Subject: availability of A5000 ARM Linux and LaTeX query

From: Sandy Nicholson <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 12:21:05 +0100 (BST)

I'm a newcomer to the linux-arm mailing list; please forgive me for leaping
in when I haven't yet seen any postings by others. I just joined the list
yesterday, having previously joined the low-volume arm-linux list for fear
of being swamped by email if I joined this one! (Is there anyone out there?!)

I don't actually have Linux installed at present, but would very much like
to get it up and running on my A5000 in the near future. (I don't think my
budget will stretch to a new Risc PC for quite some time!) However, I notice
from the ARM Linux FAQ (dated June 27 1997) that there is no A5000 root disk
image available at the moment - due to problems with the kernel. Yet I had
thought that ARM Linux was originally developed on the A5000 and had only
recently migrated to the Risc PC. Is there perhaps an earlier working
kernel available somewhere else? (And, if so, is it reliable?)

Secondly, in the lists of precompiled software at the ARM Linux web site, no
mention is made of TeX / LaTeX. This is a fairly important package for me as
it is something I use a great deal on Unix machines at work - it would be
very handy to be able to work on the same source material at home (something
which can't be done at all easily using the RISC OS implementation of TeX,
good though it is in many respects). So, how much of TeX is available for
ARM Linux? Does LaTeX 2e work? What about the more exotic packages including
those from the AMS? (Presumably, if TeX itself works, getting the rest going
on a Linux system shouldn't present too many problems.)

One last thing. If I were to download the Linux distribution onto a PC-
or Acorn-formatted ZIP disk(s), would I be able to install from that or do I
need to use a multitude of floppy disks?

Thanks in advance for any answers to these basic queries.
--
Sandy Nicholson * http://www.ed.ac.uk/~anich/

---

From: Ale Terlevich <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 12:32:59 +0100 (BST)

> on a Linux system shouldn't present too many problems.)

  Don't know anything about A5000s, but the entire 
Unix teTeX distribution compiles staright out of the box.

  Runs at about the same speed as a 50MHz Sparc20 too :)

  Just get the sources, unpack them, do a make world and wait!

Took maybe an hour on my SA110 RiscPC, so could be considerably longer on 
an A5000.

  Also, you'l need about 70MB free disk space to compile it. This goes 
down to ~30MB once you've deleted the sources.

  You can get teTeX from...

ftp.tex.ac.uk in dir /ctan/tex-archive/systems/unix/teTeX/distrib

(Read INSTALL.src)

  Good luck with getting Linux running!

Ale.

---

From: Howard <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 13:02:03 +0100 (BST)

> kernel available somewhere else? (And, if so, is it reliable?)

Welcome to the growing list of people waiting for the A5000 root disk. 
I don't know how much work is being done in it.  As far as I can gathe
the previous version of the kernel was not particularly reliable and
it's worth waiting for the new one.  Unfortunately we have been waiting
a while. 

You're not the only one wanting to run Latex on it so when the root disk
does come out let me know how you get on. 

ttfn

H.
-- 
 Howard Windsor   Email:[email-masked]  otherwise known as warthog
"On Christmas day, you can't get sore, your fellow man you must adore,
there's time to rob him all the more the other 364"
                                          Tom Lehrer