Squeak on framebuffer?

Kevin Fisher kgf at golden.net
Tue Mar 26 18:17:28 UTC 2002


On Tue, Mar 26, 2002 at 11:17:26PM +0530, Mayuresh Kathe wrote:
> I was wondering about framebuffer because, then we can build low costing,
> solid state computers running Squeak (for schools).

Absolutely!  Plus, I like the novelty of running without X as well. :)

> 
> BTW, where did you get the framebuffer version of Squeak?
> How big was it (other than the image)
> 
> ~Mayuresh

Well, I don't believe there is an official framebuffer-enabled squeak
to be found anywhere...I hacked my own code up from bits and pieces of
other people's code, primarily the Helio and Itsy code (you'll probably
find references to at least one of them on http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak).
I wasn't really successful with it, not having a very good grasp of the
framebuffer (or even the orignial Xlib code).

It's been over a year since I tried, but I believe the resultant VM executable
was notably smaller than the X11-linked one (and this was an unoptimized
ARM executable).  Sorry, I don't remember specific file sizes. :)
There are others on this list that have better experience with the
framebuffer that probably know, however.

On the other hand, the people at handhelds.org have some good arguments for
keeping X (specifically Jim Gettys)...the framebuffer X server they use on
the iPaq is remarkably small and lightweight.  They've done some marvellous
work weeding out the old unused bits and slimming XFree86 down...keep
in mind that this runs on low-memory handhelds (16 meg ram, typically, with
lots of space left over for other applications).  The advantages of
continuing to use X is the application base, of course.

If you look at the configuration options for building Xfree86, you can 
really streamline the executable.


> 
> 
> > From: Kevin Fisher <kgf at golden.net>
> > Reply-To: squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> > Date: Tue, 26 Mar 2002 12:43:21 -0500
> > To: squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> > Subject: Re: Squeak on framebuffer?
> > 
> > Framebuffer would be neat, but I think a better idea would be an SDL-enabled
> > Squeak...that way we could support any graphical target, whether it be
> > X11, framebuffer or OpenGL (not to mention the different sound output targets
> > SDL knows about).
> > 
> > I once tried to get framebuffer Squeak running on my iPaq, but not being very
> > graphics-saavy, I didn't get very far (I did get the Morphic interface to
> > draw on the screen, but the colours were screwed up, and no pen/mouse input).
> > I pieced together some framebuffer code from various sources to make it
> > work...I think the bulk of it was a modified version of the Helio framebuffer
> > code.  Eventually I just gave up on it. :)
> > 
> > 
> > On Tue, Mar 26, 2002 at 10:57:58PM +0530, Mayuresh Kathe wrote:
> >> Hi,
> >> 
> >> Does anyone have an idea about how to get Squeak running on raw framebuffer?
> >> 
> >> That way we can really do away with the (sic) X Windowing System...
> >> 
> >> ~Mayuresh
> >> 
> >> 
> > 
> > 
> 
> 



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