Subject: Linux-Misc Digest #196
From: Digestifier <Linux-Misc-Request@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU>
To: Linux-Misc@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU
Reply-To: Linux-Misc@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU
Date:     Wed, 1 Jun 94 00:13:07 EDT

Linux-Misc Digest #196, Volume #2                 Wed, 1 Jun 94 00:13:07 EDT

Contents:
  adaptec 1522 jumpers (Jeff Hecker)
  ANNOUNCEMENT: Two Yggdrasil E-Mail Lists (Adam J. Richter)
  Adaptec 1510 (AHA 1510) SCSI controller (Saul J. Rosenberg)
  set text mode at bootup.  ANSWER (zachary brown)
  Re: 4 MB too little for linux (Beeblebrox)
  Re: who wants POV for Linux ??? (David A. Vohwinkel)
  Re: Computerworld says "Expose, Schmexpose" (Ken Sorensen)
  Re: Linux for the masses? (WordProcessing again) (Byron A Jeff)
  Re: retire Linux drive (Burton Bicksler)
  Re: Norton utilities trash lilo (na8520d00-Nichols)
  Linux counter: There are 6459 registered Linux users (Harald.T.Alvestrand@uninett.no)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: heckerj@mary.iia.org (Jeff Hecker)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
Subject: adaptec 1522 jumpers
Date: 31 May 1994 12:51:14 -0400

I've recently acquired an adaptec 1522 SCSI controller, sans 
documentation.  I plugged it in, and no smoke came out :)  When
booting,  LILO came up and Linux loaded,  but then crashed with
a "couldn't mount root" error message.   A similar problem
occurs when booting MS-DOS.  I expect that one of the many
jumpers is mis-configured.  I have a call in to adaptec,  but
would not mind if someone on the net has any clues...

                                     Thanks in advance / Jeff

------------------------------

From: adam@adam.yggdrasil.com (Adam J. Richter)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
Subject: ANNOUNCEMENT: Two Yggdrasil E-Mail Lists
Date: 31 May 1994 15:02:37 GMT

        Announcing two new mailing lists on yggdrasil.com:


        yggdrasil-announce              Yggdrasil announcements
        yggdrasil-users                 A virtual users' group


        yggdrasil-users@yggdrasil.com is a virtual Yggdrasil users'
group.  To join, send an email message to majordomo@yggdrasil.com with
"subscribe yggdrasil-users" in the body of the message (not in the
subject line).  This mailing list is a forum for people who want to
set up Linux user group meetings, exchange tips, and talk about what
interesting things they're doing with Linux.  This mailing list is not
a support line to Yggdrasil.  In the future we may add more mailing
lists for specific topics.

        yggdrasil-announce@yggdrasil.com is for Yggdrasil
announcements only.  Subscribe to this list if you want to get
announcements from us rather than daily email discussions.  To join,
send an email message to majordomo@yggdrasil.com with "subscribe
yggdrasil-users" in the body of the message (not in the subject line).

-- 
Adam J. Richter                     -      --------------   "Free software for
adam@yggdrasil.com                    \  /                   the rest of us."
4880 Stevens Creek Blvd., Suite 205    || g g d r a s i l    408-261-6630
San Jose, CA 95129-1034                ||  Computing Inc.    fax 408-261-6631

------------------------------

From: rosenberg@eisner.decus.org (Saul J. Rosenberg)
Subject: Adaptec 1510 (AHA 1510) SCSI controller
Date: 31 May 94 16:47:21 -0400


Original Problem description:
    Unable to boot Linux 1.0 from NEC 3Xi triple speed CDROM

Revised problem statement:
    Unable to boot Linux 1.0 from Adaptec AHA 1510
    
In my prior email, I had indicated that I could not boot Linux 1.1
(Yggdrasil Summer 1994) from an NEC 3xi CDROM on a system with an
integrated SCSI controller on the motherboard (Adaptec 1510)
 
To identify whether the NEC CDROM or the SCSI controller was the
problem, I purchased a low cost Future Domain TMC-1670 controller,
and shifted the NEC CDROM to that.

Good news: we can now boot Linux from the CDROM.  Therefore, the
NEC CDROM was probably not the problem.

However, the error messages still remain whenever the SCSI disk is
accessed.  Specifically, the error lines with...
    aha152x: P_CMD: 1(0) bytes left in FIFO, resetting

Therefore, my conclusion is that it is the AHA 1510 that is
incompatible with the Linux software.

***Caution: do not repeat this experiment...
Because Linux is important to us, and since I had a relatively new
system with (most) things backed up, I decided to ignore the error
messages, hope they were warnings only, and try the first step of
installing Linux, namely running Linux's FDISK.

This was a mistake.

Two errors were printed.  Linux FDISK complained that the number of
cylinders was 1033, and that some software might not run correctly
if the number of cylinders exceeds 1024.  (This error may be
independent of the controller)

Linux FDISK appeared to run OK (of course generating more disk I/O
error messages).  However, the disk was still not usable.  Worse,
whatever was done to the partition table meant that DOS FDISK now
prints an error message ("error in fixed disk") and immediately aborts.

IOW, I now had a disk with a logical partition that was useless under
Linux, and not able to be deleted or modified or Formatted by DOS.
Also, the active partition was switched away from DOS, and I had
difficulty in trying to switch it back so DOS would boot as before.

After trying to recover from this situation, I did the ultimate
reset: namely reformatted the whole disk, then reloaded the partition
tables via DOS, and reloaded my software.  Painful :-(
Wasted 1-2 days.

20/20 hindsight: It is possible the Norton utilities "rescue" disk or
other software which saves / reloads the partition table might have
helped in this situation.

Bottom line thoughts:

Do not install Linux on a system with an AHA 1510 SCSI controller
until this controller is supported.

Disks with more than 1024 cylinders may be a problem, or the extra
cylinders may not be able to be used by Linux.

NEC CDROM 3xi (CDR-500) is probably OK


Boot options used (see pg 58 of manual)
    linux aha152x=0x340,11,7,1

Environment
    Linux from Yggdrasil, Summer 1994, version 1.1, received 5/94
 
    486/66, AMI motherboards, 16 MB memory
 
    single-device internal SCSI cable:
    1) Adaptec SCSI controller, integrated on the motherboard, which
       identifies itself as AHA 1510/AIC 6360, IO Port 340H, IRQ 11
       terminated
    2) SCSI disk, Fuji 1 GB, terminated

    single-device internal SCSI cable:
    1) Future Domain TMC 1670 SCSI controller board (IRQ 10)
    2) NEC CDROM 3xi, terminated
 
Notes:
    The backpage of the Yggdrasil booklet does not list the NEC drive.
    The Adaptec 1510 SCSI controller is listed as experimental,
    which means it may or may not work.
 
Any help would be appreciated....
Thanx
Saul Rosenberg

------------------------------

From: zbrown@lynx.dac.neu.edu (zachary brown)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
Subject: set text mode at bootup.  ANSWER
Date: 31 May 1994 19:28:19 -0400

There have been several postings asking about this, but no responses. In
response to my own posting, I received (aside from someone telling me it
couldn't be done) the following email (unfortunately I don't have the
message, so I can't give credit): To get a 50 line screen at bootup:

In lilo.conf, in the Lilo global section there is a line

vga = normal     #force sane state

just change the "normal" to "extended", run lilo, and reboot.
========================
OR (I haven't tested this one, but the first works on my system (386/25
8M ram SLACKWARE, kernel 1.0.8)) at the shell, type

rdev -v vmlinuz -2

and reboot.

------------------------------

From: mashton@dcs.warwick.ac.uk (Beeblebrox)
Subject: Re: 4 MB too little for linux
Date: Tue, 31 May 1994 23:47:20 GMT

>I have also found that my rxvt does not exit properly when shutting down 
>the server and keeps eating lots of CPU.

That can happen particularly if the server gets a signal, rather than falls
off the end of the .xinitrc.
___
mashton@dcs.warwick.ac.uk                 M.S.Ashton@csv.warwick.ac.uk
C++ consultant and emacs support.         Mail me if you have any problems.

------------------------------

Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
From: vohwi-d@acsu.buffalo.edu (David A. Vohwinkel)
Subject: Re: who wants POV for Linux ???
Date: Wed, 1 Jun 1994 00:28:39 GMT

In article <alexr.0sqc@willow.login.qc.ca>,
Alexandre Rousseau <alexr@willow.login.qc.ca> wrote:
>In article <2rvnl9INNjed@CS.UTK.EDU> peek@duncan.cs.utk.edu (Michael Peek) writes:
>> : >How many readers would be interested in an officially-compiled and
>> : >supported version of POVRAY, with X-Windows support, for LINUX ???
>> 
>> : Yes, I'm interested in POVRAY for Linux.
>> : Patrick Reijnen
>> 
>> I'm voting yes too.
>> Mike Peek - peek@math.utk.edu
>> 
>Me too !
>-- 
>

Me too !!

        Dave


-- 
  David A Vohwinkel        
Unix Consulting   ^ ^     vohwi-d@acsu.buffalo.edu
  & Operations    0 0    @ The State University of New York at Buffalo   
==============oOO=(_)=OOo====================================================

------------------------------

From: ksore@atr-14 (Ken Sorensen)
Subject: Re: Computerworld says "Expose, Schmexpose"
Date: 26 May 1994 14:48:01 GMT

STEVEN L BLAKE (slblake@eos.ncsu.edu) wrote:
: The following is from the May 23, 1994 issue of Computerworld, Inside Lines
: column, pg. 174, reprinted without permission:

:     Expose, Schmexpose...

:     Novell senior vice president Michael DeFazio confirmed last week
:     that the vendor has no product plans for the so-called Expose, a
:     strange UnixWare/DOS 7 hybrid with a three-dimensional graphical
              ^^^^^^^^
So does this mean that PC-Week is wrong (i.e. by claiming that
Linux was the test platform for Expose) or is this article wrong,
or both??? 

:     interface that Novell was reportedly going to announce in July
:     for a mere $99.  Novell did demonstrate such technology at the
:     Brainshare developer's conference in March along with other in-
:     teresting, but experimental, technologies.  But as Burton Group's
:     Jodie Mardesich pointed out: What's the point of merging two un-
:     successful desktop operating systems?

Well given the above discrepancy, I'm not sure if I agree about the
term unsuccessful yet.

--
Kenneth Sorensen                    |  ksore@sed.hac.com
====================================+==================================
Hughes Aircraft Company             |  Phone: (714) 732-9816
P.O. Box 3310                       |  Fax:   (714) 732-1953
Fullerton, California, US           +----------------------------------
92634-3310, Mail Station: 618/B223  |  #include <std-disclaimer.h>

------------------------------

From: byron@cc.gatech.edu (Byron A Jeff)
Subject: Re: Linux for the masses? (WordProcessing again)
Date: 31 May 1994 22:03:13 -0400

In article <1994May31.145704.7174@taylor.wyvern.com>,
Mark A. Davis <mark@taylor.wyvern.com> wrote:
>sta@whale.micro.umn.edu (Shawn T. Amundson) writes:
>
>>Byron A Jeff (byron@cc.gatech.edu) wrote:
>>: In article <2scudj$2e8c@ns2.cc.lehigh.edu>,
>>: DAVID L. JOHNSON <dlj0@ns2.CC.Lehigh.EDU> wrote:
>Personally, I still think the best wordprocessor is one which has 
>text, text/graphics preview, AND GUI versions (like WordPerfect for Unix).
>This way, the user can support all display devices:  dumb and smart 
>ASCII terminals, graphics preview terminals, console, and X/Xterminals.  
>It would also allow the user to decide how much resources can or would be
>devoted to it (X/GUI does use quite a bit of memory and CPU).

Thanks Mark. However it's going to be a tough grind trying to build all
those interfaces. My thinking is to start with a simple one (text) and
then move on to more complicated ones.

I've heard good things about WP for Unix. Are there any major incompatibilities
using the ISBC2 (sp) emulation.

The only slight drawback is cost. I do realize (from reading your writing)
that WP for Unix in compteitively priced with WP for DOS and WP for Windows.
But frankly one of Linux selling points ;-) is that it has a bunch of free
tools. And since the WordProcessor is the flagship app for many many users
it would be a letdown to have to say "There is a killer WP for Linux, but
it's WordPerfect and it'll cost you $100. (or whatever the going cost is)"
The quick reply will be "Well for that I can just run it on DOS/Windows."

Trying to build a free WordPerfect for Unix is an extremely tough task.
But we have to start somewhere.

Later,

BAJ
-- 
---
Another random extraction from the mental bit stream of...
Byron A. Jeff - PhD student operating in parallel - And Using Linux!
Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332   Internet: byron@cc.gatech.edu

------------------------------

From: bbick@netcom.com (Burton Bicksler)
Subject: Re: retire Linux drive
Date: Wed, 1 Jun 1994 00:40:44 GMT

Try the Undocumented, of course, /MBR switch with the DOS fdisk command.  
This should rewrite the Master boot record, where LILO lives, on your 
hard drive.  

I think that should do it.

Burt


Donald VuKovic (dvukovic@csn.org) wrote:

: I purchased a new larger IDE drive for my Linux system. The old drive I
: wish to sell. I've deleted the partition with my Linux ( SLS ) disk and
: setup a partition with my DOS fdisk program. Now whenever I try to boot,
: LILO is still there and crashes because of no Linux on the disk.

: How do I get rid of LILO from my boot track. ( I've tried sys.com but,
: LILO's still there??? )

: Any help would be wonderful!!!
: thanks in advance

: donaldV

-- 
                                             bbick@netcom.com

------------------------------

From: rnichols@ih4ehw.ih.att.com (na8520d00-Nichols)
Subject: Re: Norton utilities trash lilo
Reply-To: rnichols@ihlpm.ih.att.com
Date: Tue, 31 May 1994 18:42:35 GMT

In article <2sf3s1$hf9@ccu2.auckland.ac.nz>,
Luke Wilson <luke@ccu1.auckland.ac.nz> wrote:
>paai@kub.nl (J.J. Paijmans) writes:
>
>>I have had a nasty experience with the Norton Utilities, both older
>>versions and the new one. When I start the diskchecker, Norton checks
>>among others the bootsector, detects lilo and reports something
>>amiss with that sector. So far so good.
>
>>After that it asks whether it should correct the problem (Yes, No, Cancel).
>>*BUT* regardless what I answer now it proceeds and thrashes lilo so
>>I have to dig out my boot diskettes for Linux and reinstall lilo
>>correctly.
>>-- 
>>Copyright Hans Paijmans 1994. Niets hierboven mag geheel of
>>gedeeltelijk worden geciteerd buiten de nieuwsgroep(en) waar het
>>oorspronkelijk is geplaatst.  Nothing of the above may be cited
>>outside the newsgroups in which the message originally was posted.
>
>I'm using Norton Utilities v7, and it checks my disk every time I boot
>dos. I've never had it trash Linux.

Perhaps you don't have the partition marked "Linux Native" in the
partition table.  NU should ignore a non-DOS partition, but NU's Disk
Doctor got very upset when I identified my Linux partition as "BIGDOS"
(just as an experiment).  Use the Linux fdisk program to set the
partition type properly.

--
Bob Nichols
AT&T Bell Laboratories
rnichols@ihlpm.ih.att.com

------------------------------

From: Harald.T.Alvestrand@uninett.no
Subject: Linux counter: There are 6459 registered Linux users
Date: 1 Jun 1994 03:00:05 +0200

This is the monthly report from the Linux Usage Counter.
It is posted on the 1st of every month on the newsgroup
comp.os.linux.misc

An uptodate version is always available by anonymous FTP from
ftp://aun.uninett.no/pub/misc/linux-counter, together with other
reports based on the same material.

To enter your registration into the statistics, send an E-mail to
linux-counter@uninett.no, with the SUBJECT line being one of

  I use Linux at home
  I use Linux at work
  I use Linux at school

The reply will contain information about how to register more
information about yourself, your machine and your friends, if you
want to.

If you can't do FTP, you can get the reports by sending the counter
an E-mail containing in the BODY one of the lines

//REPORT short
//REPORT persons
//REPORT machines
//HELP

Any questions should be adressed to the maintainer of the counter,
Harald.T.Alvestrand@uninett.no

Good luck!

=================================================================
Status of the Linux counter, as of Wed Jun  1 00:02:50 MET DST 1994

There are 6459 registered Linux users


PLACES WHERE LINUX IS USED
==========================
 Self Other   Sum %Sum  Place
 4861    67  4928  75% home
 1558    40  1598  24% work
  160   510   670  10% school
  454    51   505   7% somewhere
   56     0    56   0% not used
==========================
 5854   661  6515 100% TOTAL

NOTE: Some people use Linux in multiple places, so the total is not
the sum of the columns.

COUNTRIES WHERE LINUX IS USED
=============================
      Country                    Self Other   Sum  MPop Linux/M
===============================================================
 1 is Iceland                      10     0    10     0.3  39.4
 2 fi Finland                     187     0   187     5.0  37.4
 3 no Norway                      119     0   119     4.3  27.7
 4 dk Denmark                      93     1    94     5.1  18.2
 5 nl Netherlands                 254     0   254    14.9  17.0
 6 se Sweden                      132     0   132     8.6  15.3
 7 au Australia                   218     4   222    17.1  12.7
 8 de Germany                     922    11   933    79.1  11.7
 9 at Austria                      88    11    99     7.6  11.6
10 ca Canada                      276    17   293    26.6  10.4
11 us USA                        2371    45  2416   249.6   9.5
12 ch Switzerland                  62     0    62     6.7   9.3
13 si Slovenia                     16     1    17     2.0   8.2
14 ie Ireland                      21     0    21     3.5   6.0
15 gb Great Britain               326     7   333    57.2   5.7
16 lu Luxembourg                    2     0     2     0.4   5.1
17 nz New Zealand                  16     2    18     3.4   4.7
18 be Belgium                      44   506   550     9.9   4.4
19 fr France                      212    14   226    56.2   3.8
20 ee Estonia                       4     4     8     1.6   2.5
21 il Israel                       15     0    15     6.3   2.4
22 hk Hong Kong                    14     0    14     5.9   2.4
23 sg Singapore                     6     0     6     2.7   2.2
24 pt Portugal                     14     2    16    10.3   1.4
25 gr Greece                       13     0    13    10.1   1.3
26 cr Costa Rica                    4     0     4     3.1   1.3
27 hr Croatia                       6     0     6     4.8   1.3
28 hu Hungary                      12     0    12    10.5   1.1
29 it Italy                        64     0    64    57.7   1.1
30 tw Taiwan                       20     0    20    20.3   1.0
31 cl Chile                        13     0    13    13.5   1.0
32 es Spain                        37     0    37    39.5   0.9
33 za South Africa                 28     0    28    30.2   0.9
34 cz Czech Rebublic                9     0     9    10.0   0.9
35 na Namibia                       1     0     1     1.5   0.7
36 jp Japan                        68     0    68   123.3   0.6
37 pl Poland                       14     8    22    38.4   0.4
38 lb Lebanon                       1     0     1     3.6   0.3
39 ro Romania                       6     0     6    23.2   0.3
40 ve Venezuela                     5     0     5    20.1   0.2
41 kr Korea (South)                 8     0     8    43.1   0.2
42 by Belarus                       1     0     1    10.4   0.1
43 ar Argentine                     3     0     3    32.7   0.1
44 co Colombia                      3     0     3    34.3   0.1
45 su Soviet Union (former)        11     3    14   147.4   0.1
46 cs Czechoslovakia (former)       1     0     1    15.7   0.1
47 br Brazil                       10     3    13   158.2   0.1
48 mx Mexico                        5     3     8    81.4   0.1
49 ua Ukraine                       3     0     3    51.9   0.1
50 my Malaysia                      1     0     1    18.0   0.1
51 th Thailand                      2     0     2    57.6   0.0
52 xe Europe (Somewhere in it)     11     0    11   320.0   0.0
53 ph Philippines                   1     0     1    68.5   0.0
54 in India                         5     0     5   844.0   0.0
55 xx Unknown                       7    19    26  5000.0   0.0
56 xw The World (Somewhere in i     3     0     3  5000.0   0.0

------------------------------


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