Linux PPC build?

[richmond62]

I have been reliably informed that there are PPC bits and bobs in the pipeline

Which of the following things will turn out to be we can only watch and wait . . .

pipeline.JPG

MagrittePipe.jpg

[richmond62]

And how long has your pipe dripped before it was seen by a plumber?

[richmond62]

Come on!

I have "put my macMini PPC to bed" and got this 'thing' ready and waiting for a Linux PPC build:

iMac G5, 2 GHz processor, 1 GB RAM, 80 GB hard drive.

[LCfraser]

Hi Richmond,

Sorry for it having been so long since my last post - I've been very busy with everything 7.0-related.

One of the items on my ToDo list for 7.0 is to fix building for 64-bit Linux. I suspect that some of the issues you've been having will be the same ones I encounter when doing that. Hopefully, this will mean that it becomes easier to build for PPC too. I've also completely re-written the way pre-builts function for 7.0; it no longer requires a bundled version of Revolution to generate some files so (in theory) the whole build can now be done on a non-x86 machine without having to copy any files across.

Regards,
Fraser

[richmond62]

OK.

Well, as discussed elsewhere: my younger son has got his "sweaty paws" on the G5 iMac (currently running Mac OS 10.5.8 ) and
won't be letting go of it until he goes off to University in Philadelphia at the end of August (UPenn; swank, swank).

I might try things, if I find the time, on my G4 MacMIni; but as it sports only 256 MB RAM, running Lubuntu PPC is glacially slow
and extremely frustrating.

What I should like to do, as soon as:

1. I can replace the current 80 GB HD in the G5 with something a bit bigger.

2. Set up a dual Mac 10.5.8 / Xubuntu PPC boot.

is go for a PPC build from the latest code.

[[-hh]]

..........

[richmond62]

LC 7 sounds like a monster.

I am aware that LC 7 has "all sorts of jazzy things" rolled into it . . .

However, I am sure that, in due course, it will be necessary to prune things a bit.

I cannot see everybody 'out there' running out to splash lots of fine gold on monster-munching computers just to run LC 7.

There was some talk (careless talk costs lives) a while back about modularising the code, so one could cherry-pick what one wanted, and, possibly, end up with a number of LC variants:

1. The one that does all the jazzy Unicode things.

2. The one that does Cocoa.

3. and so forth.

At that point one could build PPC builds (for Linux PPC and, possibly, Mac OS PPC) that did not go in for
quite so much bloat.

I am still trying to work out why one would really want to run Linux PPC on a Mac PPC when Mac OS 10.4 or 10.5 rests more lightly on a machine's
resources. I wouldn't bother, frankly.

I wrote a little stack a while back (LC 4.0) that runs through some processor-heavy routines: running on my PPC MacMini, 256 RAM running Lubuntu 14.04
it was glacially slow, until it just froze the thing. Running on Mac OS 10.4.11 it behaved really quite respectably.

As far as I can see the ONLY reason one would install Linux PPC ona PPC Mac would be because one could not get one's hands on
a Mac OS PPC install disk.

What I can see is the advantage of having Linux PPC builds for people working with other, non-Mac, PPC machines.

Interestingly enough; my 'little stack' runs faster on my G3 iMac (G3) running Mac OS 9 !!!! than on the G4 with Lubuntu.

Or, put it another way: Linux PPC stinks.

[richmond62]

Come to think of things.

Surely a PPC Unix build would be a good thing as about half
UNIX servers running use a PPC chipset.

[[-hh]]

..........

[richmond62]

I have several bones to pick with people who make Linux distros, and especially with Mark Shuttleworth.

There is a lot of Ballyhoo on their websites about using Linux to "breath new life into old computers", and
that sounds super until one realises that what they mean by "old computers" are models that are less than 5 years old,
and have at least half a Gig of RAM.

What is not really being catered to is the bunch of 10-15 year old computers being dumped all over Africa and so on with Pentium 3 processors
and 128 MB RAM.

So, obviously, the name 'Ubuntu' has gone sour.

[FourthWorld]

I have several bones to pick with people who make Linux distros, and especially with Mark Shuttleworth.

From the Ubuntu PPC wiki:

PowerPC was an officially supported architecture for Ubuntu between versions 4.10 and 6.10. From 7.04 onwards it is a community supported port.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PowerPC

It's very generous of the community to step in to maintain PPC builds of Ubuntu for that ever-smaller audience, but Mark Shuttleworth is not responsible for that build. On the contrary, his company donates server space and some community support to assist that community effort.

If you have an issue with PPC, your bone-picking may be better directed at Apple than Shuttleworth. Apple maintained their role as the only major computer vendor attempting to use PPC long after the rest of the world had switched to x86, as Apple themselves eventually did as well. Had they made that jump sooner, PPC would have been purged from the pool of available platforms that much earlier, and this would not be affecting you today.

Or conversely, if Apple remained committed to their PPC choice you would also not be in the position you're in today.

Either way, AFAIK Mark Shuttleworth was not consulted in Apple's decision to either adopt or later abandon the PPC architecture.

There is a lot of Ballyhoo on their websites about using Linux to "breath new life into old computers", and
that sounds super until one realises that what they mean by "old computers" are models that are less than 5 years old,
and have at least half a Gig of RAM.

What is not really being catered to is the bunch of 10-15 year old computers being dumped all over Africa and so on with Pentium 3 processors and 128 MB RAM.

So, obviously, the name 'Ubuntu' has gone sour.

For older machines you are correct: instead of "Ubuntu" you would be looking for "Lubuntu" or "Xubuntu", both of which receive generous funding from Mark Shuttleworth, and both of which work surprisingly well on older hardware (I use Lubuntu on an Atom 230-powered nettop and it's been amazingly reliable).

For markets where resources are even more scarce than any fully-featured modern Debian-based distro can address well, projects like OLPC have been working with other distros to providing computing resources for such unusually sparse systems. OLPC itself ships with Sugar, but there are many other distros available for unusually modest systems as well, including the popular Puppy Linux which is so slender it can even run entirely from RAM.

There's also Raspian, the Debian variant stripped down to work on the Raspberry Pi, which is likely far cheaper to ship to Africa new than to try shipping a large, heavy 15-year-old Pentium 3 box with its much greater power requirements, more restrictive system resources, and insufficiently-available replacement parts.

And for those who have 15-year-old hardware that still runs, Puppy Linux and others will serve them well with modern security features beyond any OS that shipped with the machine.

If you're working with any NGOs supplying computing resources to Africa, there are far more cost-effective options than 15-year-old hardware. I have friends who work with the OLPC, Internet in a Box, and other related projects, and am on the advisory board of Kids Care Everywhere, and would be happy to help share resources with such groups if needed.

[richmond62]

Richard Gaskin: I am sure you are right. However, out here in "the boonies"
the impression one gets is not the same.

Having said that, that does NOT stop me want to continue (after I reclaim my G5) to build
a PPC Linux build of Livecode (and, preferably of version 7).

[Peter Wood]

Apple maintained their role as the only major computer vendor attempting to use PPC long after the rest of the world had switched to x86

Better not tell IBM

[FourthWorld]

IBM makes PCs with PowerPC chips?

[malte]

Oh yes, they do. One of the reasons I can not use liveCode server for one of my bigger projects.