Openbsd 5.4

[mathemajikian]

SL-C3200 is still supported on OpenBSD. I'm currently running version 5.4 on my Zaurus with zero issues.

[ArchiMark]

Never used OpenBSD before....although I've read a bit about BSD in general....

How does it compare to other ROMs for Zaurus?

Also, are there many programs available to use with OpenBSD?

Do you recommend using it?

Thanks,

Mark

[koan]

I'm planning to switch my C3200 to this, seeing as it's the only distribution available to Zaurus that is still updated. (The Angstrom main web site has been in temporary mode for a while now).

[mathemajikian]

Never used OpenBSD before....although I've read a bit about BSD in general....

How does it compare to other ROMs for Zaurus?

Also, are there many programs available to use with OpenBSD?

Do you recommend using it?

Thanks,

Mark

Pretty much anything in the openbsd ports can be built on the Zaurus. But this may not be a good idea do to CPU speed limitations. However, there are tons of awesome console base programs that get the job done.

[ArchiMark]

Never used OpenBSD before....although I've read a bit about BSD in general....

How does it compare to other ROMs for Zaurus?

Also, are there many programs available to use with OpenBSD?

Do you recommend using it?

Thanks,

Mark

Pretty much anything in the openbsd ports can be built on the Zaurus. But this may not be a good idea do to CPU speed limitations. However, there are tons of awesome console base programs that get the job done.

Thank you for your input.....sounds good, but understand issue of CPU limitations, etc....

[ArchiMark]

Managed to install OpenBSD 5.5 on my C3200 now and it works!!!.....    

I have it running and using xterm...and ethernet card is working....

However, now have some questions please....

Installing Other Programs

Now, need to clear up how to install a window manager (any suggestions?) or desktop environment (xfce or lxde, etc...) and other programs to use such as nano, browser, etc...

Assume that these are packages that get installed, not ports?.....not clear as to what are ports vs packages....

Also, I just use ' pkg_add <programname> ' command to add a package?

Repository

Not clear as to what is good repository of packages (or ports if that's what I need...) that I can use on Zaurus?

Please note that I installed OpenBSD 5.5....from looking around now online, it looks like this is still beta version?.....is that OK?
Don't see packages in Packages directory for it? Do I use version 5.4 packages for now or ?

Thanks for your help with this!

Mark


UPDATE:  just tried typing a command that has the letter 'v' in it and don't know why but it won't type this letter!.....very odd and problematic to use C3200 now......hmmmmm..............

Got back into console and the 'v' key works....rebooted Zaurus and back into xterm and same thing, nothing happens when I type a 'v'.....Any suggestions how to fix this?

[TronDD]

Installing Other Programs

Now, need to clear up how to install a window manager (any suggestions?) or desktop environment (xfce or lxde, etc...) and other programs to use such as nano, browser, etc...

Assume that these are packages that get installed, not ports?.....not clear as to what are ports vs packages....

Also, I just use ' pkg_add <programname> ' command to add a package?


UPDATE:  just tried typing a command that has the letter 'v' in it and don't know why but it won't type this letter!.....very odd and problematic to use C3200 now......hmmmmm..............

Got back into console and the 'v' key works....rebooted Zaurus and back into xterm and same thing, nothing happens when I type a 'v'.....Any suggestions how to fix this?

Ports = compile and install everything.  Download the 5.5 ports.tar.gz file.  Extact to /usr and it'll create a ports directory there.
Packages = install prebuilt binaries.  As far as I know, no one is building and providing packages for the Zaurus.

OpenBSD docs are pretty good: http://www.openbsd.org/faq/faq15.html#Ports
As are the man pages.

Ah hah!  I thought the v key issue was me.  Apparently it's an xterm issue.  It's interpreting v as a paste command.  A work around is to find a v somewhere and select it.  I'm going to install a different terminal emulator to see if it's xterm only.

EDIT:  Common wisdom is to NOT mix OpenBSD versions.  Don't use 5.4 ports or packages on 5.5.  It's ok to run 5.5 if you want to be cutting edge, I used to always run newer version on my Z, but it was still maturing then.  Not sure what the benefit might be now, unless there is some cool new feature.

[ArchiMark]

Installing Other Programs

Now, need to clear up how to install a window manager (any suggestions?) or desktop environment (xfce or lxde, etc...) and other programs to use such as nano, browser, etc...

Assume that these are packages that get installed, not ports?.....not clear as to what are ports vs packages....

Also, I just use ' pkg_add <programname> ' command to add a package?


UPDATE:  just tried typing a command that has the letter 'v' in it and don't know why but it won't type this letter!.....very odd and problematic to use C3200 now......hmmmmm..............

Got back into console and the 'v' key works....rebooted Zaurus and back into xterm and same thing, nothing happens when I type a 'v'.....Any suggestions how to fix this?

Ports = compile and install everything.  Download the 5.5 ports.tar.gz file.  Extact to /usr and it'll create a ports directory there.
Packages = install prebuilt binaries.  As far as I know, no one is building and providing packages for the Zaurus.

OpenBSD docs are pretty good: http://www.openbsd.org/faq/faq15.html#Ports
As are the man pages.

Ah hah!  I thought the v key issue was me.  Apparently it's an xterm issue.  It's interpreting v as a paste command.  A work around is to find a v somewhere and select it.  I'm going to install a different terminal emulator to see if it's xterm only.

EDIT:  Common wisdom is to NOT mix OpenBSD versions.  Don't use 5.4 ports or packages on 5.5.  It's ok to run 5.5 if you want to be cutting edge, I used to always run newer version on my Z, but it was still maturing then.  Not sure what the benefit might be now, unless there is some cool new feature.

Understand about ports and packages now....just a bit different nomenclature than I'm used to.....and yes, docs are pretty good overall, been reading some this afternoon....

OK, will try to install ports file and attempt to build a package....have done that type of thing while using Debian and Arch in the past.....


Well, glad to hear that it's not my screwing up the OpenBSD install regarding the 'v' issue....although not glad to hear that it is a bug.....but good idea to try another terminal and see what happens....let me know how it goes....

Thanks!!!

[TronDD]

Tips for building from ports:

Always read the pkg/DESC file (or files!) to learn about any flavors or sub packages.  You want to keep things small on the Z so don't built a full featured flavor if you know there are things you'll never use.  Like integration with some programming language you don't use or x11 support if you will only use it from the terminal.

I first build with 'make package' so it resolves all it's dependencies and makes all the packages.
Run 'make install' to install everything.
To keep disk usage down, thoroughly clean up.
make clean
make clean=depends
make clean=dist

There will also be a /usr/ports/packages directory where all the built packages go.  You can clean those up to free some space too.  Just make sure you're done with them first as rebuilding something could take days.  I usually leave them until I am pressed for disk space.

I'm waiting for another application to finish building, been a couple days but all the dependencies are done now.  Then I will build rxvt for a terminal to see if the v key works or not.

Tim.

[ArchiMark]

Thank you for all the tips and input!....

Well, I successfully built my first application today on the 3200!.....only took about 4.5 hours I think.....

Built nano.....and it works.....

However, not having your input, I did it by using 'make install'.......didn't read the pkg/DESC file(s).....

So, you're saying to typically do both:

1.  run 'make package' and then

2. run 'make install'

Not just step 2 as I did.....

Are there instances where you would just do step 2, like I did?.....


As for clean up, I did a partial one so far....'make clean'....
Will do the rest...

Besides building another app or two, I want to see if I can get my Ambicom wifi card working....been using my Socket 10/100 ethernet card so far, which works great....


Thanks.

Mark

[TronDD]

Yeah, you can just run make install directly.  I like to have the break in there so after days of compiling I can see what gets added when I run install.

By the way, I built rxvt to use in place of xterm and it does not have a problem with the v key.

Tim.

[ArchiMark]

Started making rxvt last evening using your suggestion of first doing 'make package'....

After about 15 hours, it finished....however, what I see in terminal now is a lot of error 1 messages...    

Such as this one at the very end:

===> Exiting x11/dialog with an error
*** Error 1 in /usr/ports/x11 (/usr/ports/infrastructure/mk/bsd.port.subdir.mk:147 'package')


Just tried making roxterm, but same thing happened as with rxvt.....only good thing is that it finished in about a half hour...so, at least I did not have to wait a long time to get the bad news...

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

UPDATE

Don't know what happened, but I can now type the letter 'v' and it shows up on display......go figure.....  


UPDATE 2

Hmmm....rebooted and now, no letter 'v' again.......oh well.....

UPDATE 3

Just tried making rxvt again.....after about 1/2 hour, process stopped with message:

Code: [Select]

make: don't know how to make rxvt
Stop in /usr/ports/x11/rxvt
Any suggestions?

[TronDD]

x11/dialog?  Don't know what that is.  Is that a port?

What's the first error?  The errors trickle backwards up the dependency tree.

For rxvt, you might try to make clean and make clean=dist just for rxvt so it starts rxvt over (and not all the dependencies).

Tim.

[ArchiMark]

Tried making another app.....was going OK after about 27 hours.....then I shut off my DSL modem and went to sleep....

Looked at 3200 this morning and saw this process had stopped.....but with Error 1 messages.....looked up at top of xterm window and saw message that it had tried to fetch a file from repo, but couldn't do it of course, since I'd turned off internet connection.....

Assume that only thing you can do is start over, right?....

Can see why some people make packages on another faster computer.....

Oh well......

[ArchiMark]

x11/dialog?  Don't know what that is.  Is that a port?

What's the first error?  The errors trickle backwards up the dependency tree.

For rxvt, you might try to make clean and make clean=dist just for rxvt so it starts rxvt over (and not all the dependencies).

Tim.

Since I just tried making another app, there's too much other text now to be able to scroll back up and see those errors now....at least I can't see a way to do it...

Good question about dialog......assume it is an input window....

OK, will try what you suggest about rxvt....although is there anyway to do make without needing to have a live internet connection all throughout the make process? In other words, have everything downloaded at the beginning of the process, then you don't need to worry about having internet connection working....

Have you tried making rxvt or any other app yet? So, we can tell if the letter 'v' issue is a xterm or global issue...

Thanks!