Date: Fri, 04 SEP 1998 16:06:46 +0000 (GMT) From: Dave Walker Subject: Acorn Developer News 04/09/1998: Softloadable Ursula Image, UrsulaBugs Alias, Updated Tools, etc To: isvquery@acorn.com Resent-Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1998 17:07:28 +0100 (BST) Resent-From: regdevs@acorn.com Resent-Sender: regdevs-request@acorn.com Hi folks... Acorn Developer News 04/09/98 Hugely interesting info ahead... Softloadable Ursula Image ------------------------- Following considerable effort on the part of Mike and Alan in Software Engineering (thanks, guys), I now have a version of Ursula which will softload on a Risc PC fitted with an ARM610 or ARM710 (*NOT* a StrongARM) and which you can download to test things against and write things for pending the construction and shipping of Phoebe hardware. You can find this, along with slightly reorganised copies of the Phoebe and Ursula functional specs and the previously-extant overview notes on Phoebe / Ursula and Ursula memory management, in the new http://www.art.acorn.co.uk/SALES/DEVELOPERS/resource/reference/ro4 hierarchy; the image, along with a set of installation docs / other useful notes and a list of known bugs, can be found in http://www.art.acorn.co.uk/SALES/DEVELOPERS/resource/reference/ro4/distrib . Owing to the size of the distribution (the full !Boot / !Printers / !HForm occupies 20Mb when compressed!), I've also built a distribution which has much of the usual resources of !Boot stripped out of it; this skeleton version can be found as http://www.art.acorn.co.uk/SALES/DEVELOPERS/resource/reference/ro4/distrib/skeleton.arc and occupies 10Mb when compressed. Enjoy. However, be sure to read and understand the readme.txt file in the distrib directory before you start. UrsulaBugs Alias ---------------- If you come across any apparent bugs in the above release, please check the http://www.art.acorn.co.uk/SALES/DEVELOPERS/resource/reference/ro4/distrib/knownbugs.txt file; if the bug you have found is not listed there, please report it to the new ursulabugs@acorn.co.uk alias; this will expand internally to the faults database "incoming" repository and my email address, so both I and Software Engineering automatically get to see what's going on. When you submit a fault report, please use the template provided as http://www.art.acorn.co.uk/SALES/DEVELOPERS/resource/reference/faults/template.txt . The distribution detailed above has had limited testing, and is known to work on a number of machines when the installation instructions above are followed. If the software does not install correctly (ie crashes occur during booting of an out-of-the-box distribution), please contact me rather than flagging the ursulabugs alias. Updated C/C++ Tools ------------------- We now have a new C++ wrapper and updated linker which, in conjunction with an updated cc backend, should enable C++ to be embedded in relocatable modules more easily. There's also a new set of stubs which you'll need to link with in order to do this. You can find an archive of these components as http://www.art.acorn.co.uk/SALES/DEVELOPERS/resource/updates/c++mod.arc ; the contents in terms of version numbers are: cc 5.09 cmhg 5.20 c++ 3.12 - note this is just the wrapper, not the cfront tool link 5.08 Phoebe Logos ------------ The official Phoebe logo gets released today; if you want to start putting logos on whatever WWW pages you may have relating to your Phoebe-oriented developments, you can find copies of it (as a 256-colour sprite with a default white background, as a 256-colour sprite with a transparent background, and as GIFs with each background) as http://www.art.acorn.co.uk/SALES/DEVELOPERS/resource/reference/ro4/phoebelogos.arc Cheers, -- Dave Walker, Developer Support Specialist Acorn Computers Ltd Tel: +44 (0) 1223 725233 Acorn House, 645 Newmarket Road Fax: +44 (0) 1223 725333 Cambridge, CB5 8PB, United Kingdom WWW: http://www.acorn.co.uk/ **** ACORN WORLD '98: 16 - 18th OCTOBER 1998, LONDON ARENA, DOCKLANDS **** **** *TICKET HOTLINE 0171 538 1212* **** **** http://www.argonet.co.uk/acornworld98/ ****