Frequently Asked Questions about Linux on S/390
Linux on ESA/390 architecture page by Linas Vepstas
IBM's release of Linux for S/390
Linux-VM discussion list

From:         "Terrence W. Zellers"
Subject:      Linux on VM

Here follows my latest "vmlinux.needs" - basically the "plan" I produced last March broken down a little differently.

If Neale is "in" he's probably the best person to take the GCC part (if  willing) - though I want to talk about program linkage: gcc370 produces an MVSish linkage which is not good for *ix.  Which piece are you going after?  I'll pick another piece - I'm inclined either to the TEXT2elf or the ext2 FS, but I'll buy myself an xmas  present of the Linux device driver book as well.

There's a guy (Moshe Bar) who posted about Linux for S370 last month on comp.os.linux.development.system.  I don't think he understood how big a job he was talking about but I'll email him to see where he's gotten.
 

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1. Resources.
1. Personnel.
1. Administrator. We can probably do without an executive admin for a while but sooner or later we will need one.  In the meantime a lot of authority will devolve by default on Webmaster below.
2. Webmaster to setup and manage what becomes the central point of communication. This will be a fair amount of work.   See 1.A
3. Coders. BAL and C.
4. Documentors.
5. Testers.
2. Web site.
1. Front page describing us to "the world" our goal and our consensus target. News and timeline pages.
2. Code and notes archive for work already done.
3. Dramatis personae. A list of who is working on what most recently.
3. Mailing list - so as not to tie up VMESA-L,
4. Accounts on a VM machine for those who wish to contribute who cannot use their work machines.
2. Tools.
1. Definition of program linkage matching Unix/linux standards.
2. gcc modified to produce code matching 2.A
3. Neale reports HLASM doesn't do long names:  since HLASM would only be used as a temporary intermediate tool hack gcc to produce a hash pseudo name for long name functions and a fixed format comment record to establish an equivalence between the hash name and the long name.
4. Tool to read a TEXT file and produce an elf .o file manipulable through the rest of binutils.  While 2.C is in effect it will also need to read the source to extract and translate hashed names into real long names.
5. Hack to GAS to do 390 assembler from gcc (rehacked to export long names) and out an elf.
3. Kernel work.
1. KNOW-HOW  of S390 paging and memory management.  Code linux mm to match.
2. Code linux dispatcher to work with S390 interrupts and timers.
3. KNOW-HOW of S390 boot process, to write the bootstrap loader for the linux kernel.
4. IO
1. A CMS prog to build an ext2 file system on a minidisk.
2. CMS progs to read and write to ext2 fs.
3. KNOW-HOW on what Linux expects in a device driver.
4. Device driver for console.
5. Device driver for 3270 devices.
6. Device driver for minidisk (DIAG).
7. Generic IUCV device driver.
8. TCPIP
1. Rework TCPIP to be cooperative with the TCPIP service machine.
2. Leave Linux TCPIP stack alone just routed through the TCPIP SVM via the IUCV driver (Is the TCPIP IUCV-IUCV routing doc'd anywhere?)
9. A terminal server which can be telnetted to as a VT or other ASCII device which will pass through as ASCII to the Linux VM. (Do the more recent TCPIP's for VM have this - I've been out a while).

Penguin logo borrowed from Larry Ewing  who created the orginial using  The GIMP .
I used Microsoft's PhotoDraw 2000 to add the VM on his chest.