Linux 2.1 on an Alpha SX164

David Woodhouse (Dave@imladris.demon.co.uk)
Wed, 04 Feb 1998 22:33:22 +0000

Following my recent question about whether it's possible to run 2.1 series
kernels on an SX164, the answer is now yes. I've ported the parts of
"alpha-patches-2.0.32-0.1" which are relevant to SX164 support. The patch is
available at ftp://dwmw2.robinson.cam.ac.uk/pub/kernel/alpha-SX164-2.1.85.gz

Could some people with other types of Alpha machine please apply this and
check I haven't screwed something else up, please?

Also, I have some questions...

Q1: What's the official status of the Alpha port? 2.0.x seems unusable without
the patches from ftp.digital.com, and 2.1.x doesn't have half of those patches
in either. Who maintains them, and why are they not ported to, and included in,
2.1.x? 2.1.84 didn't look like it compiled on _any_ Alpha platform, because of
references to local_bh_count

Q2: What's the point of binfmt_em86 when you still need the extra patches for
31-bit addressing? Are these not included because of GPL problems?

BTW, The em86 patch from ftp.digital.com didn't apply cleanly to 2.1.85;
there's a working copy at
ftp://dwmw2.robinson.cam.ac.uk/pub/kernel/alpha-linux-2.1.85-em86-diffs

Happy Hacking.

---- ---- ----
David Woodhouse, Robinson College, CB3 9AN, England. (+44) 0976 658355
Dave@imladris.demon.co.uk http://dwmw2.robinson.cam.ac.uk
finger pgp@dwmw2.robinson.cam.ac.uk for PGP key.