[E3-hacking] E2 hackery & coding

[David Given]

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Dave Mills wrote:
[...]
> I've been given an E2, it has never been connected to the 'phone line,
> so is still running factory fresh software. Has anyone managed to get
> their own code running on one of these beasts? Any pointers on where to
> start?

Yes, it's actually fairly straightforward, provided you have the special
cable. I have some information here:

http://www.cowlark.com/amstrad/index.html

Once you have the cable, you can use pblq to upload code via the serial
cable or to reflash it. Be aware that pblq 0.2 is a bit old; I was in
the process of working on it when I managed to fry my E2. I'll try and
get 0.3 up on the website soon, along with some more technical stuff I
figured out.

You should be aware that the E2's processor has no MMU, which means you
can't run normal Linux on it. Porting ucLinux is quite possible but most
likely a horrible job. I was partway through porting Prex (a rather nice
little Minix-like embedded OS) onto mine when I my UART esplode, but
I'll I managed was the boot loader and the very basics of the kernel
startup procedure; so while running custom code on an E2 isn't hard,
there's not a lot of code to run...

- --
David Given
dg at cowlark.com
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