ELKS 9 with many extra programs

[toncho11]

elks9.zip

1. Contains the new nano-X desktop. Start the desktop app with nxstart. It will allow you to point and click other nano-X apps. You can exit with Ctrl + A. Requires a serial mouse on COM1. Note that mouse is currently not supported with https://copy.sh/v86.

2. The new native compiler C toolchain (compiles code inside ELKS)
   Go to /usr/src and type make to compile all demo applications coded in C (or assmebler)
   You will get the following applications compiled from source in /usr/src :

• test - very simple program that prints some env variables
• vgatest
• paint - use left mouse button to draw, right to change color, requires serial mouse on COM1
• chess - a console chess game
• evtest - a console applications that tests for mouse and keyboard events

3. Three image view applications are available in /root for bmp, jpg and ppm images. Example images are in /root/images

4. Contains DOOM. Start it with elksdoom.os2 from /root. Might need memory reduce options for ELKS. This is the current git version, not an official release. It is compiled for large model with watcom.

5. lua 5.1
   The interpreter is in /usr/bin. Lua source code examples are in /usr/src. Try:

lua env.lua
lua hello.lua
lua xd.lua < /bin/yes

The xd.lua is a hex editor that will print the content of the program /bin/yes

[jhhoward]

Is there a branch or tag for this preview release if I wanted to compile from source?

Running in QEMU, the mouse motion when running nano-X appears to be inverted. I'm using the qemu.sh script from the repo so not sure if I need to change some settings in QEMU?

[toncho11]

No. The title a bit misleading. It is current 9 development branch of ELKS with lots of applications added - applications that are not part of the ELKS source tree.

[toncho11]

Mouse is OK on 86Box emulator. The mouse support in nano-X is compiled for slower systems currently.

[ghaerr]

Running in QEMU, the mouse motion when running nano-X appears to be inverted. I'm using the qemu.sh script

@jhhoward, I just tried this using elks9.img and qemu.sh, and the mouse is working properly. We support various mouse types, but this is compiled for Microsoft mouse, which QEMU is supposed to support by default. I'm wondering if this might be a QEMU version issue. What version are you running, I am running v5.2.0.

Is there a branch or tag for this preview release if I wanted to compile from source?

You can compile from source, but it is done from two repos (I assume you want to look at Nano-X, the 8086 toolchain requires three repos and and OWC installation). To compile from source, first pull down ELKS and build it normally. Then, clone Microwindows and the following make will build Nano-X and copy the binaries over to the ELKS image, providing that $TOPDIR= is set, which is done by ELKS setup:

$ cd /path/to/elks  # this is $TOPDIR
$ make
$ cd /path/to/microwindows/src 
$ make -f Makefile.elks clean
$ make -f Makefile.elks
$ cd $TOPDIR 
$ make kimage
$ ./qemu.sh

[ghaerr]

The mouse support in nano-X is compiled for slower systems currently.

Actually, the "slow support" mentioned in the mouse driver turns out to be no good, subject to closer inspection. So it isn't being used. The change for Nano-X on ELKS currently is cursor drawing, where an 8x8 cursor is being drawn, instead of 16x16, for speed. This is separate from any mouse support.

[toncho11]

$ cd /path/to/elks # this is $TOPDIR
$ make
$ cd /path/to/microwindows/src
$ make -f Makefile.elks clean
$ make -f Makefile.elks
$ cd $TOPDIR
$ make kimage
$ ./qemu.sh

Actually you might need an extra step to set the $TOPDIR to ELKS if you did not compile ELKS before that with ./build.sh:

$ cd /path/to/elks  # this is $TOPDIR
$ . ./env.sh #sets the variable $TOPDIR   <===================
$ make
$ cd /path/to/microwindows/src 
$ make -f Makefile.elks clean
$ make -f Makefile.elks
$ cd $TOPDIR 
$ make kimage
$ ./qemu.sh

[ghaerr]

Contains DOOM. Start it with elksdoom.os2 from /root. Might need memory reduce options for ELKS. This git version, not an official release.

I noticed your comments on elksdoom, did you get elksdoom to compile from source and run properly? Is this running in large or medium model, and does that match what was intended, or did you have to switch to large model in order to get it to run/compile?

[toncho11]

I used the current git version. It does compile, but I did changed the name of the abs() in ELKS doom function because it was in conflict with another function FrenkelS/elksdoom#10 (comment) Then I changed to ELKS Doom to compile to large model as this was the default for Watcom libc. After these two changes it does compile and run OK and I added it to the image above.

[rafael2k]

I just released a new elks's lua version with far memory fallback memory allocation, which allows memory allocation after the arena is exhausted. This allowed the pretty memory intense "life.lua" test to run correctly.

[rafael2k]

For those willing full-compatibility with stock Lua, I finished the port of Roberto's master branch head:
https://github.com/rafael2k/lua/tree/master

Using ELKS's OWC float functions already!