The collected works of josehill - Page 7

SGI added the link from freeware.sgi.com to Nekochan back when IRIX 6.5.30 came out, August 2006. It was discussed here in the forums at the time.

Geoman wrote: okay, I edited my post

I don't think that there was any need to edit your post. It's pretty clear that Oracle's acquisition of Sun has not been a good thing for many Sun customers, and it has been quite a bad thing for Sun hobbyists.

fu wrote: back in the day, i'd search the forum and just link to the kind of discussion recondas + magellan have above, just to keep this thread as a single-post list (to make my (re)search easier).

to stay honest, the longer it grows, the harder is is to be maintained as a single post. so what do you guys think, shall we migrate this to the wiki? or are you happy as it is?

It does seem to be a natural fit for the wiki, and likewise for the similar threads for the Octane and the Fuel.

One idea - move the aggregator contents to the wiki, but keep this thread here as a placeholder, perhaps editing the first post to be a pointer to the wiki page and to have a recommendation to add future content directly to the wiki. For those who don't want to edit the wiki directly, messages could be added to this thread as candidates for wiki inclusion.

PS. If agreed, would it make more sense to maintain as a single, long wiki page, or would it be better to break it into smaller pages within a category, e.g. O2 Hardware Aggregator/SCSI HardDisks, O2 Hardware Aggregator/SCSI PCI Cards, O2 Hardware Aggregator/Fibre Channel Cards, and so on?

fu wrote: to be honest editing the wiki ain't easier than editing a phpbb thread. to me at least). i think it'll look better on the wiki though.

It's true that learning/relearning how to edit wikis can be a bit of a barrier, particularly for "one-time" or casual users. It's not difficult, but it is a little arcane. That's why I think it should be okay to put candidate items for wiki inclusion here on the thread. I'd rather have the information shared somewhere so that it can be incorporated later, rather than not having it shared at all because someone didn't want to sign up for a wiki account and learn a little wiki syntax just to add a one line item.

I'm happy to pitch in with the converting/editing. I'd like to hear a little more feedback about organizing the content (single page vs multiple pages within a wiki category) before spending time on it, though.

It seems that the folks who have been the main editors/owners of the Hardware Aggregators all agree that a migration to the wiki for article content makes sense, while keeping the existing forum threads alive so that people who are not interested in editing the wiki or who are uncertain about whether something belongs in the wiki can make proposals and sort out any issues.

Next comes organization.

A single, long article for each machine, or a collection of multiple, shorter articles in a category? (Note: PymbleSoftware reminded me that smaller articles can be incorporated automatically into longer articles, as in the "Kernel Rebuild" section of the Optimizing_and_tuning_IRIX article. The drawback there is that it would be easy to forget to add new "sub" articles to a master article.)

Since long articles can be a little unwieldy to edit, I suggest creating new sub-categories for each wikified O2/Octane/Fuel Aggregator within the wiki Hardware: SGI Workstations category. Something like:

• Hardware: SGI Workstations: O2 Compatible Hardware
• Hardware: SGI Workstations: Octane Compatible Hardware
• Hardware: SGI Workstations: Fuel Compatible Hardware

Within each of those categories would be individual articles for each class of component or peripheral. For example, in the Hardware: SGI Workstations: O2 Compatible Hardware category, there would be individual articles for each topic in the current O2 Aggregator:

• SCSI HardDisks
• SCSI PCI Cards
• Fibre Channel Cards
• FireWire (IEEE-1394) Cards
• Network Cards
• CD-ROM Drives
• CD-RW Drives
• DVD-ROM Drives
• DVD-R/RW
• DVD-RAM Drives
• DAT/DDS
• 3.5" Floppy Drives
• Removable Drives
• Magneto-Optical (MO) Drives
• Scanners / Printers
• Tablets/Mice/Spaceballs
• PCMCIA Card readers
• Monitors

Probably something like the "O2 Hardware FAQs" section of the current aggregator would best fit as a separate article in the SGI Workstations category.

What do you guys think? (Regan, since you, along with SMJ and a couple of others are the local wiki gurus, please do chime in!)

fu wrote: does anyone know of a wiki-style (pre)viewer (that may be installed on a mac)?

being able to type/edit/preview would rock, as i won't have to worry about braking anything that's already there

I hear you, fu. I think that the absence of a good, gui-mode MediaWiki editor that would allow wiki editing without requiring knowledge of wikicode is something that really limits the potential of Wikipedia and similar wikis. Again, wikicode isn't particularly difficult, but it is arcane enough to chase away a lot of people who might otherwise be willing to contribute to a wiki.

No doubt, of course, that if such a client existed, there would be no shortage of wiki mavens who would bemoan an influx of wiki contributors who couldn't be bothered to learn wikicode, much like the way people who used gui html editors were (sometimes justifiably) derided for not learning to handcraft html.

Of course, if a gui wiki editor were to create wikicode as poorly as some gui tools generate html, it would make it harder for others to edit wiki pages manually, which would be a huge step backwards. No good, broad-based solution in sight.

I think hacks are fine, maybe even encouraged, as long as the hack is documented in the wiki entry or via a link to a forum post or other source of documentation.

fu wrote: the aggregators include non sgi-made, community-contributed pieces of hardware (some require hacks, other are kinda sorta working). O2 Compatible Hardware sounds more formal (and may also include sgi-made hardware?)

we might want to think about that and tag each piece of hardware with some sort of disclaimer (dear user, please don't search for official drivers but take a look @ this hack) or select only the ones that work 100% hack-free

True for almost all SCSI devices, but the situation can get more complicated for other devices, like certain PCI cards. (Apologies in advance if I misunderstood the context.)

PymbleSoftware wrote: I think that works... I think nothing of moving stuff between machines.. The DAT drive on my Origin 300s came with an Origin 200 bracket. I move U160/U320 SCA hard drives between machines without hesitation. And you can include parts of articles inside other articles and go nuts with the linking, if you so choose

Looks great!

magellan wrote: He created a page http://www.nekochan.net/wiki/index.php/DVD-ROM_Drives that list the O2 compatible devices. How do I create the same but for the Fuel?

I suggest calling it DVD-ROM Drives (Fuel Compatible) to make it obvious which platform we are talking about. I'll go ahead and add "(O2 Compatible)" to the O2 pages.

I agree with what you said about SCSI devices, but I still lean towards keeping it separated by platform. I think that the idea is that a device should be on the list only if it is confirmed to work on a particular machine. It reduces the (admittedly, for SCSI, unlikely) possibility of time wasted trying to get an incompatible device working after reading an ambiguous compatibility report.

We could always put a note in the individual articles that SCSI devices that are confirmed to work on one type of system are likely to work on contemporary systems.

In any case, the important thing is to get the content up on the wiki, so if folks don't agree with my suggestion, no problem -- wikify as you see fit!

recondas wrote: As long as we're dealing with SGI hardware of roughly the same era <O2, Octane, O2k, Onyx2, IP35, attributing specific SCSI devices to individual hardware platforms might be a little too fine-grained <SCSI devices such as hard drives, DVDs, CD-ROMs, CDRWs, but *not* PCI SCSI controllers> . I've worked my way through pretty much all of those systems, and can't recall a SCSI device that worked on one but not the others. I might have just been lucky, but if not, it'd save quite a bit of wiki creation time.

If a specific device appears in only one or two of the forum aggregators, it would be simple enough to add a note mentioning "not yet tested on platform X".

PymbleSoftware wrote: Anyone have quantities of production runs?

Now that would be some interesting info!

I tried it with colleagues using Indys (and later, O2s) in the mid/late 90s. By today's standards, it's not that big of a deal at all, but in 1996, it was jaw-droppingly cool, even on unswitched 10Base-T ethernet.

Degrees in life sciences; formerly head of bioinformatics at a global pharmaceuticals firm; also ran a genomics laboratory. I've had a consulting business for the last few years, with practices in data analysis and more generalized management consulting. I'm on the board of a few non-profit and for-profit organizations, too. I really enjoy coaching startups with business plans and business development.

johnsmith wrote: Can it work with Skype or modern conferencing implementations?

Totally different protocols, unfortunately.

You can use SGI's later SGImeeting with Microsoft NetMeeting and, IIRC, Lotus Notes/Sametime, but it needs a license.

Keep in mind that many systems, including IRIX 6.5, only recognize the first eight characters of a password.

Worth a look - http://xkcd.com/radiation/

Nuclear accidents are serious matters, of course, particularly at the point of the accident itself, but nothing I've seen yet suggests that the issues at the plant will compare even remotely to the devastation already inflicted by the earthquake and tsunami, even factoring in long term effects.

No. Generally, it's excreted quickly.

SAQ wrote: Does Cs accumulate biologically the same way?

Lots of options out there.

I don't think anything on the Mac ever really matched the ease-of-use of the old MacDraw. Check out Intaglio for a simple refresh of the oldskool flavor ($89). http://www.purgatorydesign.com/Intaglio/
EazyDraw also fits into the MacDraw skool, though its interface is a bit too candy colored for my taste ($95). http://www.eazydraw.com/

Lately, I've been using LineForm for quick and dirty drawings. It uses some quirky interface conventions, but once I bothered to skim through the documentation, I found it very easy to use. ~$80 at http://www.freeverse.com/mac/product/?id=6020

If you like something that feels a bit more like a CAD program, but is very inexpensive, check out CADintosh, around $30 (fully functional demo, too) from the folks who make GraphicConverter - http://lemkesoft.com/content/189/cadintosh.html

MacDraft is a bit more upscale at ~$300-350, but still worth a look, too. I spent a lot of time with an older version a few years back, and I really liked it. http://www.microspot.com/products/macdraft

PS. I also like ratfink's suggestion regarding the Omni Group's stuff, including OmniGraffle. Omni is a longtime Mac developer, and their tools are reliable and sometimes quite innovative. iPad support, too!

duck wrote: Unsupported CPU?

Correct. I forget which version of IRIX is needed - 6.5.4, perhaps.

I understand, but the Forum rules are at the top of the page, and the one about commercial software is strictly enforced. "Any posts...offering to buy/sell/trade commercial software are subject to removal." The topic has been discussed many times here on Nekochan. The owner provides this site to the community for free, he has no desire to spend his time responding to letters from lawyers, and so the policy is what it is. There are many places to get IRIX, but this isn't one of them.

Nolis wrote: Hey all my disks are original from SGI with release date and serial number on !!! So means that I already paid for it, and I just lost 2 disks of it... just want to get it done.. ! I mean this is just old stuff and not a new distribution, by the way it's just working to SGI.. so I also had to buy a SGI for it right ?

Any chance that this is related to the PMTU issue that used to screw up installations from Linux all the time? See http://software.majix.org/irix/install- ... inux.shtml or http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sys ... 08fb4a6bd3

A great machine to use to get reacquainted with IRIX! Congrats, and welcome!

ajw99uk wrote: First impression is that the organisation of directories is rather different, though that may be just the way the previous owner had set things up (/usr/people for user directories, rather than /home, for example).

/usr/people is the IRIX default, but the location is completely arbitrary. For a list of default directories as found on a "factory installed" version of IRIX, check out http://techpubs.sgi.com/library/tpl/cgi ... 458-PARENT

ajw99uk wrote: I have managed to clone the 2GB drive's contents, but only by creating an xfsdump file, then as a separate command xfsrestore-ing that file onto the larger disk. Joining the commands with | did not work - early attempts produces screens of output but nothing written to the destination disk, as if the pipe was not passing things through properly - and when I have tried it again more recently xfsdump returns an error about the hostname being of zero length (I now want to move from a 9GB disk to 18GB or 73GB).

Sounds a bit odd. You might want to triple check that you are typing the command correctly. I've found that I need to be extremely careful when typing xfsdump commands using pipes; I tend to want to put directories or other options in the wrong place. Weird syntax; very easy to screw it up.

ajw99uk wrote: It came with IRIX 6.5 (no indication of a sub-version number, so perhaps base 6.5 only) plus some freeware.

Type "uname -aR" If that doesn't give a sub-version, than the original was, indeed, 6.5.0.

ajw99uk wrote: Having cloned the disk, I put it away for safe keeping in case I need to go back to square one!

Smart!

ajw99uk wrote: After the updates, booting and shutting down seems to take much longer than it did before. Is this most likely a symptom of later 6.5 versions of core software stretching an R4400 / 256MB a bit further than the base 6.5 versions?

Try "chkconfig esp off" as root (or via su) and then reboot.

ajw99uk wrote: I had been expecting to install Linux or NetBSD (though the lack of X support is a bit off-putting), being aware that proprietary IRIX might make second user hobbyist use difficult. I have however been very impressed with the level of community support - primarily nekochan, but also the SGI techpubs/freeware resources and mapesdhs's technical notes.

You'll always get more performance from this machine using IRIX, which is highly optimized for the hardware, than from using one of the BSDs or Linux. Nothing against trying the latter options, but I think most people end up gravitating back to IRIX on the old hardware.

ajw99uk wrote: 4. Perhaps more RAM, especially if it would speed things up appreciably, though the right 32MB SIMMs do not seem to common at what I would regard as a sensible price for my usage, so that may go by the by.

Unless you are seeing a lot of active swapping (watch the memory bar in "gr_osview -a" for example), 256 MB is probably enough for most things, aside from browsing modern web pages. The cpu itself is not the zippiest, so don't expect web browsing ever to be fast, for example, even with 1 GB of RAM.

Good luck, and, again, welcome aboard!

...but Roboinst requires a license on the installation server, IIRC.

Harry - thanks for the info! I had a license in my previous shop, and I found Roboinst to be very helpful. Nice to know about the other mode!

deBug wrote:

josehill wrote: ...but Roboinst requires a license on the installation server, IIRC.

That is common misconception.
I believed the same by just glancing the documentation but if you read it in detail you will find that a license is only needed for after-installs.
Roboinst has two working "modes"
1 Do a install from PROM
2 Do additional install from IRIX.
Only the second mode requires a license.

So you do not need a license for roboinst as long as you do them from PROM

//Harry

Apple's Worldwide Developer's Conference kicked off toady, so I figure it's time to start a thread about Lion, iCloud, and anything else that came out of it.

A lot of the attention seems to be about how many bits of the iPad/iPhone interface/experience will be available in Lion (see the video at the linked page ), but there are a bunch of features that may be more useful, particularly for the more technically inclined.

Nice to see built-in support for whole disk encryption with an "instant wipe" capability. The new system restore options are also welcome, including a Windows-style restore partition. Speaking of Windows, Lion includes some Windows-like features, like a new "Resume" function (seems like Hibernate on steroids) and the ability to resize windows from any window edge.

In the networking department, Lion adds support for NFSv4 and SMB/DFS. It also looks like Apple is building some of the necessary infrastructure for moving all of OS X to the cloud some day, as witnessed by the ability to use Apple IDs, rather than local accounts, for accessing various network services, including file sharing, etc.

VMS fans might get a kick out of Lion's file versioning schemes, and both UNIX and VMS fans might have a chuckle over the Terminal program's new-found ability to run in full-screen mode, i.e. without menus, for that old school, vt100 experience.

Most significant of all, however, is the aggressive move to the cloud. At the moment, Apple has no plans to offer Lion via DVD -- if you want it, it's a $30, 4 GB upgrade, installable from the App Store. Will people really want that, or will people insist on DVDs? Will this mark the real beginning of moving all of a user's computing experience to the cloud, abandoning the device-centric computing model of the last few generations?

Release the hounds!

That's a whole lot of awesome, recondas!

I really envy you for taking the trip. A few of those photos bring back some terrific memories from years ago for me.

PymbleSoftware wrote: I thought the Grand Canyon was a let down for some reason... maybe I wasn't in the right mood that day.

Perhaps it was the weather or lighting, too. I had to be dragged to the Grand Canyon on my cross country trip. I figured that I had seen it hundreds of times on tv and in photographs, so why should I go out of my way to see a crack in the dirt? I arrived at the canyon just before sunset, and I was totally unprepared for the scale, the depth, and the range of colors. Almost a sensory overload.

Strangely enough, despite all that, I don't have any particular desire to go back. Maybe I'm afraid that the second time wouldn't be like the first, and I want to keep the memories of the first time undiminished.

recondas wrote: From there it'd be hard to pick a bad direction (the mountains in New Mexico are spectacular), but Monument Vally, the Utah Canyon Lands, Zion, and Bryce would be hard to pass up - and if you go that way be sure to get to Arches NP.

I second the recommendations for the Utah parks. You can cover a lot of them in a short amount of time, and the scenery is often spectacular. Just be sure to fill up on gas and food when you can - there are a few places where you might as well be on Mars as far as evidence of civilization (and supplies) goes.

ps. Nice shots, ks!

delta wrote: How much it will be the shipping cost to Athens/Greece ?

You wouldn't happen to be one of those Greek shipping tycoons, would you?

From Apple's Lion press release - "later this August, Lion will be made available on a USB thumb drive through the Apple Store® ( www.apple.com ) for $69 (US)."

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2011/07 ... Store.html

Do you have a flickr stream or something similar where we can see more of your work?