Release notes for mips64emul 0.2.3
==================================

Copyright (C) 2003-2004  Anders Gavare.


mips64emul is a MIPS machine emulator. The goals are to emulate MIPS-like
CPUs and enough surrounding hardware to be able to run unmodified
operating systems (such as NetBSD, Ultrix, Linux, FreeBSD, or OpenBSD) as
if they were running on a real machine, and to assist in experiments
involving MIPS-like code in general.

(MIPS is a registered trademark of MIPS Technologies. This project is not
affiliated with MIPS Technologies in any way whatsoever.) 


In its current form, it is possible to use the emulator to install an
operating systems onto a harddisk image; the "guest" operating system will run
similar to how it would run on a real physical machine.

The following guest operating systems have been verified to work:


    Operating system                Emulated machine
    ----------------                ----------------

    NetBSD 1.6.2/pmax               DECstation 5000/200
    OpenBSD 2.8-BETA/pmax           DECstation 5000/200
    Ultrix 4.2-4.5/RISC             DECstation 5000/200
    Sprite demo harddisk image      DECstation 5000/200
    Redhat Linux 7.1 for mips       DECstation 5000/200
    NetBSD 1.6.2/arc                Acer PICA-61
    OpenBSD 2.3/arc                 Acer PICA-61


A couple of other emulation modes exist (for SGI's MIPS-based machines,
Playstation 2, Cobalt, some other ARC machines, etc) but these modes are more
of a curiosity, and should not be considered working yet.


Here is a short summary of the changes from version 0.2.2 to 0.2.3:

	x)  An experimental dynamic binary translation subsystem has been
	    added, which improves speed.  It should work when emulating
	    R3000-style CPUs. Add -b to the command line to enable bintrans.
	    (For R4000-style CPUs, the bintrans system is not entirely
	    reliable yet.)  Bintrans backends have been written for the
	    Alpha and i386 platforms.

	x)  Redhat Linux 7.1 for mips has been verified to work under
	    DECstation 5000/200 emulation. (It could probably run with
	    earlier versions of the emulator, but I hadn't seen it myself.)

        x)  Lots of minor bug fixes.


This release has a number of known bugs, listed in the BUGS file, but feel
free to drop me an email regarding other bugs.


Files included in this release are:

  BUGS                        A list of known bugs.
  HISTORY                     Detailed revision history/changelog.
  LICENSE                     Copyright message / license.
  README                      Quick start instructions, for the impatient.
  RELEASE                     This file.
  TODO                        TODO notes.
  doc                         Documentation.
  experiments                 Experimental code (not usually needed).
  src, devices, and include   Source code.
  tests                       Regression tests.


To build the emulator, run the ./configure script, and then run make.

Building the emulator should work on most Unix-like systems.  (One system
which is specifically known to NOT work is Ultrix/RISC inside the
emulator; Ultrix chokes on the configure script and the default cc in
Ultrix doesn't work.)


Regarding files in the include/ directory:  only a few of these are
written by me, the rest are from other sources (such as NetBSD).  The
license text says that "All advertising materials mentioning features or
use of this software" must display acknowledgements.  Even though I do NOT
feel I mention features or use of the header files (the "software") in any
advertising materials, I am still very greatful for the fact that these
people have made their files available for re-use, so I guess thanking
them like this is in order:

    This product includes software developed by the University of
    California, Berkeley and its contributors.

    This product includes software developed for the
    NetBSD Project.  See http://www.netbsd.org/ for
    information about NetBSD.

    This product includes software developed by Jonathan Stone for
    the NetBSD Project.

    This product includes software developed for the NetBSD Project
    by Matthias Drochner.

    This product includes software developed by the NetBSD
    Foundation, Inc. and its contributors.

    This product includes software developed by Christopher G. Demetriou.
    [for the NetBSD Project.]

    This product includes software developed by Adam Glass.

    This product includes software developed by the PocketBSD project
    and its contributors.

    This product includes software developed by Peter Galbavy.

    Carnegie Mellon University   (multiple header files,
    no specific advertisement text required)

    This product includes software developed by Charles M. Hannum.

    This product includes software developed under OpenBSD by Per Fogelstrm.

    This product includes software developed by Per Fogelstrm.

    This product includes software developed at Ludd, University of
    Lule, Sweden and its contributors.

    This product includes software developed by Hellmuth Michaelis
    and Joerg Wunsch

    The font(s) in devices/fonts are Copyright (c) 1992, 1993, 1994
    by Hellmuth Michaelis and Joerg Wunsch.  ("This product includes software
    developed by Hellmuth Michaelis and Joerg Wunsch", well, the font
    is maybe not software, but still...)

    impactsr-bsd.h is Copyright (C) 2004 by Stanislaw Skowronek.

    This product includes software developed for the NetBSD Project by
    Wasabi Systems, Inc.  [by Simon Burge]


See individual files for license details, if you plan to redistribute
mips64emul or reuse code.

And thanks to everyone who has provided me with feedback, ideas, patches,
or encouraged me to work on specific issues.

Don't hesitate to send feedback to me (Anders Gavare, md1gavan at
mdstud.chalmers.se) if you have found mips64emul useful or if you have 
found a bug.

