Re: [ECOS] common x86 features support

[Nick Garnett <nickg at ecoscentric dot com>]

"Simon Johanson" <simon_johanson@hotmail.com> writes:

> Dear ecos-developers...
> 
> Possibly I've not read whole e-mail-lists to find the right answer to my
> question, sorry for that, maybe someone could provide references to previous
> discussions.
> 
> I'm looking for eCos running on my X-86 based board...
> 
> as I understand -
> 1). there's no chances to get Video support under eCos (even simple
> VGA-text-mod driver)
> 2). No PC keyboard driver

There is HAL support for the text mode screen and keyboard. There is
some support for microwindows on VGA. Text on anything other than the
default screen mode would require fonts and rendering software. The
problem with PC display hardware is the weird legacy modes that don't
give you a simple linear frame buffer to work with.

> 3). No ATA devices support, I'm not able to run eCos with my FSs on HDD or
> Floppy

We (eCosCentric) have IDE/CF device drivers. A floppy driver would not
be too hard to do, but has not been done yet, since there is little
demand for it.

> 4). USB support - I'm looking for OHCI driver for Opti82c861 controller
> (USB1.compliant)
> Is it possible to get "finger in air" estimation for such USB controller in
> eCos. Which  USB-device classes available?

This is probably the biggest chunk of work. You may want to contact us
for an estimate.

> 5). No parallel port driver
> 6). No PS/2 mouse driver
>

Again, there's been little demand for these. There are no big barriers
to developing drivers, however. Just time and testing.


> Could you please correct my doubts concerning eCos features...maybe I can
> get some of them or it's completely "undeveloped" part of eCos - i.e. I can
> use right now Kernel + serial drivers + Ethernets (IP stack) and memory
> (flash cards, ROM, RAM) and nothing more,
> and other peripheral will be out of the scope of eCos infrastructure ?

While the PC is a good demo and prototyping platform, it is not
usually the ultimate target for most eCos developers. Hence only those
devices that are shared with more embedded targets, such as serial, timers,
ethernet, flash, and recently IDE, have been supported. 

-- 
Nick Garnett                    eCos Kernel Architect
http://www.ecoscentric.com/     The eCos and RedBoot experts


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