[Simh] VAX Simulator 99.9% CPU , and flush nvram never finishes .

[James W. Laferriere]

Hello All , I am noticing a VERY High cpu with JUST simh running and it
does not reduce over time . Any ideas ? Hopefully everything needed is below .

Tia , JimL


*** Exiting with this configuration never returns from the below
writing buffer .

sim> exit
Goodbye
NVR: writing buffer to file


*** the TOP output below is with simh sitting at the sim> prompt no boot has
been issued .

top - 15:03:32 up 1 day, 21:10, 2 users, load average: 0.97, 0.44, 0.20
Tasks: 107 total, 1 running, 106 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
Cpu(s): 99.7%us, 0.3%sy, 0.0%ni, 0.0%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st
Mem: 1012484k total, 935692k used, 76792k free, 175564k buffers
Swap: 8388604k total, 608k used, 8387996k free, 304496k cached

PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
14162 vaxuser 20 0 692m 29m 5076 S 99.6 2.9 2:34.66 vaxX
...snip...


sim> sh ver
VAXStation 3900 (KA655) simulator V4.0-0 Current
Simulator Framework Capabilities:
64b data
64b addresses
Threaded Ethernet Packet transports:PCAP:TAP:NAT:UDP
Idle/Throttling support is available
Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) support
RAW disk and CD/DVD ROM support
Asynchronous I/O support (Lock free asynchronous event queue)
Asynchronous Clock support
FrontPanel API Version 12
Host Platform:
Compiler: GCC 4.8.2
Simulator Compiled as C arch: x64 (Debug Build) on Apr 15 2018 at 18:06:09
Memory Access: Little Endian
Memory Pointer Size: 64 bits
Large File (>2GB) support
SDL Video support: SDL Version 1.2.15
PCRE RegEx (Version 8.39 2016-06-14) support for EXPECT commands
OS clock resolution: 1ms
Time taken by msleep(1): 1ms
OS: Linux ns4 3.10.17 #2 SMP Wed Oct 23 16:34:38 CDT 2013 x86_64 AMD Opteron(tm) Processor 6376 AuthenticAMD GNU/Linux

on VMWare 6.5

git commit id: c8beee2d
git commit time: 2018-04-15T12:53:29-07:00


***@ns4:~$ cat /home/vaxuser/bin/vaxX.ini
;
; Setup Logging point for vax(simh) errors and what not
;
set log /home/vaxuser/LOGS/vaxX.log
;
; Set Memory size and idle the cpu
;
; SET CPU EXTEND ; No longer functional/needed .
SET CPU 512M
SET CPU IDLE=VMS
SET CPU MODEL=VAXStation
;
; LOAD the cpu binary ie: the Vax emulator
;
LOAD -r /home/vaxuser/VAX-DISKS/ka655x.bin
;
; Define a NonVolatileRam location
;
ATTACH nvr /home/vaxuser/VAX-DISKS/vaxX-nvram.bin
;
; Define some disk types and sizes
; RQ0 is first disk on controller DU(a)
;
;SET RQ0 RA92
SET -L RQ0 RAUSER=8380080
ATTACH RQ0 /home/vaxuser/VAX-DISKS/vaxX-vms-rq0.dsk
;
; RQ1 set to be a RA92 ~= 1.5GB
;
SET RQ1 RA92
ATTACH RQ1 /home/vaxuser/VAX-DISKS/vaxX-vms-rq1.dsk
;
; Set RQ2 as a cdrom type rrd40
;
SET RQ2 RRD40
ATTACH RQ2 /home/vaxuser/VAX-INSTALL-MEDIA/VMS-7_2-ODS-cdrom.iso
;
; Set some parameters for the DH(u|v)11
;
set VH ENABLE
attach VH 65000
set VH lines=8
set VH0 MODEM
set VH0 HANGUP

;
; Disable some unused devices
;
SET CR DISABLE
SET LPT DISABLE
SET DZ DISABLE
SET RL DISABLE
SET TS DISABLE
SET RY DISABLE
SET TQ DISABLE
;
; Setup and attach networking
;
;set debug stderr
SET XQ MAC=08-00-2B-33-44-55
set xq type=delqa
ATTACH XQ tap0
;
; Set break mode .
; Note: ^E will always get you to SIM> prompt .
;
set cpu conhalt
;set cpu simhalt
;
; Show the config
;
show config
;
; To enable auto boot in SIMH .
;
;dep bdr 0
;
; Start emulator .
;
;BOOT CPU

[Mark Pizzolato]

Post by James W. Laferriere
Hello All , I am noticing a VERY High cpu with JUST simh running and it
does not reduce over time . Any ideas ? Hopefully everything needed is below .
Tia , JimL
*** Exiting with this configuration never returns from the below
writing buffer .
sim> exit
Goodbye
NVR: writing buffer to file
*** the TOP output below is with simh sitting at the sim> prompt no boot has
been issued .
top - 15:03:32 up 1 day, 21:10, 2 users, load average: 0.97, 0.44, 0.20
Tasks: 107 total, 1 running, 106 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
Cpu(s): 99.7%us, 0.3%sy, 0.0%ni, 0.0%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st
Mem: 1012484k total, 935692k used, 76792k free, 175564k buffers
Swap: 8388604k total, 608k used, 8387996k free, 304496k cached
PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
14162 vaxuser 20 0 692m 29m 5076 S 99.6 2.9 2:34.66 vaxX
...snip...
sim> sh ver
VAXStation 3900 (KA655) simulator V4.0-0 Current
64b data
64b addresses
Threaded Ethernet Packet transports:PCAP:TAP:NAT:UDP
Idle/Throttling support is available
Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) support
RAW disk and CD/DVD ROM support
Asynchronous I/O support (Lock free asynchronous event queue)
Asynchronous Clock support
FrontPanel API Version 12
Compiler: GCC 4.8.2
Simulator Compiled as C arch: x64 (Debug Build) on Apr 15 2018 at 18:06:09
Memory Access: Little Endian
Memory Pointer Size: 64 bits
Large File (>2GB) support
SDL Video support: SDL Version 1.2.15
PCRE RegEx (Version 8.39 2016-06-14) support for EXPECT commands
OS clock resolution: 1ms
Time taken by msleep(1): 1ms
OS: Linux ns4 3.10.17 #2 SMP Wed Oct 23 16:34:38 CDT 2013 x86_64 AMD
Opteron(tm) Processor 6376 AuthenticAMD GNU/Linux

on VMWare 6.5

git commit id: c8beee2d
git commit time: 2018-04-15T12:53:29-07:00

Hi James,

Hmmm...

First, please try the lastest GitHub code.

Second, I see you've built the simulator with video support, but you're not using any Video device in your configuration. Additionally, I see that you're working with the older SDL version 1 video. SDL version 1 was needed when video capabilities were first added to simh, but at this point libSDL Version 2 is available on essentially all interesting host platforms, so libSDL1 is deprecated and some changes coming in the near future will remove any attempt to support it.
Try installing the libSDL Version 2 development package and rebuilding the simulator.

Third, unless you're preparing to dig deeply under the covers, you probably want to run the optimized vs debug build of the simulator.

Let us know where this takes you.

- Mark

[James W. Laferriere]

Hello Mark , ...

Post by Mark Pizzolato

Post by James W. Laferriere
Hello All , I am noticing a VERY High cpu with JUST simh running and it
does not reduce over time . Any ideas ? Hopefully everything needed is below .

...snip...

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Hi James,
Hmmm...
First, please try the lastest GitHub code.

Done ...

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Second, I see you've built the simulator with video support, but you're not using any Video device in your configuration. Additionally, I see that you're working with the older SDL version 1 video. SDL version 1 was needed when video capabilities were first added to simh, but at this point libSDL Version 2 is available on essentially all interesting host platforms, so libSDL1 is deprecated and some changes coming in the near future will remove any attempt to support it.
Try installing the libSDL Version 2 development package and rebuilding the simulator.

I have downloaded and compliled up SDL2-2.0.8 , Tho not installed it
for the above and below test . But it will be soonest .

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Third, unless you're preparing to dig deeply under the covers, you probably want to run the optimized vs debug build of the simulator.

Done . The High CPU usage is now gone . Though the never returning to
command line prompt on 'exit' is still an issue . I have to issue a ctrl-Z and
then 'kill -HUP %1' to have the process stop . Also fmi is there a way to
get simh to flush output to the logfiles when it gets into such a state ? Some
signal or tool ?

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Let us know where this takes you.
- Mark

Tia , JimL

[Mark Pizzolato]

Hi James,

Post by James W. Laferriere

Post by Mark Pizzolato

Post by James W. Laferriere
Hello All , I am noticing a VERY High cpu with JUST simh running
and it does not reduce over time . Any ideas ? Hopefully everything
needed is below .

...snip...

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Hi James,
Hmmm...
First, please try the lastest GitHub code.

Done ...

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Second, I see you've built the simulator with video support, but you're not

using any Video device in your configuration. Additionally, I see that you're
working with the older SDL version 1 video. SDL version 1 was needed when
video capabilities were first added to simh, but at this point libSDL Version 2 is
available on essentially all interesting host platforms, so libSDL1 is deprecated
and some changes coming in the near future will remove any attempt to
support it.

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Try installing the libSDL Version 2 development package and rebuilding the

simulator.
I have downloaded and compliled up SDL2-2.0.8 , Tho not installed it
for the above and below test . But it will be soonest .

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Third, unless you're preparing to dig deeply under the covers, you probably

want to run the optimized vs debug build of the simulator.
Done . The High CPU usage is now gone . Though the never returning
to command line prompt on 'exit' is still an issue . I have to issue a ctrl-Z and
then 'kill -HUP %1' to have the process stop . Also fmi is there a way to get
simh to flush output to the logfiles when it gets into such a state ? Some signal
or tool ?

Nothing special like this should be needed. The hanging behavior you're seeing
it broken and unexpected. We'll fix that and no extra mechanism will be needed.

Please identify what your host OS is. I can see it is some Linux version, but what distribution and version?

Meanwhile, please provide the output produced when building the simulator, and the output of SHOW VERSION from the sim> prompt after you've made changes.

If the build is finding libSDL (version 1), then presumably it was installed by some
OS package system. Uninstall the libsdl-dev package and rebuild and run the
simulator.

Post by James W. Laferriere

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Let us know where this takes you.

- Mark

[James W. Laferriere]

Hello Mark , ... Thank you ...

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Hi James,

Post by Mark Pizzolato

Post by Mark Pizzolato

Post by James W. Laferriere
Hello All , I am noticing a VERY High cpu with JUST simh running
and it does not reduce over time . Any ideas ? Hopefully everything
needed is below .

...snip...

Post by Mark Pizzolato

Post by Mark Pizzolato

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Third, unless you're preparing to dig deeply under the covers, you probably

want to run the optimized vs debug build of the simulator.
Done . The High CPU usage is now gone . Though the never returning
to command line prompt on 'exit' is still an issue . I have to issue a ctrl-Z and
then 'kill -HUP %1' to have the process stop . Also fmi is there a way to get
simh to flush output to the logfiles when it gets into such a state ? Some signal
or tool ?

Nothing special like this should be needed. The hanging behavior you're seeing
it broken and unexpected. We'll fix that and no extra mechanism will be needed.
Please identify what your host OS is. I can see it is some Linux version, but what distribution and version?

slackware 14.1 , running under VMWare 6.5 .

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Meanwhile, please provide the output produced when building the simulator,

and the output of SHOW VERSION from the sim> prompt after you've made changes.
zipd up and attached . This is a report of git commit time:
2018-05-23T15:52:08-07:00 , Still with the SDL v1 .
Show version is below Your .sig .

Post by Mark Pizzolato
If the build is finding libSDL (version 1), then presumably it was installed by some
OS package system. Uninstall the libsdl-dev package and rebuild and run the
simulator.

I'll do so , Just not tonight .

Post by Mark Pizzolato

Post by Mark Pizzolato

Post by Mark Pizzolato
Let us know where this takes you.

- Mark

sim> show version
VAXStation 3900 (KA655) simulator V4.0-0 Current
Simulator Framework Capabilities:
64b data
64b addresses
Threaded Ethernet Packet transports:PCAP:TAP:NAT:UDP
Idle/Throttling support is available
Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) support
RAW disk and CD/DVD ROM support
Asynchronous I/O support (Lock free asynchronous event queue)
Asynchronous Clock support
FrontPanel API Version 12
Host Platform:
Compiler: GCC 4.8.2
Simulator Compiled as C arch: x64 (Release Build) on May 23 2018 at 17:03:36
Memory Access: Little Endian
Memory Pointer Size: 64 bits
Large File (>2GB) support
SDL Video support: SDL Version 1.2.15
PCRE RegEx (Version 8.39 2016-06-14) support for EXPECT commands
OS clock resolution: 1ms
Time taken by msleep(1): 1ms
OS: Linux ns4 3.10.17 #2 SMP Wed Oct 23 16:34:38 CDT 2013 x86_64 AMD
Opteron(tm) Processor 6376 AuthenticAMD GNU/Linux
git commit id: ef94dcbe
git commit time: 2018-05-23T15:52:08-07:00
sim>

[James W. Laferriere]

Hello Mark , ... Below is a ver_linux print for my system .

$ /usr/src/linux/scripts/ver_linux
If some fields are empty or look unusual you may have an old version.
Compare to the current minimal requirements in Documentation/Changes.

Linux ns4 3.10.17 #2 SMP Wed Oct 23 16:34:38 CDT 2013 x86_64 AMD Opteron(tm)
Processor 6376 AuthenticAMD GNU/Linux

Gnu C 4.8.2
Gnu make 3.82
binutils 2.23.52.0.1.20130226
util-linux 2.21.2
mount support
module-init-tools 15
e2fsprogs 1.42.8
jfsutils 1.1.15
reiserfsprogs 3.6.23
xfsprogs 3.1.11
pcmciautils 017
quota-tools 3.17.
PPP 2.4.5
Linux C Library 2.17
Dynamic linker (ldd) 2.17
Linux C++ Library 6.0.18
Procps 3.2.8
Net-tools 1.60
Kbd 1.15.3
oprofile 0.9.7
Sh-utils 8.21
wireless-tools 29
Modules Loaded nfnetlink_queue nfnetlink_log nfnetlink bluetooth rfkill
tun vmw_vsock_vmci_transport vsock lp ppdev parport_pc parport hid_generic
usbhid hid fuse crc32_pclmul processor crc32c_intel evdev shpchp thermal_sys
intel_agp vmw_vmci vmw_balloon psmouse serio_raw vmwgfx ttm drm
ghash_clmulni_intel microcode vmxnet3 intel_gtt agpgart i2c_piix4 uhci_hcd
ehci_pci i2c_core ehci_hcd freq_table hwmon ac button loop