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What would it take to get an updated client for BeOS?
With Haiku (pre-alpha) now demonstrating pretty good binary-compatibility with BeOS R5 - I'd like to ask if we can pursue the option of an updated client for these OSes.
Several members of Team Haiku would love to run their SB clients on their favorite hobby OS ;)
Is there anything we can do to help this process?
Well, honestly, I've never touched BeOS/Haiku/etc. I just attempted to use the Haiku image under Parallels, but it fails miserably. Unless there's an easy way to install the OS so I can tinker, the chances are pretty slim.
The problem is: Haiku is currently pre-alpha and doesn't have any build tools installed by default. The pending Alpha release will have this support soon.
Parallels users have succeeded in running it by using the ImgTool to fix the disk size (not sure why this is - apparently Parallels can't use the raw disk image as it is). VMWare is actually much easier to use and demonstrates excellent performance for Haiku.
BeOS R5 is completely installable and has development tools - but lacks a lot of modern drivers (BeOS Max Edition V4 b1 is the best choice)
Zeta supports a lot of modern hardware, but is commercial and now defunct (like BeOS was).
Many dedicated Haiku testers have been able to load the BeOS R5 development tools onto their Haiku installs and compile working software - but software compiled *ON* BeOS is upward binary compatible with both Haiku and Zeta - so this is where I would focus efforts in order to support all 3 OSes with a single binary release.
Another interesting detail is that BeOS and Zeta use an "updated" GCC 2.95.3 still because GCC3 and newer have broken ABI compatibility with C++ binaries generated with GCC2. Haiku can be also compiled with GCC4, but a GCC4 binary for Haiku will not currently run on a GCC2 version of Haiku which is required to retain binary compatibility with BeOS R5 and Zeta.
If it would help, I can probably get you a BeOS R5 vmware or QEMU image complete with build tools. I can probably also do the same with Haiku.
The latest builds seem to not work with Parallels anymore. I've tried all the posted tricks..Quote:
Originally Posted by umccullough
Anyways, if you could get a BeOS R5 vmware that'd probably make life easier.
I appreciate your willingness to consider an updated BeOS/Zeta/Haiku port. This is a much more positive response than I've gotten in the past! :)
I will do what I can to prepare a BeOS R5 (personal edition for legal reasons) VMWare image complete with build tools, etc. and get it to you soon.
Shall I PM you when I have something?
BTW, I will be building and testing this image using VMWare Server 1.x (as this is what I run at home at the moment). It should be compatible with VMWare Server 2.x, VMWare Player 1.x/2.x, VMWare Workstation 5.x and hopefully VMWare Fusion as well (if you're using OS X and have a beta or whatever).
Yeah, PM me when you do.
Alien88,
Just checking to see if you had a chance to mess with building a newer client on BeOS or Haiku yet.
No pressure, I realize it's probably not very high on the priority list ;)
Let me know if there's anything I can help with.
- Urias McCullough
Team Haiku
I got the new Beta client to compile but linking was a problem:
BeOS has NO pthreads!
This is not an optional library for future SB clients. Someone would need to port the threading code to Be Threads. :/
So for now, no new client.
BeOS R5 had a funky hacky pthreads "emulation" library that can be installed:Quote:
Originally Posted by jjjjL
I believe you can get an ancient version of it from here: http://bebits.com/app/3322
I think Zeta has an even more up-to-date pthreads implementation.
Not likely that BeOS will be getting anything newer. As you mentioned, it does have an alternative native bthreads implementation which can be used - but of course someone would have to write the implementation for that to support this. A common issue when porting software to BeOS.
However, Haiku does have better POSIX support than BeOS ever did - including an updated and more-completed pthreads implementation built-in:
http://svn.berlios.de/viewcvs/haiku/....h?view=markup
If there's anything missing that will be required - let me know and I will put a Trac ticket in to see if anyone is willing to add it.
On the other hand, Haiku doesn't yet have a native toolchain - but that is coming soon I hope. I will let you know when it's available. There is a way to use the BeOS R5 toolchain to compile Haiku software, but usually this also ends up using the BeOS R5 headers. Perhaps adding the necessary public headers from Haiku would work, I don't know.
Thanks!
And now it does :)Quote:
Originally Posted by umccullough
It's possible to build a Haiku image with a full native toolchain installed now. I can provide one of these (VMWare I guess would be easiest) if you would like to attempt to build the new sb client on Haiku.
Just let me know what the dependencies are - any GNU packages that are required to build, etc, and I will make an attempt to get them all compiled and loaded onto the image before I provide it.
Also, have you had a chance to review the pthreads header to see if it has everything necessary for a pthreads-compiled Haiku client?
Thanks,
Urias
I hate to be a pest... but is there any chance this could get another look?
I can provide a recent Haiku VMWare image complete with dev tools and a GUI programming editor (Pe).
Haiku's pthread implementation is pretty rich, so I doubt that would be a problem (although, my question about which APIs are required has gone unanswered).
See the current Haiku pthread API here if you're curious:
http://dev.haiku-os.org/browser/haik...osix/pthread.h
Anyhow, I've got at least two machines here running Haiku that could be running SoB as well if there was an updated client :) A P4 2.8ghz and a C2D E6850...
Well now those machines are running dnetc as there's a native Haiku port of it now (it was pretty easy to port, even some of the beos-specific code was unnecessary now due to Haiku's higher posix-compliance)...Quote:
Originally Posted by umccullough
Since we have that under our belt, would someone be willing to look at a Haiku port again?
Would someone trust me to port it and send back the patches?
- Urias