[pkg-firebird-general] Firebird pkg on SPARC

[Daniel Smolik]

Damyan Ivanov napsal(a):
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> - -=| Daniel Smolik, 14.03.2007 23:14 |=-
> 
>>I would like to help developing FB pkg. I am not programmer but good
>>tester and have big experience with compiling under Linux.
>>I am specialy interested to debian SPARC package. If you would like test
>>some on SPARC let m know.
> 
> 
> Thanks for the generous offer :)
> 
> After your help on 1.5.3-sparc front, can you help me get 2.0 built also?
Yes  I can :-)

> 
> Currently, as you've already read, the build of 2.0.1rc1 fails with bus
> error at the first call of "create_db". create_db is a small,
> statically-linked program, whose purpose is to simply create an empty
> database file. For some reason, this program generates a BUS error on
> sparc, meaning that it accesses memory which is not properly aligned.
> 
When I try compile 1.5 it crashes too. But when I disable things about 
cpu and mcpu it compiles and run.

> (please don't get offended if I am too verbose in my explanations below.
> I don't assume anything about your abilities/knowledge. The only reason
> to be verbose is to ensure you have enough information to understand
> what I mean)
> 
> Why 1.5 builds ok and 2.0 fails is a mistery to me. I have zero
> experience with sparc, but from what I've heard, CPU has some
> constraints when accessing memory. For example, it requires that if a
> program accesses a 4-byte memory value that that value must start at an
> address that is multiple of 4 (like 0, 4, 8, etc). If a program tries to
> fetch a 4-byte value from address 3, it receives a BUS error.
It is true SPARC is big and i386 little endian or reverse :-)  is the 
same as my first computer Amiga. This problem is called unaligned access 
  Am I right ?

> 
> So, there is something wrong in the 2.0-related changes (probably not
> caused by debian patches) that make firebird2.0 access unaligned memory.
> To see what exactly happens, upstream developers need a backtrace.
> 
> Backtrace is a list of source lines, which the program was executing at
> the moment of the bus error. To get it, please do the following on sparc.
> 
> 1. Get the sources. The easiest way is to run "dget -x
> http://your.mirror.here/debian/pool/main/f/firebird2.0/firebird2.0_2.0.0.12748.ds1-5.dsc".
> dget is in the "devscripts" debian package. It will download the source
> package and extract it into ./firebird2.0-2.0.0.12748.ds1
> 2. cd firebird2.0-2.0.0.12748.ds1
> 3. Check that all packages needed for the build are present
>   dpkg-checkbuilddeps
> 4. disable the autoboot debian patch
>   edit debian/patches/series and place a dash before the line
> "autoboot.patch"
> 5. apply all patches
>   quilt push -a
> 3. run "./autogen.sh --enable-debug"
>   (this will require that autoconf is installed)
> 4. run "make"
> .. eventually, make is interrupted because of the bus error of create_db
> 5. get a backtrace: (gdb is in the gdb debian package)
>   export FIREBIRD=./gen/firebird
>   gdb gen/firebird/bin/create_db
>   ... gdb prints some messages ...
>   (gdb) run empty.fdb
> Program received signal SIGBUS, Bus error.
>   (gdb) bt
>   ... gdb shows the backtrace ...
> 
> All this is much easier if you have someone to ask when stuck. Please
> feel free to contact me on my Jabber ID "dam at jabber.minus273.org" or on
> IRC (I am "dam" on server irc.debian.org, usually I hang on
> #debian-devel). If you prefer some other instant messaging protocol -
> please say so and I'll try to reach you.
> 
> Thank you for your help so far and please keep it coming :)

my jabber id is ardent at njs.netlab.cz.

			Dan