====== ST Mint: Opensource Unix for Atari ST ======
ST Mint  is a [[https://freemint.github.io/|FreeMiNT]] distribution which provides an opensource Unix environment for the 16/32 bits Atari line of computers.
The target platform are Atari ST(E) and Mist FPGA board with at least 4 MB of RAM, 512MB SD Card [[https://lotharek.pl/productdetail.php?id=48|drive]], ST High Resolution.

ST Mint is distributed in the form of a ready to boot disk image, to use for instance with [[https://lotharek.pl/productdetail.php?id=48|Lotharek's UltraSatan drive]]

{{:st_mint.jpg?400|}}

== Disk image ==
Download: [[https://subsole.org/static/retrocomputing/st_mint-1.4.img.zip| ACSI disk image]]

===== Writing the media =====
 
  * unzip the SD card image, and write to it a SD card. The card has to be 512MB minimum, and all previous data on the SD card will be erased. How to write the SD card image depends on your platform:
    * Linux & Unix: follow this tutorial  http://askubuntu.com/questions/179437/how-can-i-burn-a-raspberry-pi-image-to-sd-card-from-ubuntu or use ''dd''
    * Windows: Download the Win32DiskImager program, and follow this tutorial: http://raspi.tv/2012/how-to-make-a-raspberry-pi-disk-image-to-sd-card-with-win32diskimager
    * OsX: follow this tutorial: https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/a/23640

===== Using ST Mint =====

== First Boot ==
After inserting the media in your Ultrasatan device, your ST should boot into ST Mint. The boot sequence is quite long, and will start in the end the XaaES graphical environment with the TeraDesk desktop. When using a 4MB machine, you should have around 1MB of RAM free for applications.

== Try out multitasking ==

Click on COMMAND.TOS, and 2048.APP and notice the two apps running simultaneously. Such a thing is not possible using the standard Atari TOS.

{{:st-mint-0.8-multitaskdemo.png?200|}}

== Try out a Unix shell ==
Click on the Desk menu  ==> TosWin2 ==> File ==> Start shell
and enjoy /bin/mksh, a Korn shell clone.
Note that due to the very limited hardware of the ST compared to current standards, you can at most only run simple Unix command line tools.

== Play some PCM Audio (Atari STE with 8MB RAM minimum) ==
After a starting Unix shell, you can play on the command line some music files, courtesy of my previous [[https://subsole.org/manuka|Live Dub bands]].
From the Unix shell:

<code>
cd /d/demodata
fplay *
</code>

===== With an emulator =====
Use the downloaded .img file as an emulated ACSI device, and just boot. If you use the [[http://hatari.tuxfamily.org/|Hatari]] emulator, it would be:
<code>hatari --acsi st_mint-1.4.img</code>

== What's inside ==
  * Atari Hard Disk Driver 5 from http://www.nic.funet.fi/index/atari/diskutil/ahdi5.zoo
  * FreeMiNT 1.19 build from 2022 snapshot
  * 2048.APP from https://ptonthat.fr/two-o-forty-eight/
  * COMMAND.TOS interpreter from http://download.minix3.org/previous-versions/Atari/
  * mksh shell, with patch to run executables on FAT filesystem
  * GNU Coreutils, crossed compiled by Vincent Riviere from http://vincent.riviere.free.fr/soft/m68k-atari-mint/archives/mint/
  * Minix 3.1 grep and term

== Bugs and limitations ==

See the Roadmap on [[https://github.com/EmmanuelKasper/mck/wiki/Roadmap | github]].
For General Questions, please[[http://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=27040 | use this thread]] on the Atari Forums.
For Bug Reports, use the [[https://github.com/EmmanuelKasper/mck/issues | Contruction Kit Bug Tracker]]