Hey all! As far as I know, nobody has really put much effort into installing any Copland builds in an emulator. I thought I would quickly summarize my efforts/progress and see if anybody wants to help out. It would be really awesome to get this working on a modern machine since Power Macs aren't super easy to come by anymore.
I've tested 3 builds, to different results:
D7E1 "Sun N Fun"
- Installable in SheepShaver by manually following the install instructions that come with the software
- Boots with the following messages:
- "Loading Copland Micro-kernel"
- "Failed to find main GDevice." (stops)
D9 "Space Aliens"
- Install is similar to D7
- Boot messages and eventual error are the same, but the graphics are more polished
D11E4 "Spaz"
- Can't be installed in SheepShaver because it needs a weird partition scheme
- Custom Drive Setup bundled with it can't initialize SheepShaver's weird "big floppy disk" drives
I've made the following discoveries, resulting in somewhat more progress:
D7E1 and D9
- They expect a NuBus based Power Mac, SheepShaver emulates a PCI one
- The initial boot code is inside the System suitcase on the 7.5 volume ("scarecrow volume")
- The codes in the boot resources #1-3 run first, and call the nkld resource ("NuKernel loader" perhaps?)
- This resource draws the boot screen and finds devices and volumes, and eventually shows the "Failed to find main GDevice" error
- With some NOPs in the nkld code (use Resourcerer), this error can be bypassed, and the boot process proceeds as follows:
- Another dialog "Preening Disks"
- A big "Mac OS 8" logo
- Segmentation fault, crashing the emulator
- And that's about all I've figured out so far...
- Possible leads include further analysis of nkld and ModernOSLoader or modifications to SheepShaver itself so that it more accurately emulates a 6100, 7100, or 8100 device-tree, allowing Copland to find the "GDevice" without modifications
D11E4
- The installer script can be modified in Resourcerer to bypass the checks for a compatible Macintosh and partition scheme
- The installation succeeds!
- SheepShaver segfaults during the happy Mac before any Copland-related code loads (looks like it doesn't even load boot resources)
- I believe this is because the installer can't write a boot partition at all, preventing any progress in booting at all
- Possible leads most likely require further analysis of the installer script and perhaps manual copying/creation of the expected volume scheme to create a bootable system
- If this were achieved, D11 would have a much higher chance of booting than D7 and D9, since it supports PCI-based Power Macs
Anyways, this is getting long. I'm new here and still trying to meet the 3 post quota (please approve this!) so I'm not sure if this fits your interests. I hope that somebody finds this info useful and can make some progress! I haven't seen this documented anywhere else online (and believe me, I have spent hours looking) so I think in any case it's good to lay out the patches I've found so far.
This has been a personal project for me for a while and I hope my work is helpful.
