Re: adapting Bochs to a different CPU architecture

I haven't had a chance to examine the source code in depth yet

to assess the difficulty of adding a new CPU. I suppose the first step is to simply

rename cpu directory to cpu-x86 or x86. Then, find all code in other directories

that is tied to the x86 architecture in some way. For instance, it may be

that on an x86 system a device is accessed via IN/OUT instructions but on an ARM

or MIPS it would be memory mapped, so some change will be needed to

accommodate the two means of addressing such a device.

Sent: Monday, April 03, 2017 at 10:36 PM

From: Stanislav <[email protected]>

To: "'Zz Zz'" <[email protected]>, [email protected]

Subject: RE: [Bochs-developers] adapting Bochs to a different CPU architecture

We would be glad to extend Bochs for support of other architectures like ARM.

And you are right, all that is need to be done is writing the CPU model from scratch and couple of device models from scratch.

Do you want to contribute some ?

Because we don’t have effort to do any of those L

From: Zz Zz [mailto:[email protected]]

Sent: Monday, April 03, 2017 8:37 PM

To: [email protected]

Subject: [Bochs-developers] adapting Bochs to a different CPU architecture

Hi all,

Is there any interest in adapting Bochs to a different CPU architecture that might emulate faster?

On my computer it appears that Bochs is running 32-bit x86 code at a rate of one emulated instruction per 180 native Intel Core i5 cycles. That is unusably slow for many purposes.

While x86 may be needed for some applications e.g. MSDOS, for others such as running GNU/Linux a different CPU architecture is perfectly all right.

It just requires a Linux distro for it may need to be located or ported. But for example, the ARM has Debian and Slackware distros available.

The goal would be to run and isolate GNU/Linux e.g. for ARM in Bochs which is safer but slower than running it in a virtual machine. This is a good idea because security researchers periodically show that "breakout exploits" are possible e.g. during the Pwn2Own contest. Emulation may be safer.

It seems likely that many of the devices supported by Bochs could be useful and that some would not. The goal of running GNU/Linux safely however doesn't require emulating a system that really exists physically; it just requires having a distro that supports the CPU and devices that Bochs would emulate.

Zack

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