Re: html page about L4-Hurd

[Zeno Gantner]

> Sorry about the delay in the reply, I'm quite behind on my email still.
> Last weekend I moved the Hurd website into CVS, so that you (and some
> other people) would be able to have space without me having to create a
> whole bunch of accounts on the GNU web server).  I don't have the
> automatic updating running yet (Soon.  One of these days I'll have to
> find some way to get paid just to hack... <sigh>)
> 
> Is it posted somewhere right now?  I'll try to take a look at it right away.

Here is a draft for the next version of l4-hurd.html.
It's just a snapshot.
I've added the sections why?, problems, how to contribute, download
(empty).
The links are not tested, it'll be ready tomorrow.

OKUJI, what do you think of the small texts in "why?" and "problems"?
Are they
ok?
You won't like the big number of links, but I think this is a must (in
the next
version, I hope this one will be on gnu.org, the links will be on a
separate page).
SaMill, for example, _is_ related to L4-Hurd. It is also an L4-based
system with
multiple servers trying to emulate Unix. They will do a release soon,
and the
way they handle libc will be quite interesting.

Jeff, is the web-hurd CVS already available?
Are there plans to rewrite the other hurd stuff on gnu.org?
There are some guys out there that maintain real good Hurd related link
lists,
what about including these?
Some folk at slashdot complained about the FSF pages not being very up
to date.
At the moment, the Hurd gets more and more publicity, I think it's very
important
to have good web sites!
btw, the Debian/Hurd pages (e.g. the news) are also very old. Is there a
special
maintainer for this site?


cu
        Zeno

PS:
I didn't send this mail to address@hidden 'cause I don't want to send
HTML
attachments there all the time, when the page is ready, I'll drop a
message
containing the URL to l4-hurd.

Porting GNU Hurd to L4

Table of Contents

• Status
• Why porting the Hurd to another microkernel?
• Problems
• Mailing Lists
• Documentation
  • L4
  • Hurd
• Tools
• WWW Links
• Download
• How to contribute

Status

Discussion. Join the list!!
OKUJI Yoshinori has compiled the differences between L4 and Mach on this page.

Why porting the Hurd to another microkernel?

One of the design goals of GNU Hurd was to be platform (architecture, microkernel) independent.
This is NOT the case at the moment.
GNU Mach runs only on IA32 systems. GNU Mach doesn't support SMP.
There are L4 implementations for IA32, ARM, Alpha and MIPS.
L4 is being actively developed.
There are plans to support SMP.
In the future, L4 will run on distributed systems, perhaps the Hurd will benefit from that.
GNU Mach is BIG (more than 100 system calls). L4 is fast and small (7 system calls).
Mach has built-in device drivers, that means a bug in a driver can crash the whole system.
The Hurd hasn't ever been ported to another microkernel.
Porting it for the first time will help to be able to do that in the future.
The first discussions on the mailing list have shown that there it won't be easy to do the
port, one suggestion was to rewrite the Hurd servers from scratch.

Problems

• The Hurd is not that microkernel-independent as claimed in the past, it makes use of many Mach-specific features.
• Mach and L4 are quite different.
• The L4 interface is not fix yet, there will still be changes in the future.
• There are no built-in device drivers. An interface for drivers is needed.

Mailing Lists

• address@hidden: [information] [archive]
• address@hidden: [information] [subscribe] (closed forum)
• address@hidden: [information] [archive]
• address@hidden: [information] [archive]

Documentation

L4

• Manuals
  • L4 Reference Manual ver X.0 (IA32)
  • L4 Reference Manual (IA32) another one
  • L4 User Manual (MIPS)
  • L4 Reference Manual (MIPS)
• FAQ
  • L4KA
  • L4 at TU Dresden
  • Fiasco
• Man Pages (system calls)
  • L4/IA32 and Fiasco
  • L4/MIPS
• Requirements Definition for Fiasco
• L4/Alpha diploma thesis
• Papers at UNSW
• L4KA: Publications

Hurd

• Hurd Reference Manual: [one file] [toc]

Tools

• Farid Haji wrote a patch for using Bochs to boot L4KA, there is a page containing instructions how to use it.

WWW Links

• Microkernels and MK-based Systems
  • L4KA
  • ChacmOS an example OS on top of L4KA "Hazelnut"
  • Fiasco
  • L4 at TU Dresden
  • L4 implementations (overview)
  • Debian GNU/Hurd
  • Linux on L4
  • SawMill
  a multi-server linux on top of L4, there will be a release soon...
  • Mungi another L4-based OS
• Platform specific sites
  • Hurd on Alpha
  • L4KA/IA32
  • L4KA/ARM
  • L4/MIPS
  • L4/Alpha

Download

There is no code yet...

How to contribute

There are no specific tasks yet.
We need people that know both internals of Mach and L4, or who are willing to read
documentation to get that knowledge.
???
If you're good in graphics, you could do some sketches, e.g.
how the Hurd servers, glibc, Mach and the Mach device drivers work together.

---

11/23/2000 feedback
If you have technical questions about Hurd/L4, please post to the mailing list.

---

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