Meeting Pearls 1/Meeting Pearls Vol 1 (1994).iso/installed_progs/text/faqs/dec-faq.osf1

Internet Message Format | 1994-04-12 | 12.4 KB

Subject: comp.unix.ultrix DEC OSF/1 Frequently Asked Questions
Newsgroups: comp.unix.ultrix,comp.unix.osf.osf1,comp.sys.dec,news.answers,comp.answers
From: [e-mail]
Date: 11 Apr 1994 21:00:44 -0400

Archive-name: dec-faq/osf1
Last-modified: Sun Jan 16 16:51:33 EST 1994
Version: 1.6

This is part 3 of the Frequently Asked Questions posting for
comp.unix.ultrix, with answers about the OSF/1 operating system from
Digital.  It is also posted on comp.sys.dec and comp.unix.osf.osf1,
but it is not a full FAQ for those groups.  Companion postings have
answers that apply to both ULTRIX and OSF/1 and answers that apply to
ULTRIX alone.

A separate FAQ describes how to get information about Digital products
and interacting with Digital.

This FAQ is available in the following archive sites, in the directory
/pub/DEC/dec-faq:

    gatekeeper.dec.com
    crl.dec.com

It can also be obtained by sending mail to [e-mail] with the
following lines:
    connect
    get /pub/DEC/dec-faq/osf1

Many FAQs, including this one, are available on the archive site
rtfm.mit.edu in the directory pub/usenet/news.answers.  The name under
which a FAQ is archived appears in the Archive-name line at the top of
the article.  This FAQ is archived in the directory dec-faq.

To receive this posting by mail, send a note to
[e-mail].

If the location of a file in an archive is not specifically mentioned
below, it is in /pub/DEC on the above machines.

To make suggestions for changes or additions to this Frequently Asked
Questions list, send mail to [e-mail].  Answers are
especially appreciated.

An archive of recent postings to comp.unix.ultrix can be found via
anonymous FTP on ftp.cc.rochester.edu in /pub/usenet/comp.unix.ultrix.
Thanks to folks at the University of Rochester for providing this
service.

Some general notes:

When used alone, the word "DECstation" is used to mean any of the
DECstations or DECsystems that use MIPS RISC processors.  Similarly,
"Alpha" refers to any DEC systems that use the Alpha AXP processor.

Unless otherwise specified, these answers refer to ULTRIX 4.3, which is
the current release of ULTRIX.

Many people have contributed to this list, directly or indirectly.  In
some cases, an answer has been adapted from one or more postings on the
comp.unix.ultrix newsgroup.  Our thanks to all of those who post answers.
The name (or names) at the end of an entry indicate that the information
was taken from postings by those individuals; the text may have been
edited for this FAQ.  These citations are only given to acknowledge the
contribution.

Although the editor of this FAQ is an employee of Digital Equipment
Corporation, this posting is not an official statement from Digital
Equipment Corporation.

Alpha
======================================================
A1.**CHANGED** Where can I find software that has been ported to Alpha?
A2. What does the "AXP" in "DEC 3000 Model 400 AXP Workstation" mean?
A3. Where can I get Emacs and Epoch for Alpha OSF/1?
A4. Where can I get technical information about Alpha?

Software
======================================================
S1.**CHANGED** What (free) tools are there for looking at system behavior?

Programming
======================================================
P1.**NEW** What tools will help me port software to the 64-bit Alpha system?
P2. Why can't I run dbx?
P3. Why do my applications not work after I upgrade to a new version of DEC OSF/1?
P4. Where can I get a debugging malloc that works on Alpha OSF/1?
P5.**NEW** What's with 'ld: unresolved symbols: dnet_conn'?

Graphics
======================================================
G1. How can I make the graphics go faster?
G2. Where can I get an xv that works on Alpha OSF/1?

Network
======================================================
N1. Why doesn't FTP work to an XYZ system?
N2. How do you use a NFS-mounted /usr filesystem on OSF/1?
N3. Where can I get rstatd for DEC OSF/1?
N4.**NEW** How do I switch between the AUI and 10 Base-T Ethernet ports?

Hardware
======================================================
H1.**NEW** Where can I get information about Alpha chips?

Miscellaneous
======================================================
M1. Where else is DEC OSF/1 discussed?
M2. How do I add a new terminal definition?

==============================================
A1.**CHANGED** Where can I find software that has been ported to Alpha?

A list of software known to be ported to Alpha OSF/1 is available
on the World-Wide Web:

    http://www.dec.com/pub/Digital/info/html/pub-domain.html

The "Alpha AXP Freeware CD," which is shipped with the DEC OSF/1
software distribution, has many popular programs in both source and
binary form. The current Alpha Freeware CD-ROM can also be ordered
from DECdirect, order number QA-0PSAA-H8.  The price is $12 US.

The Freeware CD is mounted on some Internet machines, including
gatekeeper.dec.com and ftp.Uni-Koeln.de, for anonymous FTP.

Many programs are also available in ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu:/DEC_Alpha.

The alpha-osf-managers archive (see below) also has some programs.

                [Pete Kaiser, [e-mail]]
                [Win Treese, [e-mail]]

==============================================
A2. What does the "AXP" in "DEC 3000 Model 400 AXP Workstation" mean?

Nothing. It is part of the trademark.

==============================================
A3. Where can I get Emacs and Epoch for Alpha OSF/1?

Both a binary and sources for GNU Emacs are included on the base
system CD-ROM. Epoch is available on the Alpha OSF/1 Freeware CD-ROM
(see answer A1 for more information).  Epoch can also be copied from
ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu:/DEC_Alpha.

Patches to make Emacs version 19 run on Alpha OSF/1 can be found by
anonymous FTP to gatekeeper.dec.com:/pub/GNU.  The files are

    emacs-19.22-alpha-patch.README
    emacs-19.22-alpha-patch.gz


                [Pete Kaiser, [e-mail]]
                [Rob McCool, [e-mail]]

==============================================
A4. Where can I get technical information about Alpha?

Sites, R.L., Ed., Alpha Architecture Reference Manual (600 page book,
1992) from Digital Press (EY-L520E-DP) or Prentice-Hall 9ISBN
0-13-033663-7). Also at most technical bookstores, including
Quantum(Cambridge) and Stacey's (Palo Alto)

Communications of the ACM, February 1993 issue (4 Alpha articles)

Digital Technical Journal, Winter 1992 (200 pages of Alpha articles,
including 4 above with fewer typos). Order info: [e-mail]
(Available from gatekeeper.dec.com:/pub/DEC/DECinfo/DTJ/axp*)

Jim Montanaro "The Design of the Alpha 21064 CPU Chip" (42 minutes)
Dick Sites and Dirk Meyer, "Alpha Architecture" (73 minutes)
University Video Communications P.O. BOx 5129 Stanford CA 94309 USA
[phone]
                    [Dick Sites, [e-mail]]

==============================================
S1.**CHANGED** What (free) tools are there for looking at system behavior?

syd, a utility like top, is on the Alpha OSF/1 Freeware disk.  It is also
available for anonymous FTP from many sites.  It is only known to work on
versions 1.2 and 1.3 of OSF.

top has been ported to DEC OSF/1, and works under 1.2, 1.3, and field
test releases of version 2.0.  It is available from
file://ftp.eng.umd.edu/pub/alpha.

lsof, a utility for listing open files, is available from
file://vic.cc.purdue.edu:/pub.

                    [Dave Sill, [e-mail]]
                    [Anthony Baxter, [e-mail]]

==============================================
P1.**NEW** What tools will help me port software to the 64-bit Alpha system?

The version of lint shipped with Alpha OSF/1 has many checks to help
port software to Alpha.  In particular, the -Q option is very useful.
See the manual page for more details.

A document entitled "SunOS to DEC OSF/1 Porting Guide" is available
from

    file://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/DEC/DECinfo/document/EC-N0736-43.ps.Z

==============================================
P2. Why can't I run dbx?

With DEC OSF/1 V1.2 the development environment is a separate layered
product beyond the base OS.  Although it is included on the DEC OSF/1
consolidated CD-ROM, the license must be purchased separately to use
any portion of the Developer's kit.  Within the DEC OSF/1 Developer's
Kit the license just happens to be enforced by a check in dbx.

For more information, look in the /pub/DEC/DECinfo/DECnews-UNIX directory
or gatekeeper.dec.com for:

      0104.txt      DEC OSF/1 Developer's Extensions V1.2 article, 11/17/92
      0603.txt      DEC OSF/1 Developer's Toolkit V1.2 article, 03/23/93
      0806.txt    C Compiler for DEC OSF/1 Operating System article, 05/13/93
                    [Russ Jones, [e-mail]]

==============================================
P3. Why do my applications not work after I upgrade to a new version of DEC OSF/1?

Sometimes the details of the shared libraries change between releases.
In general, applications compiled on an earlier version of DEC OSF/1
should still run on a later version.  The converse may not be true.

In particular, there were some incompatibilies between the field test and
final versions of DEC OSF/1 V1.2.

The usual solution is to recompile from scratch.
                        [John Kohl, [e-mail]]

==============================================
P4. Where can I get a debugging malloc that works on Alpha OSF/1?

Anonymous FTP to gatekeeper.dec.com:pub/misc/malloc_dbg.

If you get the package, be sure to read the stuff in the file
contrib/dec_notes which explains how to replace malloc on the fly in
an existing program.

                    [Dave Hill, [e-mail]]

==============================================
P5.**NEW** What's with 'ld: unresolved symbols: dnet_conn'?

Some libraries on OSF/1 (notably the X11 library) are compiled so that
they can use DECnet as well as TCP/IP.  To link with such libraries,
include -ldnet_stub at the end of link command.  If you have DECnet
software installed, use -ldnet.


==============================================
G1. How can I make the graphics go faster?

If your application is sending lots of data (using, say, PutImage
requests), try setting DISPLAY to local:0, which uses a shared memory
transport between the client and the X server.
                    [Gail Grant, [e-mail]]

==============================================
G2. Where can I get an xv that works on Alpha OSF/1?

ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu:/DEC_Alpha.  Make sure that LONG and U_LONG in
xvtiffwr.c are defined to be int and unsigned int.
                [Mike Iglesias, [e-mail]]

==============================================
N1. Why doesn't FTP work to an XYZ system?

DEC OSF/1 uses the IP type-of-service option (TOS) by default.  This
confuses some systems (reportedly Macintoshes).  To turn off the
option for ftp, create a file /etc/iptos with the following entries:

    ftp-control    tcp    0x0
    ftp-data    tcp    0x0

Reboot the Alpha system.

==============================================
N2. How do you use a NFS-mounted /usr filesystem on OSF/1?

Jon Forrest ([e-mail]) has written a document that
describes how to do this. Use anonymous ftp to toe.CS.Berkeley.EDU and
look in pub/personal/forrest/remote.mounting.

Note that as of OSF 1.3 DEC does not support this but it is quite
easy to do.
                [Jon Forrest, [e-mail]]

==============================================
N3. Where can I get rstatd for DEC OSF/1?

rstatd is reportedly in DEC OSF/1 version 2.0.

==============================================
N4.**NEW** How do I switch between the AUI and 10 Base-T Ethernet ports?

- Shutdown the system.
- At the ">>>" prompt, type:

    set ethernet thick
      or
          set ethernet tenbt

- Reboot the system.
                               [Steve Imber, [e-mail]]


==============================================
H1.**NEW** Where can I get information about Alpha chips?

Call the DECchip Hotline
   1-800-332-2717 (voice)
   1-800-332-2515 (TTY)
   8:30am - 5:30pm ET

                        [Jim Gettys, [e-mail]]

==============================================
M1. Where else is DEC OSF/1 discussed?

You can join the mailing list [e-mail].  Send a message
with
    subscribe alpha-osf-managers
in the body to [e-mail].  Archives of the list are available
for FTP from ftp.kpc.com:/pub/list/alpha-osf-managers.  Some useful
Alpha software is also kept there.
                    [Dave Sill, [e-mail]]

==============================================
M2. How do I add a new terminal definition?

Some applications on OSF/1 use termcap; others use terminfo.  tic(1)
compiles a termcap definition for terminfo.   It is best to add a
new terminal definition both ways.
                    [Jeffrey Heller, [e-mail]]