PR submitted for Linux 5.10 / Debian Bullseye support

[Joan Touzet]

HI everyone,

Today I've submitted a pull request to David's GitHub repository, adding support for modern Linux and the current Debian image from the BeagleBone community.

While I've had a few friends test the code already, I'd love it if others might take the chance to give the new build a test drive.

A microSD card image based on the official BeagleBoard Debian image with these changes applied is available. This is a non-flashing image, so your BeagleBone's internal eMMC will not be altered. To test the code:

• Burn this image (using dd, Balena Etcher, etc.) to a 4GB or larger microSD card, and insert it into your BBB/BBG/BBGW.
• Hold the User button down while powering up. This requires using a chopstick, pencil, or other non-conductive rod to hold the button down while applying power, as the button is at the back left of the card and is completely covered over by the MFM emulator cape. The button can be released after all 4 LEDs light, then extinguish.
• Login to the image is debian with password temppwd. (Root remote login is disabled by default.)
• The software resides in /opt/mfm (so, /opt/mfm/emu/mfm_emu or /opt/mfm/mfm/mfm_read).
• Run the programs as the debian user; root access is no longer necessary.

This image has been tested by a few people using real hardware, including a PDP-11/23 (RQDX3), an IRIS 2400, and a TI Explorer (custom MFM-SCSI bridge). So far, there are no issues, and performance is improved in some cases - as it seems the latest kernel and runtime provides about a 30% base file system performance improvement over the existing 3.x image.

Cheers,
Joan @ DECromancer

[Joan Touzet]

A quick update to let folks know that David has looked this over and thinks it looks fine, but is too busy to merge the PR for a week or two. So, you still have time to test and request changes.

He also asked me to look at dealing with a bugfix for the Ethernet PHY reset issue, as Rev C3 BeagleBone Black boards now have a hardware change that can allow software GPIO reset to correctly initialize the PHY on boot. Today my proposed device tree overlay change to fix this was merged into the v5.10.x-ti tree. If you are running my test image, a "make install" from /opt/mfm or /opt/mfm/emu should pull this change to your image and it should be present on reboot. Once David merges my PR, I'll be sure to publish a refreshed image with that patch applied.

Cheers,

Joan @ DECromancer