Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!munnari.oz.au!cluster!metro!gestetner!mykel
From: mykel@gestetner.oz (Michael Landers)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Floating point exceptions on Sun Workstations
Keywords: 68881 exception SunOS 4.0.1
Message-ID: <427@gestetner.oz>
Date: 23 Feb 90 04:56:08 GMT
Reply-To: mykel@gestetner.oz.au
Organization: Gestetner Laser Systems
Lines: 32

Unfortunately, I am asking this question for someone else, and I must say
I might not have a full grip on the problem, but here goes...

We are doing development on a Sun Workstation (3/60 with 68881 co-processor,
SunOS 4.0.1), in assembler.  The problem we have is that when the co-processor
gets an addressing exception, the Sun kernal doesn't seem to handle it
properly.  An example message is

	psi: USER COPROCESSOR PROTOCOL ERROR
	trap address 0x34, pid 3445, pc = 9e65e, sr = 4, stkfmt 9, context 5
	D0-D7  3 fdb62455 44d007db 0 44b239e7 44b291a3 44b1e349 44b29251
	A0-A7  efff84c d384c 0 d3fcc d384c efff9b8 efff83c

Sometimes these exceptions cause the program to crash (not _too_ bad), but
often the exception causes the machine to crash.

What I want to know is, is there anyone else doing development on Sun's in
this manner that has come across this problem, and if so, what has been
done as a work around?  It is making it very difficult to debug anything if
the machine constantly crashes.

Response by EMail preferred but not required.

Thanks in Advance,

Mykel
--
 ()                                  \\     Black Wind always follows
|\/|ykel Landers (mykel@gestetner.oz) \\    Where my black horse rides.
_||_    Gestetner Laser Systems        \\   Fire's in my soul
Phone: 612 975 0555  Fax: 612 975 0448  \\  Steel is on my side.
ACSnet: mykel@gestetner.oz.au	Internet: mykel@gestetner.oz.au@uunet.uu.net