Category Archives: Arca Noae

ACPI package version 3.23.03 released

Arca Noae is pleased to announce the immediate availability of our ACPI Package for OS/2 and eComStation version 3.23.03.

This release contains the following changes:

Updated to ACPICA 20160831.
Added support for up to 64 interrupts.
Removed automatic fallback to VW if too many interrupts. Use of /VW is discouraged. Use of /VW can cause failures on modern hardware.
Some minor fixes to the Warpin installer.

This driver package is available for download from the Arca Noae website as part of your Arca Noae OS/2 & eCS Drivers and Software Subscription. Please log into your account in order to access your software.

More information about the ACPI Package may be found in the ACPI wiki.

If you haven’t yet purchased a software subscription, this is a great reason to do so now.

New MultiMac NIC driver package (20161008) released

Arca Noae is pleased to announce the immediate availability of a new release of our MultiMac NIC driver package.

This release is a refresh of the 20161005 package. There was a problem in the system library which affected all drivers in the package. If you previously installed the 20161005 package, you are strongly encouraged to download and install this package to update your drivers.

This package is just a refresh of the 20161005 release so the information for that release is the same for this one and is repeated here:

An updated E1000B driver.
An updated MMALE driver.
An updated MMLEM driver.
An updated MMRE driver.
An updated MMAE driver.
An updated MMALC driver.
A new MMIGB driver for older Intel NICs.
A new MMSK driver for SysKonnect SK-NET NICs.
All the other drivers are not changed at all. In fact, they are the same files that were distributed in the last release simply copied into this current release for convenience.

Note that when you install this package, four of the drivers are marked as untested (MMAE, MMALC, MMIGB, MMSK) and are not automatically selected for installation. This means that the developer does not have the hardware to test these drivers and could not get someone to test them. If you want to use these drivers, you must select them on the packages page of the installer. If you use one of these four drivers and would like to become the official tester for it, please see the info section of the .txt file for the driver (mmae.txt for example) after installation, or the ReadMe on the wiki.

As always, please read the .txt file that comes with each driver and also provided on the wiki. If you have problems with any of the drivers in this release, please read the Debugging Guide in the wiki first. If your problem cannot be resolved with the Debugging Guide, then the problem should be reported to the ticketing system. Simply log in with your Arca Noae credentials, select MultiMac from the list of projects, and open a ticket.

This driver package is available for download from the Arca Noae website as part of your Arca Noae OS/2 & eCS drivers and software package subscription. Please log into your account in order to access your software.

If you haven’t yet purchased a software subscription, this is a great reason to do so now.

More information about the MultiMac NIC drivers may be found in the wiki.

New MultiMac NIC driver package (20161005) released

Arca Noae is pleased to announce the immediate availability of a new release of our MultiMac NIC driver package.

More information about the MultiMac NIC drivers may be found in the wiki.

New in this release:

An updated E1000B driver.
An updated MMALE driver.
An updated MMLEM driver.
An updated MMRE driver.
An updated MMAE driver.
An updated MMALC driver.
A new MMIGB driver for older Intel NICs.
A new MMSK driver for SysKonnect SK-NET NICs.
All the other drivers are not changed at all. In fact, they are the same files that were distributed in the last release simply copied into this current release for convenience.

If you haven’t yet purchased a software subscription, this is a great reason to do so now.

Arca Noae Package Manager: Spanish language pack now available and French refreshed

Arca Noae Package Manager has been refreshed to include support for the Spanish language pack (thanks to Alfredo Fernández Díaz for the translation). Note that this pack does not yet include a translated help file.

The French language pack for Arca Noae Package Manager has been refreshed to address a typo which caused the Preferences menu item to revert to English.

Arca Noae Package Manager is available in English with Dutch, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Swedish language packs (more languages to be added).

This open source utility is available to everyone, free of charge, regardless whether you have an Arca Noae software subscription.

Please review the wiki for important first-time installation notes and other tips.

ACPI package version 3.23.02 released

Arca Noae is pleased to announce the immediate availability of our ACPI Package for OS/2 and eComStation version 3.23.02.

This release contains the following changes:

Updated to ACPICA 20160527. ACPI 6.1 is now supported.
Fixed some issues with toolkit programs
There are toolkit changes with this version.

More information about the ACPI Package may be found in the ACPI wiki.

If you haven’t yet purchased a software subscription, this is a great reason to do so now.

How’s your NetDrive?

NetDrive for OS/2 is an essential connectivity tool for OS/2 and derivative operating systems, including eComStation. This week, NetDrive 3.1.5 has been released, addressing a couple minor issues and enabling the use of the updated plugin for SFTP connections, now available from the Arca Noae store. NetDrive 3.1.5 is a free upgrade for existing NetDrive 3 licensees.

You may purchase new or additional licenses for NetDrive and a number of commercial plugins from our store.

Arca Noae’s support of open source projects: Ports and more by bww bitwise works GmbH

Following our last installment in this series which focused on Arca Noae’s commitment to Firefox development, we thought that pulling back the focus a little to give a broader perspective might be a good idea.

Development of various open source ports by our strategic partner, bww bitwise works, GmbH, enables building Firefox, Thunderbird, SeaMonkey, and many, many other modern and useful applications and components. While the Ports project is hosted at Netlabs, the bulk of the heavy lifting is done by bww bitwise works, with the resulting work product made available free of charge to everyone.

These packages are installable via YUM and RPM at the command line or via the free, easy-to-use, native OS/2 Arca Noae Package Manager (ANPM), straight from the OS/2 desktop.

Similarly, the Samba for OS/2 and OS/2-based systems project allows OS/2 to stay connected to the rest of the world – all for free, and this is just one more example of the great things this team is doing.

Sponsoring this critical work helps to ensure that new releases of Firefox, Thunderbird, SeaMonkey, and other cutting edge technologies are available on OS/2. If you utilize any of these technologies, and wish to see new ports, continuing maintenance for existing ports, or just want to say “thanks,” please visit our store and sponsor them.

Arca Noae needs your help

In order to make the installation of Blue Lion as smooth and intuitive as possible, we need to update and maintain an extensive database of hardware we are likely to encounter during installation and the drivers associated with the various devices installed in current machines.

Luckily, during the installation of eComStation, a file is created: MACHINE.CFG, stored in <boot drive>\ecs\install\rsp. This file contains all of the relevant data we need to update our current database.

We are asking for community assistance to gather as many MACHINE.CFG files as possible. If you have installed eComStation systems, please attach the MACHINE.CFG file from each one to an email (you may attach multiple files to a single email or send separate ones) addressed to hardware-info at arcanoae dot com. This file should not contain any personally identifiable information, but to be sure, please review before attaching.

Many thanks from the Blue Lion Dev Team for your assistance!

Arca Noae’s support of open source projects: Firefox

Did you know that Arca Noae provides ongoing funding for continued Firefox development and maintenance on the OS/2 platform? Firefox development by our strategic partner, bww bitwise works, GmbH, enables building Thunderbird and SeaMonkey, too, as well as many ancillary components which are used by other programs, so like the space program, there are other technologies which grow out of this work and allow OS/2 users to get more out of their investment.

Sponsoring this important work helps to ensure that new releases of Firefox, Thunderbird, and SeaMonkey are available to all. The Mozilla for OS/2 Project aims to keep relatively close to the official Extended Support Release (ESR) cycle for Firefox as outlined by Mozilla, with additional components released as they are ported and/or developed along the way.

Convenience of shutdown/poweroff in a virtual machine

At one time, shutting down an OS/2 guest under VirtualBox meant full shutdown and virtual powerdown. With recent versions of VirtualBox (5.x), however, this has not been the case.

We’ve noticed, and we’ve done some work to address this.

Did you know that Arca Noae’s ACPI driver runs just fine under these latest builds of VirtualBox? Using the ACPI driver, it is possible to configure the OS/2 (or eComStation) guest machine for complete poweroff using ACPI, just as you might configure a physical workstation.

If you’ve thought that the Arca Noae Drivers and Software subscription didn’t bring value to your virtual OS/2 experience, think again. Now is a great time to subscribe.