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From: j@tcd-dresden.de (J Wunsch)
Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.announce,comp.os.386bsd.apps
Subject: pcvt compatible with XFree86 + ftp server
Followup-To: comp.os.386bsd.apps
Date: 21 May 1993 21:16:46 -0700
Organization: Textil Computer Design GmbH, Dresden
Lines: 133
Sender: cgd@agate.berkeley.edu
Approved: 386bsd-announce-request@agate.berkeley.edu
Message-ID: <9305211405.AA08119@bonnie.tcd-dresden.de>
Reply-To: joerg_wunsch@tcd-dresden.de
NNTP-Posting-Host: agate.berkeley.edu
Phone: +49-351-5965 137
Date: May 18 1993
Author: J"org Wunsch <joerg_wunsch@uriah.sax.de>
This is the first interim release of some patches to allow X to run
with a pcvt console driver on 386BSD. The patches require pcvt with
patchlevel 2.10. They have been tested with XFree86 release 1.2
(and with their beta releases so it's expected to be okay when
release 1.3 will be published).
Since those patches aren't fully beta-tested by the whole pcvt beta
team, their status is ``inofficial''. (Though Hellmuth Michaelis is
well-informed about this action and has just tested the X mode.)
Thus i've divided the source archives on the ftp server into the
official release (as posted to alt.sources) and the X upgrade diffs.
The patches mainly introduce the rather primitive X compatibility
stuff of the old pccons driver. This mode lacks a lot of useful
functionality. My intend was to upgrade pcvt so it's compatible
with XFree86, not to get the all-singing-all-dancing solution.
It's useful for those people who like to run X from time to time,
but who're working on plain text mode virtual terminals mostly.
A note on 386BSD console drivers in general:
============================================
The wide variety of console drivers led to some confusion. The authors
of codrv (Holger Veit), syscons (Soeren Schmidt) and pcvt (Hellmuth
Michaelis) constituted a consortium along with other interested people,
to discuss for a common driver specification. The discussion is moder-
ated by Julian Elischer. [If someone has a great need to participate
there, write to console@dialix.oz.au] It is likely to have a standard
some day in the future sufficing all our needs. So guys, keep this
in mind before extensively improving the X support of this driver.
Special notes & features
========================
. Follow the README and README.386BSD instructions of XFree86.
. Since the X patches provide the same X stuff as pccons,
use the pccons X server. (XFree86 1.3 will have only
a single X server for both, pccons and codrv. Wow! You
won't have to worry about the wrong thing.)
. Remember you must have ``option XSERVER,UCONSOLE'' in
your system's config file.
. pcvt with X mode will compile only when PCVT_NULLCHARS
is #defined (in pcvt_hdr.h). Since this wasn't defined
by default, the patches attempt to define it.
. After you've successfully built a new kernel, don't forget
to rename /dev/console into /dev/vga, and update your
/etc/ttys to reflect this. (If you wanna run xdm -- i don't
believe it -- disable the console/vga logins.)
. The X mode of pcvt may be activated ONLY FROM CONSOLE
(/dev/vga). Any attempt to run it from another VT will
actually fail.
. For the sake of simplicity, no VT switching is allowed while
running the X server. Any output to the VT's is discarded,
so don't forget to redirect stdout and stderr from your
startx program when doing the first steps. Actually, the
background buffers for the VT's and font memory are pageable,
so the physical memory requirements are reduced. (But you
won't feel very lucky with only 4 MB of physical mem. 6 MB
seem to be a total minimum [of course, possible only on a
386SX], and you'd need to have a fast and large paging area.
Virtual memory requirements of abt. 15 MB are common even
if you're running only a few processes.)
. pcvt's X mode doesn't support any extraction of the driver's
keyboard mapping. If you happen to have a national keyboard,
build up an xmodmaprc file and include the appropriate
xmodmap command into the xinit script. An example for a ger-
man keyboard can be found after patching as Doc/xmodmap-german.
. The keyboard LED's aren't controlled by the server, so they
might be misleading.
FTP access sites
================
For pcvt, the recent sources and the X patches are available from
irz301.inf.tu-dresden.de [141.76.4.1]
under
pub/unix/386bsd/pcvt
Since the Dresden University site has only a thin wire to outside,
please attempt to mirror those archives somewhere, especially an
US site would be appreciated to reduce oversea's traffic. (Keep
me informed, so i'd update this info here - jw.)
Excerpted from XFree86-1.2 README:
Source patches [for XFree86 --cgd] based on X11R5 PL22, from MIT, are
available via anonymous FTP from:
export.lcs.mit.edu (under /contrib/XFree86)
ftp.physics.su.oz.au (under /XFree86)
ftp.win.tue.nl (under /pub/XFree86)
Refer to the README file under the specified directory for information
on which files you need to get to build your distribution (which will
depend on whether this is a new installation or an upgrade from an
earlier version of XFree86).
Binaries [for XFree86 --cgd] are available via anonymous FTP from:
agate.berkeley.edu - 386BSD binaries
under /pub/386BSD/0.1-ports/XFree86
[Of course, there are lotta sites mirroring agate. - jw]
-------------8<-----------------------------------8>-----------------
--
>>>>>>> J"org Wunsch <<<<<<< : joerg_wunsch@tcd-dresden.de
If anything can go wrong... : [...!uunet]!mcsun!unido!textild!joerg_wunsch
.o .o : alias: joerg@sax.de, joerg_wunsch@uriah.sax.de,
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