Re: Xarm32VIDC from 1.6.1 very unstable

In article <[email protected]> you write:
>First, is still somebody actively maintaining the acorn32 port of NetBSD?

When in breaks for me, I try to fix it.  I occasionally look at PRs and try
to fix them.  

>I installed the 1.6.1 release on a RiscPC/SA110/32 MB RAM and was very
>impressed as it run out-of-the box, all hardware was detected and my
>subjective impression of the performance is very good. Good work!
>
>However the X-server seems very unstable. As long as I use only the VIDC
>console or only console via Xterm NetBSD runs stable like a rock. But
>graphical interaction (resizing windows, opening windows, using a
>webbrowser or a window manager) leads to a core dump of Xarm32VIDC sooner
>or later.

Hmm.  Are you using a wscons-capable kernel?  I use Xarm32VIDC on an NC on a
daily basis, and it's really quite solid (until a run the machine out of
swap, whereupon the X server tends to get killed and restarted).

>- Is 1.6.1 and especially Xarm32VIDC ought to be stable?

I can't actually speak for 1.6.1, since my NC runs 1.6A at the moment (the
standard 1.6 wscons kernels missed out opms, which was fatal to X, and I
haven't got around to looking at 1.6.1.

>- Can netbsd cope with StrongARMs that suffer from the STM ^ bug?

I believe so.  As I understand it, this bug only bites when saving user-mode
registers on entry to the kernel, and NetBSD's kernel entry sequence
carefully avoids triggering the bug.

>- Is there an issue withloading coredumps into gdb? Whenever I tried this,
>  gdb says it does not understand the dump's fileformat.

I'm sure I _have_ managed to load a coredump into gdb once, but I'm not sure
it was anywhere near the 1.6 release.

>- I read about an in-kernel debugger ddb - how can it be activated?

Build a kernel with "options DDB" (I think all the release kernels have it). 
The debugger will be entered on a panic, and you can drop into it using
Ctrl+Alt+Esc (wscons kernels) or some other sequence I currently forget
(non-wscons kernels).

-- 
Ben Harris                                                   <[email protected]>
Portmaster, NetBSD/acorn26           <URL:http://www.NetBSD.org/Ports/acorn26/>