[Qemu-devel] virtualize sparc developer workstation?

[Qemu-devel] virtualize sparc developer workstation?

[dennis luehring]

i want to virtualize (under a linux x86 host) my noisy sparc workstation
with the help of qemu and want to know if its possible to
get an system image to run or what other options available
for sparc virtualization

im developing a low-traffic network communication software
and sparc is one of my test platforms

is the sparc emulation good enough for
(low-traffic) network communication tests?

my current system specs:
-SUN Ultra 10 SPARC Workstation
-384 MB RAM
-Operating System: Solaris 10 November 2006 - SunOS Release 5.10
Generic_118833-33 64-bit
-Desktop: CDE 1.6.3, X11 Version 6.6.2
-Compiler: SunStudio 12 - Sun C/C++ v5.9 2007/05/03 (and gcc v.3.4.6)
-Workstation-Info: SUNW,Ultra-5_10;sparc;sun4u

it would be nice to have the desktop running
but i can compile & test my software fully on command line

questions are:
-can i boot an image of my machine into qemu?
-what bios do i need - OpenBios, OpenBoot, original (how can i get this 
from my machine?)
-use qemu git head or other version?

thx for any help

Re: [Qemu-devel] virtualize sparc developer workstation?

[Markus Armbruster]

Cc'ing the SPARC maintainer.

dennis luehring <dl.soluz@gmx.net> writes:

> i want to virtualize (under a linux x86 host) my noisy sparc workstation
> with the help of qemu and want to know if its possible to
> get an system image to run or what other options available
> for sparc virtualization
>
> im developing a low-traffic network communication software
> and sparc is one of my test platforms
>
> is the sparc emulation good enough for
> (low-traffic) network communication tests?
>
> my current system specs:
> -SUN Ultra 10 SPARC Workstation
> -384 MB RAM
> -Operating System: Solaris 10 November 2006 - SunOS Release 5.10
> Generic_118833-33 64-bit
> -Desktop: CDE 1.6.3, X11 Version 6.6.2
> -Compiler: SunStudio 12 - Sun C/C++ v5.9 2007/05/03 (and gcc v.3.4.6)
> -Workstation-Info: SUNW,Ultra-5_10;sparc;sun4u
>
> it would be nice to have the desktop running
> but i can compile & test my software fully on command line
>
> questions are:
> -can i boot an image of my machine into qemu?
> -what bios do i need - OpenBios, OpenBoot, original (how can i get
> this from my machine?)
> -use qemu git head or other version?
>
> thx for any help

Re: [Qemu-devel] virtualize sparc developer workstation?

[Mark Cave-Ayland]

On 07/07/14 07:43, Markus Armbruster wrote:

> Cc'ing the SPARC maintainer.

I'm not the official maintainer, but I've done some work on this and so 
can probably answer your question.

> dennis luehring <dl.soluz@gmx.net> writes:
>
>> i want to virtualize (under a linux x86 host) my noisy sparc workstation
>> with the help of qemu and want to know if its possible to
>> get an system image to run or what other options available
>> for sparc virtualization
>>
>> im developing a low-traffic network communication software
>> and sparc is one of my test platforms
>>
>> is the sparc emulation good enough for
>> (low-traffic) network communication tests?
>>
>> my current system specs:
>> -SUN Ultra 10 SPARC Workstation
>> -384 MB RAM
>> -Operating System: Solaris 10 November 2006 - SunOS Release 5.10
>> Generic_118833-33 64-bit
>> -Desktop: CDE 1.6.3, X11 Version 6.6.2
>> -Compiler: SunStudio 12 - Sun C/C++ v5.9 2007/05/03 (and gcc v.3.4.6)
>> -Workstation-Info: SUNW,Ultra-5_10;sparc;sun4u
>>
>> it would be nice to have the desktop running
>> but i can compile & test my software fully on command line
>>
>> questions are:
>> -can i boot an image of my machine into qemu?
>> -what bios do i need - OpenBios, OpenBoot, original (how can i get
>> this from my machine?)
>> -use qemu git head or other version?
>>
>> thx for any help

Sadly sun4u support isn't quite there yet; it's enough to boot Linux 
(and with git master you can actually start booting the *BSD kernels and 
Solaris) but there are still some issues with the device tree that need 
to be resolved in order for this to work.

In theory the only remaining issues in order to get a headless (serial) 
Solaris to boot in QEMU are to fix up the PCI BARs/interrupts and then 
to switch the RTC over to MMIO access, but I ran out of time to do any 
more development work this release cycle.

As my QEMU work is unsponsored, I'm afraid the pace of development is 
restricted to what I can do in my spare time. If you're not subscribed 
to the list full time, I can let you know when I make any further 
progress if that helps?


ATB,

Mark.

Re: [Qemu-devel] virtualize sparc developer workstation?

[Dennis Luehring]

Am 08.07.2014 00:15, schrieb Mark Cave-Ayland:
> Sadly sun4u support isn't quite there yet; it's enough to boot Linux
> (and with git master you can actually start booting the *BSD kernels and
> Solaris) but there are still some issues with the device tree that need
> to be resolved in order for this to work.

is there an better working sparc architecture available with qemu near 
to my system specs
- means big endian, 32- or 64bit, solaris?

> As my QEMU work is unsponsored, I'm afraid the pace of development is
> restricted to what I can do in my spare time. If you're not subscribed
> to the list full time, I can let you know when I make any further
> progress if that helps?
im subscribed but you can email me any progress you've made - thx

Re: [Qemu-devel] virtualize sparc developer workstation?

[Mark Cave-Ayland]

On 08/07/14 14:29, Dennis Luehring wrote:

> Am 08.07.2014 00:15, schrieb Mark Cave-Ayland:
>> Sadly sun4u support isn't quite there yet; it's enough to boot Linux
>> (and with git master you can actually start booting the *BSD kernels and
>> Solaris) but there are still some issues with the device tree that need
>> to be resolved in order for this to work.
>
> is there an better working sparc architecture available with qemu near
> to my system specs
> - means big endian, 32- or 64bit, solaris?

Sun4m support in QEMU (qemu-system-sparc) is fairly mature now. The only 
outstanding issues I know of at the moment are lack of TCX acceleration 
(Olivier submitted a patch a while back for this) and a bug in ESP 
emulation which tends to emit warnings on the BSDs (and also prevents 
NeXTStep from booting). Newer versions of 32-bit Solaris will boot fine 
with OpenBIOS, older versions still need OBP - for more information take 
a look at Artyom's blog at 
http://tyom.blogspot.co.uk/2009/12/solaris-under-qemu-how-to.html which 
is reasonably up to date.

>> As my QEMU work is unsponsored, I'm afraid the pace of development is
>> restricted to what I can do in my spare time. If you're not subscribed
>> to the list full time, I can let you know when I make any further
>> progress if that helps?
> im subscribed but you can email me any progress you've made - thx

Okay, will do.


ATB,

Mark.

[Qemu-devel] virtualize sparc developer workstation?

[dennis luehring]

i want to virtualize my noisy sparc workstation
with the help of qemu and want to know if its possible to
get an system image to run or what other options available
for sparc virtualization

im developing a low-traffic network communication software
and sparc is one of my test platforms

is the sparc emulation good enough for
network communication tests?

my current system specs:
-SUN Ultra 10 SPARC Workstation
-384 MB RAM
-Operating System: Solaris 10 November 2006 - SunOS Release 5.10 
Generic_118833-33 64-bit
-Desktop: CDE 1.6.3, X11 Version 6.6.2
-Compiler: SunStudio 12 - Sun C/C++ v5.9 2007/05/03 (and gcc v.3.4.6)
-Workstation-Info: SUNW,Ultra-5_10;sparc;sun4u

it would be nice to have the desktop running
but i can compile & test my software fully on command line

thx for any help