The first working Linux kernel for a PowerPC based machine was made available for anonymous FTP from ftp://liber.stanford.edu/pub/linuxppc last week. The implementation of Linux 1.2 runs on Motorola Inc’s PowerPC VME 1603 machine, but is still in its formative stages, according to Joseph Brothers who is co-ordinating the project. It boots and runs the rc shell single-user, but little else. It has few utilities and almost no drivers so far. It does not have X, he said. The software can be built by cross-compiling with gcc 2.7.0 and binutils 2.5.2 using ELF binary format. The team is expecting a flood of why haven’t you ported it to the Power Macintosh? queries. The answer is, as previously, that there is a dearth of very low-level programing information from Apple Computer Inc. What is needed is full programming specs on the Power Macs’ ADB and NuBus, listing addresses of the various devices, bit patterns of the commands and data to be written and read from those addresses, behaviour of the devices, memory map, and enough info on the interrupt hardware to get by, according to Brothers. He said repeated attempts over the past 15 months have failed to secure the necessary information from Apple, although he hopes that a recent approach may bear fruit. If something doesn’t happen soon, however, the project to implent Linux on NuBus Mac will become a moot point – Common Hardware Reference Platforms machines will be upon us. The next most likely target machines after the Motorola box are Motorola’s Ultra and PowerStack computers and IBM’s PowerPC-based RS/6000s. The current implementation is mainly the effort of Gary Thomas of Mercury Computer Systems Inc. Anyone that wants to help with the implementation can follow developments via the linux-ppc@vger.rutgers.edu mailing list or by anonymous ftp to ftp://liber.stanford.edu/pub/incoming.
