Returning to QEMU after a couple years

[ThePuzzledBoy]

Hey-o!

So, I last tried QEMU back in December 2016 (as detailed in this thread from around that time), back when I used Windows. In that time, I've since switched to Linux, specifically Xubuntu LTS, and now I'd like to see what's changed in QEMU since then.

My main questions are:

1. How can I setup QEMU and the prerequisites for OS9 on Linux, and (if necessary) what are the compilation instructions (and, if needed, the specific commit)? Or instead of the specific commit, can I just go to the releases page on the Github and work my way from there?
2. How do I scale/resize the VM? (I do recall a key-combo, but I've naturally forgotten it since then)
3. Can I run OS9 and OSX Tiger on the same VM? (Or would it be a better idea to run them seperately?)
4. Has the mouse cursor glitch been fixed? (That was one of two issues that drove me off last time.)
5. How can I put already downloaded apps/games/etc from Linux to the classic Mac VM? (That was the other issue.)
6. In the (potential/inevitable) case that something happen with the downloads mentioned above, how do I change the resource info so that they can be read by OS9?

Thanks in advance!

[Cat_7]

Wow, that are a lot of questions.

1. You can use the qemu package provided by Xubuntu. If that is not new enough (e.g., not providing Qemu 4.0), then compile from source. The source can be cloned with

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git clone https://www.github.com/qemu/qemu 

If you have the required development packages installed, compile with

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./configure --target-list=ppc-softmmu

(Qemu will report missing packages one after the other, so you can install those.)

2. Current Qemu supports many more screen resolutions for our guests. You can select the desired screen resolution from the monitors control panel.

3. You need to run two instances of Qemu to run two guests. If you mean whether Qemu can run e.g., Mac OS 9.2 and OSX 10.4 as guests, then yes.

4. Mouse issues might occur. Qemu on Linux defaults to using GTK for graphics. If that is not satisfactory, compile Qemu with SDL support (add --enable-sdl to your ./configure command line, and add -sdl to the command line which starts Qemu).

For the command line, see our guide for running Qemu for OSX. Much of it also applies to running in Linux.
https://www.emaculation.com/doku.php/pp ... mu-for-osx

5. That depends on the format of files downloaded. One easy way is to burn a cd image with your files and add the image as a drive to your command line. Some files might also be downloaded from within Mac OS/OSX using the Classilla (Mac OS 9.2) browser or Safari in OSX. This also answers 6.

Best,
Cat_7

[ThePuzzledBoy]

1. You can use the qemu package provided by Xubuntu. If that is not new enough (e.g., not providing Qemu 4.0), then compile from source.

Well, since Xubuntu is just Ubuntu with a different WM, that wasn't too hard to do, though it seems I'm having some trouble in actually running the thing. More on that later.

2. Current Qemu supports many more screen resolutions for our guests. You can select the desired screen resolution from the monitors control panel.

So, basically, the host window size will adjust to the guest VM's resolution accordingly, without the need for a manual keystroke? If so, that's pretty cool!

3. You need to run two instances of Qemu to run two guests. If you mean whether Qemu can run e.g., Mac OS 9.2 and OSX 10.4 as guests, then yes.

I meant along the same lines as a real PowerMac capable of dual-booting the two, i.e. both installed on one hard drive, and switchable from the Startup Disk control panel in each system.

For the command line, see our guide for running Qemu for OSX. Much of it also applies to running in Linux.
https://www.emaculation.com/doku.php/pp ... mu-for-osx

Um... Er.... How do I put this?.... Um... It didn't work. At all.

So I did the instructions on that page exact (filenames modified as necessary, including making it a shell script because Linux), which led to this error:

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qemu-system-ppc: Parameter 'id' is missing

Here's the shell script itself, just to show that very little was modfied:

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#!/bin/bash
cd "$(dirname "$0")"

./qemu-system-ppc -L pc-bios -boot d -M mac99,via=pmu -m 512 \
-prom-env 'auto-boot?=true' -prom-env 'boot-args=-v' -prom-env 'vga-ndrv?=true' \
-drive file=macos-922-uni.iso,format=raw,media=cdrom \
-drive file=MacOS9.img,format=raw,media=disk \
-netdev user,id-network01 -device sungem,netdev=network01 \
-device VGA,edid=on \

Whiskey... Tango... Foxtrot.

5. That depends on the format of files downloaded. One easy way is to burn a cd image with your files and add the image as a drive to your command line. Some files might also be downloaded from within Mac OS/OSX using the Classilla (Mac OS 9.2) browser or Safari in OSX. This also answers 6.

Cool, good to know once can I get it working.

[Cat_7]

You can remove the first two lines in your script.

Then:

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-netdev user,id-network01 -device sungem,netdev=network01 \

should be:

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-netdev user,id=network01 -device sungem,netdev=network01 \

9.2 and 10.4 can be switched by using the start-up disk CP, but only when installed on 2 separate partitions on the same hard disk image. Otherwise just install both on separate hard disk images and change the script depending what you want to boot (or make two scripts).

Best,
Cat_7

[ThePuzzledBoy]

You can remove the first two lines in your script.

Then:

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-netdev user,id-network01 -device sungem,netdev=network01 \

should be:

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-netdev user,id=network01 -device sungem,netdev=network01 \

Oh crud, I actually typed in the whole thing by hand; so I made a small typo. Thanks!

9.2 and 10.4 can be switched by using the start-up disk CP, but only when installed on 2 separate partitions on the same hard disk image. Otherwise just install both on separate hard disk images and change the script depending what you want to boot (or make two scripts).

Awesome, thanks!

[ThePuzzledBoy]

5. That depends on the format of files downloaded. One easy way is to burn a cd image with your files and add the image as a drive to your command line. Some files might also be downloaded from within Mac OS/OSX using the Classilla (Mac OS 9.2) browser or Safari in OSX. This also answers 6.

Update: number 6 didn't wind up answered, as I feared. Fortunately, I remembered a small amount and figured out the rest. Since OS9 Universal has Stuffit included, I used the File Exchange control panel and took care of all of it within the File Translation tab.

Nevertheless, thank you for all the help! It does seem my issues from back in 2016 have been fixed since then! Hurrah!