Re: MkIV Driver prototype posted

[Tom Droege <droege@wwa.com>]

Chris and all,

Sigh! You all are trying to kill me with work.   I would like to play with
this, but it is too big a job for me to start from scratch on Linux.  But I
will shortly be in a position to send out a memory card to anyone that
wants to test it and write diagnostics.  

Note that the memory card is designed for self test.  You can write to it
from the computer just like it is written to over the cable.  So you can do
useful tests with a memory card alone.
Just write to it with one program and unload it from another.   

So if one of you wants to start writing all the stuff needed for a Mark IV
you can soon get at it and have real hardware to test with.  Just load up
the memory card with an image, and then read it back and display it,
analyze it, write it to disk, etc..   Everything that you need to start all
the hard code is in the memory card.   --  Well, a lot of it.

Tom Droege

PS, I have been working on the mechanical design.  I may just build duals.
A quad installation would then be a V, I pair, and a B, R pair.  Anyone see
anything wrong with this?  I assume it would not be too hard to get both
pairs looking at about the same place.    The advantage is that one design
fits all.   Sigh, the only cure to a constantly changing design is to stop
and build it.  But I am not quite ready for that.   Another advantage is
that the pieces are smaller and fit through doors better.  Have to be
careful, or the boat will be built in the basement and I won't be able to
get it out.  



At 01:44 AM 5/3/98 +0000, you wrote:
>I have been wanting to learn how to write a standard Linux kernel
>level device driver.  So mostly as an educational exercise I
>wrote one that could be used for the Mk IV memory buffer card.
>Of course with no MkIV system the driver only returns a test
>string, no images.
>
>My goal was to make a device driver that would install at run time
>with no re-boot required and be simple enough that a Linux novice
>