Microport: how good

[John Kennedy]

In article <1990Nov30.140527.15142 at sbcs.sunysb.edu> pmartino at csserv1.ic.sunysb.edu (Steve Wechsler) writes:
>
>Greetins, folks.  I just got hold of a copy of Microport SYS V/AT v2.4 that
>my company was getting rid of (we no longer use it) and I was wondering how
>good it is.  I don't have a PC to install it on, but I am planning on buying
>some sort of system soon (either an AT or 386, or a used AT&T Unix PC if
>Microport is no good).  Can anyone tell me how close it is to AT&T System V,
>how fast it is on different machines, will it run gnu software (like Emacs
>and bash), graphics capability (X-windows, maybe?), etc, etc.  Also, if
>anyone knows of any specific hardware incompatibilities (the manual wasn't
>too helpful in this respect).
>

I ran uport 2.4 for a couple of years, with a full news feed and
passing mail to several sites.  It IS System V, so it doesn't have
to be close to it.

It's um, pretty good, all things considered.  However, some gotchas:


Their fsck is broken, for large file systems, and I can't remember how
big "large" is.  fsck will actually leave the file system more corrupted
in some cases.  The workaround is with a replacement fsck binary that was
floating around the net, that someone sent me, and have around here somewhere.

The biggest gotcha is not so much Microport's fault, but lies with the segmented
architecture of the 286 itself.  Much of the public domain software doesn't need
to worry about segment sizes or large and small models of the Intel
architecture.  Most stuff compiles ok, or has options for 286s.  Other software
needs to be examined, usually after an attempt at compiling fails.

- Among the software that worked ok:

  News, smail2.5, fas async driver 
  Any device driver that you want to write can be installed ok.


- Among what wouldn't work for me (others may have had better success)

  GNU make (got compiler "register errors")

  Don't expect networking, X windows, or anything that expects STREAMS
   capabilities, since it is SvsV release 2, not 3.

  Even though I bought it from Microport and tried on three different
  motherboards with different BIOSs from the approved list, I could never
  get Dos-Merge to work.  Could have been pilot error, though.

  Although it should run on a 386 board, I tried it and got erratic keyboard
  operation.  No explanation.

This sounds like a good project if you have plenty of time to spare and
treat it is a Unix learning experience.  If you're in a hurry to get
a system up and stable, there are easier ways.  If you're looking
for a System V to dig into and try to understand, you've got it.

John



-- 
John Kennedy                     johnk at opel.COM
Second Source, Inc.
Annapolis, MD