Should we have architecture specific sub-forums?

[OSwhatever]

Many questions here are regarding how deal and setup the HW for different architectures, often x86 related. That raises the question if we should have sub-forums in OS-development for architecture specific questions. This would also make it easier to search for architecture specific topics.

[Love4Boobies]

Probably not. It should suffice to just mention the architecture in the subject if it's really relevant. I think this sort of categorization is much more important for the wiki.

[Brynet-Inc]

Probably not.

[Combuster]

Many questions here are regarding how deal and setup the HW for different architectures, often x86 related.

Contradiction?

The amount of topics on non-x86 is neglegible. There are however quite a few topics crossing the 16-32 bit border or the 32-64 bit border so a division would not help there.

And then there's the general no for the administrative pressure it brings.

[Coty]

There are however quite a few topics crossing the 16-32 bit border or the 32-64 bit border so a division would not help there.

Enter 32bit mode, requires the use of 32bit registers and the 32bit GDT, as well as setting up segments accordingly. versus the few lines of code that are in 16bit. I'd say it would belong more in the 32bit erea. While as the real mode crap, would be filled with more hello world bios ints and things.

[VolTeK]

Enter 32bit mode, requires the use of 32bit registers and the 32bit GDT, as well as setting up segments accordingly. versus the few lines of code that are in 16bit. I'd say it would belong more in the 32bit erea. While as the real mode crap, would be filled with more hello world bios ints and things.

It almost is like your saying real mode is just something easy to do. I don't know what real mode "Crap" you have seen, but they probably weren't really operating systems.



Its easy if your goal is small and simple.

[xenos]

Architecture specific sub-forums would be nice if we had like 5-10 active discussions about ARM / MIPS / PPC / whatever, with a few posts on each of these topics every day. It would certainly be fun if we had this kind of activity, with people discussing things like embedded development, how to write an OS for their router / satellite receiver / game console / development board, ARM / MIPS memory management and caches... But unfortunately this doesn't seem to be the case. Most people here are discussing x86 development only, or general issues such as compiler toolchains. At the current activity level it really wouldn't make much sense to have architecture specific sub-forums (even though I think it's a pity).

[Combuster]

Maybe raspberries will change that

[Solar]

Only after they lift the "one order per person" limit. My first one is destined to labor as firewall / proxy / net nanny for my home network...

[Jezze]

I'm waiting for the cased version. I bought a bb previously without a case and won't do the same mistake again.

[xenos]

When I told my boss I was going to Cebit this year, he asked me to "buy a few Raspberry PIs" for our students. I had to tell him that it's not that easy...

I guess my first one will simply aid me in learning ARM assembly and a bit hardware hacking of the BCM2835

[neon]

How often do you see any serious realmode OSes on this board that actually go anywhere? Seriously? Most of what I see is "help my print hello world", or "boot loader hangs???? help!", or "NASM WONT COMPILE MY BOOT LADER!". Maybe evernow [sic] and then a somewhat cool thing, or a half finished DOSish [sic] clone.

You aren't looking hard enough.

That wasn't the point. The point was, that the GDT needed to successively enter 32pmode, is a magor part of the 32bit pmode environment, have you seen such used in RM?

"32 bit GDT" implies the GDT structure itself is 32 bits. If this wasn't the point, then why did you write it that way? The GDT is a very simple data structure -- I would not qualify it as an argument that "real mode is easier". Real mode has its own set of challenges due to its limitation not seen in protected and long modes.

Back on topic -- I like the idea of architecture specific sub forums provided the need for it. The demand for it just is not there; most of the threads are dependent on x86 or x86-64 alone. Perhaps if the demand increases through more non-x86 threads it will be a good idea: Not just for the forums, but the Wiki as well.

[cxzuk]

I'm waiting for the cased version. I bought a bb previously without a case and won't do the same mistake again.

http://www.geek.com/articles/gadgets/mo ... -20120321/

[rdos]

I like the idea. Especially if there could be a real-mode (and possibly segmented protected mode) sub-forum where off-topic ramblings about emulating these environments instead of doing the real thing could be instantly deleted.

It's been claimed previously that it is not allowed to talk about these topics in the general forum, which makes the case for sub-forums on these topics stronger, where 64-bit, ARM and flat mode is not allowed to even be mentioned!

[ACcurrent]

Yeah, we could then have a subforum for RTOS embedded systems like the Atmel AVR which do not have MMUs.