#plptools update!

Ports

The #HaikuOS port works with on-board serial ports. However, USB RS232 adapters do not work. This is because of an issue with the usb_serial driver in Haiku. DTR and RTS can't be set reliably, and RTS and CTS can't be detected.

There is still one small issue with the Haiku port. A GNU regex test in ./configure is segfaulting. This can be bypassed, but we want it fixed. That involves delving into autotools, so we'll see how I get on!

Both the #FreeBSD and #NetBSD ports are working! With a combination of brute force and the help of a few FediFolk, these now compile. (I did think that the NetBSD port was severely broken, but I was just using the wrong serial device. Sigh.)

MacOS is still stable and happy.

We're not planning on adding any more ports unless people really beg!

Bugs

Just a handful of small fixes, like plpftp not segfaulting any more when you press CTRL-C. I might have introduced a new bug into plpftp regarding Daylight Savings... I'll try to fix that soon. In my defence, Psion's implementation of DST is, to put it politely, rudimentary.

We have a working #plptools port for #FreeBSD!

#NetBSD people! I need some help. (EDIT: Answer found! Thank you, @kaveman !)

I'm trying to update the port of an old piece of software (#plptools), but I'm having issues with linking it to readline.

It's detecting libedit first, even though FSF readline is installed. The following does nothing:

CPPFLAGS="-I/usr/pkg/include/readline/" LDFLAGS="-L/usr/pkg/lib/" ./configure

Adding LIBS="-lreadline" throws an error early on in ./configure, saying that it can't find libreadline.so.8.

Do you have any advice at all?

The GitHub issue is here: https://github.com/plptools/plptools/issues/22#issuecomment-2954149613

#HaikuOS users with USB RS232 adapters! I need some help.

I'm trying to get an old piece of software working with Haiku that uses serial comms (see #plptools). I'm having some issues with DTR/DSR/RTS/CTS checking and setting, but it would be great if someone else can check my findings.

See this link for more information on my tests and results: https://discuss.haiku-os.org/t/porting-plptools-to-haiku/16849/7

Are you able to replicate what I'm seeing?

Current main projects:

• #plptools: Resurrecting old ports (#FreeBSD, #NetBSD) and working on a new port to #HaikuOS. It's an opportunity to get more familiar with the code and maybe find bugs along the way.

Upcoming projects:

• #CTRAN: Still haven't started writing unit tests. Also, complete a full write-up of what it took to get the thing working.
• Get my website running #GoHugo.
• Rebuild of DEATH, my Microserver gen8, probably with #FreeBSD. (Yes, it's been over a year since DEATH's RAID died.)
• Pick another SIBO SDK tool to rewrite. (Probably EMAKE or RCOMP.)
• Add a 17V boost converter to #PsiDrive.
• Make #fefstool create FEFS images. (I'm half-tempted to rewrite fefstool in Pascal to make it easier for me to finish.)

You'll notice that some of these projects have been sitting for a while. I've struggled to get going with things this year. I'm hoping that working though plptools will give me some mental energy to get going with other things.

#plptools update!

Haiku

The #HaikuOS port is now mostly working, with caveats. Everything compiles except plpfuse, which might require migrating plpfuse to FUSE3. I've been able to send and receive files using plpftp, but RS232 DSR checking has to be disabled in the code. I don't want to speak too soon as it could very well be my mistake, but there might be a bug in Haiku's implementation of ioctl() for serial ports. Stay tuned...

FreeBSD

The #FreeBSD port currently has issues with linking to readline, but I'm sure that's fixable. However, a different issue has come up involving FreeBSD's implementation of the timezone global variable. This, in turn, might have uncovered some very old, slightly iffy code when working out timezone offsets.

Other platforms

The #macOS port is running fine at the moment, thanks to @captfab and @jbmorley's sterling work. If you're on macOS, check out Reconnect.

I'd like to resurrect the #NetBSD port for a few reasons, not least because you can still run the current release of NetBSD on a Series 5. I have no experience with NetBSD, so that's my challenge for this afternoon.

There are indications that plptools has at some point worked on #HPUX, #IRIX and #AIX. I personally feel that these ports probably don't need to be resurrected.

The code also mentions #Solaris - I'd certainly consider working on an #IllumOS port, if people were interested.

Interestingly, there's no mention of #OpenBSD, but again I would consider working on that if people are interested.

This is very much a *NIX/POSIX suite of tools. A Windows port isn't going to happen any time soon, unless someone wants to try building it using cygwin. I'm not saying it will never happen, but it's not a priority.

Misc

A couple of small bugs have been squashed by Reuben, including an issue where logging didn't go to stdout when using the --autoexit switch.

Some #Psion news! #plptools, the open source suite of programs for transferring files to and from #EPOC16 and #EPOC32 devices, has some additional maintainers: @captfab, @jbmorley ... and me!

We're looking into how we can take the project into the future. We do have some ideas, but we're taking a considered approach to future development.

plptools currently runs on Linux and macOS (and possibly FreeBSD, NetBSD, Solaris, AIX and HP-UX, although these haven't been tested in a while). I've started work on porting it to #HaikuOS.

The repo has been moved to a new GitHub organisation, which you can find here. https://github.com/plptools/plptools

After a fair amount of pointer-wrangling, #EDisAsm can now dump SSDs to another SSD or the RAMDRIVE as a file.

Why is this useful?

1. People using #plptools can't use the `dumpssd` command because it pushes to C: over serial. This will let them pull the dump instead.

2. Peripheral ROMs (3Link/3Fax) can now be dumped! Just use `savessd c m` to save to RAM.

It's only in the Git version ATM. I'll make a proper release once I've done some cleaning up.