Greetings fellow NeXT peeps.
In my thinking about NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP...and the limited amount of Black hardware out there...and reading a post about Previous on a Raspberry Pi 3...a thought struck me...could a Raspberry Pi running Previous and an install of OPENSTEP be the basis for a full-on NeXT file/NetInfo server with 24GB of disk space online?
First, I put that question out there for consideration. If in fact it is possible to do this...
Second...create a document [with no assumptions] on how to build, from the ground up an installation of Raspberry Pi OS, how to install Previous from the CLI and then eventually integrating that into a network.
Why am I asking for this? I have some, but not all experience at the CLI. Posts I've seen kind of go into the places to get or to do 'something' related to a build. This document would lay it out, in plain and simple terms so that anyone looking to use a Pi to emulate NeXTSTEP or OPENSTEP can do it with little or limited knowledge. The same would hold true if they wanted to have a full-on server.
Some topics to consider:
1. Pre-requisites [what kind of Pi hardware would be supported?]
2. What version of Raspberry Pi OS to install? Lite or full? 32 or 64 bit?
3. How to properly get, install and compile Previous.
4. What considerations need to be taken into account when building? [in Previous, with the OS, etc.]
5. What limitations could there be?
6. Maintenance concerns
This goes out into the world, with the hopes of gaining more knowledge....and maybe all of the needed information to build an in-depth how to document. =)
There is a console mode when you login with user name "console".
I don't know how many extra cycles that provides to the emulator as you won't be doing any graphics code.
I also don't know how booting headless works with NS3.3/OS4.2 and how many cycles that would save the emulator.
Since Previous is based on Hatari it should be possible to do something similar than what is described at the following link to run Previous directly on a Raspberry Pi with a minimal Raspberrypi OS installation:
https://datapulp.de/atari/2022-06-06-hatari-on-raspberry-pi-without-x11/
@don_apple Thank you for this information! This is EXACTLY the kind of document I wanna produce for us NeXT peeps wanting to do the same thing. There's a lot that I can get from that posting. Now, if I can just get the bits and bobs needed to install and compile Previous under Linux...gonna be half way there.
Hello Jason: Great Idea , I'll see what I can do to help , talking with you on the phone currently ! Best regards Rob Blessin
Just found this via mastodon.social/@layered@chaos.social/115089547723290402 (
https://mastodon.social/@layered@chaos.social/115089547723290402) and thought it might be of interest here:
layered.work/nextstep-on-rpi5-en/ (
https://layered.work/nextstep-on-rpi5-en/)
The first paragraph provides following description:
»Previous Emulator Installation on a Raspberry Pi 5
In this guide, I'll show you step-by-step how to install NeXTSTEP 3.3 on a Raspberry Pi 5 using the Previous emulator. This guide is based on Raspberry Pi OS Lite to create a minimal system that boots directly into the NeXTSTEP interface after startup.«
I wonder what kind of excution speed can be expected on such hardware.
EDIT: This video answers my question regarding "excution speed on such hardware": layered.work/media/files/NeXTSTEP-Boot.mp4 (
https://layered.work/media/files/NeXTSTEP-Boot.mp4)
Quote from: wmlive on August 25, 2025, 09:50:16 AMlayered.work/nextstep-on-rpi5-en/ (https://layered.work/nextstep-on-rpi5-en/)
Thanks for finding that link @wmlive ! I saw it on Mastodon as well and I wanted to make sure it was shared here. I was also wondering about performance. It was painful watching that video of it booting at 33MHz. But I think his settings set it at 33 MHz and he is also running the dimension board. So I bet if you turn off dimension and bump up the frequency it would run much faster.