoe
tape with Tahoe binaries, no VAX binaries.  I was the one who compiled the
Tahoe
source for the VAX, and the result was 4.3BSD-Quasijarus0.

OTOH, you may be referring to the fact that the Tahoe distribution in the
archive is broken.  Yes, it is.  Unfortunately there was an unrecoverable
tape
read error.

> > Finally, do you know of any 4.3BSD version that will install and run on
> > simh? Quasijarus and Tahoe of the Unix Archive are broken for me and
Reno
> > doesn't boot stand. Admittedly, I haven't tried the vanilla version yet.
>
> Not that I know of. I'll cc this to the TUHS list and see if any other
> people know the answer.

This has come up time and again.  SIMH's emulation of VAX is too poor.  VAX
is
not an easy architecture to emulate.

MS


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