Need more stability first

Hi there,

I visit Jnode.org seldom but regularily to check on its progress. Today I downloaded the
0.2.3 iso and it took me multiple boots to get it to boot to its shell (it hung after
it had initialized the ramdisk). Once I was in the shell I decided to run a simple hello
world class in it:

class test {
public static void main(String[] args) {
System.out.println("Write once.. run ANNNYWHEEEREEE!");
}
}

which I compiled with

java version "1.5.0_01"
Java(TM) 2 Runtime Environment, Standard Edition (build 1.5.0_01-b08)
Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 1.5.0_01-b08, mixed mode, sharing)

and verified with

java test
Write once.. run ANNNYWHEEEREEE!

I then set up networking:

ifconfig eth-pci(0,17,0) 192.168.116.77 255.255.255.0 (twice because for some reason the first time around it prints the IP address out as null)
route add 192.168.116.0 eth-pci(0,17,0)

and mounted my home directory via ftpmount

ftpmount /mnt 192.168.116.21

To actually mount from the .21 machine I had to reboot a couple of times and had to retry mounting by deleting the ftp-(192.168.116.21,) device and trying ftpmount a couple of times

Finally I succeeded and I then tried to run the class with

java test

but I got

java.lang.ClassFormatError: Invalid Constantpool tag: 0

I then went back and recompiled the class with
javac -source 1.2 -target 1.2 test.java

but about four reboots later I still got the same ClassFormatError.

JNode is an ubercool project but this really needs to stabilize a lot because it took me over 18
reboots just to get to the point where I could execute a class file I compiled. Most of the time
it will just lock up somewhere during or after initializing its ramdisk and I remember it doing that
since 0.2.1. Don't take that as scathing criticism but the way I see it before you add isolates
(useful indeed) and a plethora of other neat stuff Jnode should really stabilize (and maybe speed up
a little too).

I've read that other people have the same problems and issues with Jnode but just in case it is _I_
that is doing something wrong here, here is the configuration I used to test it:

Linux version 2.6.15-1-k7 (Debian 2.6.15-6) (fs@debian.org) (gcc version 4.0.3 20060128 (prerelease) (Debian 4.0.2-8)) #1 Fri Feb 10 16:09:44 UTC 2006

processor : 0
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 6
model : 4
model name : AMD Athlon(tm) Processor
stepping : 4
cpu MHz : 1050.490
cache size : 256 KB
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 1
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx fxsr syscall mmxext 3dnowext 3dnow
bogomips : 2103.11

768M physical memory installed

VMware Workstation 5.5.1 build-19175
#!/usr/local/bin/vmware
config.version = "8"
virtualHW.version = "4"
scsi0.present = "TRUE"
memsize = "384"
MemAllowAutoScaleDown = "FALSE"
ide0:0.present = "FALSE"
ide0:0.fileName = "JNode.vmdk"
ide0:0.writeThrough = "TRUE"
ide1:0.present = "TRUE"
ide1:0.fileName = "/home/chris/jnode/jnode-x86-0.2.3.iso"
ide1:0.deviceType = "cdrom-image"
floppy0.fileName = "/dev/fd0"
ethernet0.present = "TRUE"
usb.present = "FALSE"
sound.present = "FALSE"
sound.virtualDev = "es1371"
displayName = "JNode"
guestOS = "other"
nvram = "JNode.nvram"

floppy0.present = "FALSE"
ide0:0.redo = ""
ethernet0.addressType = "generated"
uuid.location = "xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx-xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx"
uuid.bios = "xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx-xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx"
ethernet0.generatedAddress = "00:0c:xx:xx:xx:xx"
ethernet0.generatedAddressOffset = "0"

tools.remindInstall = "TRUE"