From: pilot-unix-errors@lists.best.com
Date: Fri, 6 Mar 1998 07:01:57 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Digest pilot-unix.v001.n672
To: pilot-unix@lists.best.com


-------------- BEGIN pilot-unix.v001.n672 --------------

    001 - Kenneth Albanowski <kjahd - Re: [Pilot-Unix] Pilot Linux

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From: Kenneth Albanowski <kjahds@kjahds.com>
Subject: Re: [Pilot-Unix] Pilot Linux
Date: Fri, 6 Mar 1998 03:07:29 -0500 (EST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
In-Reply-To: <199803060308.TAA25232@lists1.best.com>

On Thu, 5 Mar 1998, Diego Zamboni wrote:

> The page doesn't give much information, and I don't have the memory expansion 
> card. Ken, would you tell us more about it? In particular, what can you do 
> with Linux on a Pilot? I am a big fan of both, and of course I am very curious 
> about it.

Basically, the goal is to run a modern and _cheap_ OS on microcontrollers,
the sort of CPUs normally used in embedded projects. 

Linux on the Pilot is an interesting first step, since the Motorola
MC68328 microprocessor that it uses is very closely related to several
other chips that are extremely useful in embedded projects. (The '328
itself is designed to extremely useful in gadgets like the Pilot. The
PalmPilot _is_, for all intents and purposes, a '328, with a few buttons
and a screen.)

Personally, I have no expectation that Linux on the Pilot will actually be
directly useful for someone. (I could easily be wrong about that, and with
the Linux developer community, you never can tell.) We're certainly not
attempting to replace PalmOS. The main goal of the Pilot is as a
stepping-stone to other targets. 

Note that our memory usage isn't sky-high. Despite needing a memory card,
we don't actually need all the memory on that card, if you see the
difference. We only need the memory card to act as an easily reburnable
ROM. Current kernels are taking up about 512K of ROM and perhaps 100K of
RAM.  (This is without any "user applications", but with a full networking
stack and support for network file systems. Actual use of those subsystems
will consume more memory, as will running user programs.) 

Other people are already investigating ports to systems based on similar
MC68k chips, and many of them should sound familiar: Mac II & SE, Amiga
500 & 1200, etc. 

-- 
Kenneth Albanowski (kjahds@kjahds.com, CIS: 70705,126)




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