Gentoo announced beta level live cds and stages for ppc64. The hardware supported by gentoo-ppc64 is PowerMacintosh G5, IBM pSeries, older IBM 64 bit RS/6000s (such as the model 260, 270, F80, H80, see linuxppc64.org for a complete list) and soon IBM iSeries hardware.Gentoo-ppc64 is the other side of the ppc equation, it is a 64 bit kernel as well as a 64 bit user space. We are the first linux distribution to offer a 64 bit top to bottom solution which is not a toy environment. This is a significant and exciting step as there is interest in cluster computing circles, users of java, and more generally those who have needs of large address spaces. It’s fairly exciting to be on the forefront and continue to push the capabilities of linux on ppc64 forward.
Gentoo PPC 64 beta announced
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Another Linux distro that can boot on my G5.
Everybody working with linux on day by day basis should try gentoo.
How would they run the sun jdk on a platform that sun doesn’t support. Does IBM have a 64bit linux JDK?
Otherwise it’s only useful for purely opensource java vm work.
just imagine Gentoo on G5 its gonna rock.
Yeah, imagine how much quicker gentoo will break on a G5!!
How would they run the sun jdk on a platform that sun doesn’t support.
Sun supports the JDK on Linux, so it is possible to get it to run absolutely fine on Gentoo. You have to download it yourself because you have to accept a license. It is just Linux you know, and uses the same base kernel and tools as something like Red Hat.
You make it sound as if it is going to break completely if you don’t run it on Red Hat or something. How much software do you run on Windows that is unsupported?
Does IBM have a 64bit linux JDK?
No idea. They probably do now.
Otherwise it’s only useful for purely opensource java vm work.
No it isn’t, because it runs and works as it would do on any other Linux distribution. If something goes wrong then the support thing is just a way for Sun to wash their hands.
If the JDK does break in any way then it is a pretty useless piece of software anyway.
“No it isn’t, because it runs and works as it would do on any other Linux distribution”
Are you sure? Gentoo 64 PPC is NO x86! Is there really a LinuxVM for PPC by SUN?
<blockquote>”No it isn’t, because it runs and works as it would do on any other Linux distribution”
Are you sure? Gentoo 64 PPC is NO x86! Is there really a LinuxVM for PPC by SUN?</blockquote>
What about Blackdown Java? I’m pretty sure they compile that from source.
The blackdown project has a port of JDK for PPC architectures. Aside from that, Mac OS X has a Sun Java VM in it (I don’t know if it is 64-bit but it works on the PPC64 architecture).
who buys a g5 and puts linux on it? o.O
doh………
who buys a g5 and puts linux on it? o.O
doh………
Linus Torvalds is currently using a PPC64 machine, don’t know if its a G5, but it’s more than likely because IBM just came out with the POWER5 in last two months or so.
if i had a g5 i would probobly run linux on it.
ive rn linux on evry mac i ever had pb g4 500 quicksilver.
quite nice to run linux on.
There is a 64 bit IBM JDK for PowerPC64 systems. Granted it’s not open source but perhaps in time blackdown might also be a solution as well. (and hopefully so!)
> Granted it’s not open source but perhaps in time blackdown might also be a solution as well. (and hopefully so!)
Blackdown isn’t free software (open source, as you put it) either.
Are there any vendors of note for PPC PC boxes other than Apple and IBM? Are the PPC linux distributions basically designed to load onto Apple hardware or do they meet some more basic standard (CHRP?)
Yes there are others for ppc32 hardware and for ppc64 there is also this one: http://970eval.com I haven’t seen or used one of these boards yet … but it does look interesting
So whats the big deal? linux-ppc64 port has been around for a while, (done by the chaps at IBM) and Redhat will install fine. SuSE also runs happy.
(sadly Debian doesn’t yet, but they’ll get there.)
… oh, your happy that gentoo runs on it… not to be a zelot or anything but what on earth do people see in gentoo? why wait and pray as it builds/breaks your system when you can already get preoptimised binaries to install and just compile what ever extras? maybe on x86-P4/Athron where some distributions distribute i386 binaries it was an issue… but for ppc64?
Adminit it, you don’t care about gentoo, you just like watching gcc compile stuff, it makes you feel like you know more or something right?
ps.
if this was a ‘yay *BSD port has finished!’ then that would be a big deal.
You should at least try to read the article before you start trolling.
“We are the first linux distribution to offer a 64 bit top to bottom solution which is not a toy environment.”
“why wait and pray as it builds/breaks your system”
Build the big apps overnight while you sleep. Wake up and it is done, not broken. You either haven’t ever used Gentoo, or you couldn’t follow the excellent documentation and ended up with a broken system.
“when you can already get preoptimised binaries”
Funny! You should be on stage with that one. i586 & i386 are not preoptimised for alot of hardware.
“and just compile what ever extras?”
Oh you mean like that recently released rpm distro where if you add “-fstack-protector” flag before compiling it gives an error stating that your compiler can’t create executables, yet it compiles straight through once you remove that flag?
“Adminit it, you don’t care about gentoo,”
There’s no need to care once you have found a distro that “just works.”
“you just like watching gcc compile stuff,”
Please, outside of the large packages, most build so quickly you don’t have time to even see the compiler output.
“it makes you feel like you know more or something right?”
How true. I know I don’t have to do a complete system reinstall when the newest version is released.
Here can I find the livecd for the Gentoo PPC 64 beta ?
Thanks…
Look at http://dev.gentoo.org/~tgall
Thank you tgall_foo ;-))
Linux on a G5 has plenty of uses. I use my G5 to do both print graphics creation and website design and development. Nothing beats MacOS when it comes to creating print graphics, not even WinXP. But for web development it’s a different story. Many hosting providers standardise on Linux servers and software (the (in)famous LAMP software mix). OSX is a *NIX but Apple has messed with the filesystem hierarchy so much that it’s hardly standard anymore. This has caused me to prefer Linux over OSX when it comes to hosting a web development environment. I can run a complete server locally and know where stuff goes. This means I can easily switch versions of software that I use to match a client’s hosting provider and not lose track. That is my main motivation to run Linux on a G5. The other is just plain curiosity. I want to know what a G5 can really do without all the interface glitz of MacOS. I guess soon I’ll see..
What do you want to put on it otherwise? : MAC OS X….
Why run Linux when you have OS X that has *nix under the hood? With a good GUI and good software (iLife)… Beats Linux I would think.
But then, it’s only my .02$
1. Linus Torvalds has a G5.
2. You can’t compile Blackdown from source. And it sucks on ppc, only version 1.3 (gcc2.95) is avaliable for ppc32 only, and noone’s really working on any updates to it.
3. Sun does not support ppc on any platform/hardware.
4. IBM has Java 1.4.1 SDK for ppc64. Haven’t tried it though…
5. Gentoo rocks!
“3. Sun does not support ppc on any platform/hardware.”
That is incorrect. There is a Sun Java VM on OS X.
I think it’s great that we are finally going to see some
true 64 bit operating systems on ppc hardware and have it all out in the open.(not IBM’s backroom stuff) The comparisions should be fantastic.(unless your afraid of the outcomes) The trails can be run on the same machine.
Iam sure there are many tests that are completely identical that will run on both architectures.
The comparisions between hardware systems should be similarly interesting.(say ppc64 and amd64) There is soon going to be nowhere to hide for the os zealots.
To clarify a few things:
You can run Java on PPC Linux using a JRE from IBM:
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/java/jdk/linux140/
This is a JRE based on Sun’s Java libraries. This is true of ALL Java(TM) platforms since there is no clean-room implementation of the platform (by this definition I mean a JCK certified JVM – gcj/classpath does not qualify – yet).
Sun have made available the source to the platform at
http://wwws.sun.com/software/communitysource/j2se/java2/
It is basically from these sources that the blackdown.org JVMs have been produced. This included JREs for ARM and PPC (1.3.1). However, Sun rearchitected their JVMs under 1.4 to use a different JIT called hotspot which contains a lot of CPU specific optimisation. Which is why blackdown haven’t yet released 1.4 JVMs for PPC and ARM.
Apple licensed the hotspot JVM and libs from Sun for their OSX release. NB: Some of the code is Sun’s but the platform, i.e. darwin/cocoa specific work is all Apple’s.
Unfortunately for PPC Linux users, the terms of that license didn’t involve releasing the PPC hotspot work back to the community.
Had this happened 1.4 blackdown PPC JVMs would be available. More significantly, the 10 or 15 (smile, yes I’m being tongue in cheek as far as the numbers) yellowdog users running Java would be able to run the 1.5 JRE on their Mac hardware long before IBM and Apple filled the void. Both have both been historically tardy for major revisions (i.e. 1.3 – 1.4).
I believe that ARM hotspot may exist for certain J2ME deployments; in any case Sun haven’t made it available to blackdown to port it to 1.4 JVMs on Linux.
Now in whose interest would it serve if Sun Linux J2SE were available on non sparc/x86 platforms? No one but the average enthusiast, hence the lack of enthusiasm from Sun. Without a compelling business case, you’ll have to stick to IBM’s Linux JVM or OSX.
Are there already some application benchmarks (and/or comparisons to other architectures) available?
This will rock on my Pegasos/G5!