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nuclear war (Miscellaneous)

posted by kerravon, Ligao, Free World North, 18.11.2022, 01:33

> The best way to test your code is probably not to ask Internet randos. :-)
> Get an actual 16-bit C compiler, then test your code against an actual C
> compiler. This is how stuff is done.
I already did that. I built it using Watcom C in
various memory models, and ran the resultant
executable on PDOS/86.

Even though it works, it may randomly corrupt
something in the future and that's why I was
hoping for someone to desk-check it.

> I do not suppose you have actually found a public domain (N.B.) C compiler
> for x86-16 that actually knows about the various memory models? If there
> is such a thing I am sure the community here (me included) would be
> super-interested to know.
Not quite, but SubC exists, and I have made modifications
to it myself, and have paid someone else to make
modifications to it, and I have already verified that
as86 can handle its output.

I have been trying to think of an easy way to get it to
do more than small memory model, and my current thought
is to bump up the size of "int" to 32-bits using dx+ax
etc, and use large and maybe huge memory model so that
pointers are also 4 bytes.

That should produce valid 8086 code, which is at least
a starting point.

But before doing that I want to get 80386 working
satisfactorily, where I don't need to mess around
with that. And the barrier there is isolating a
subset of C90 that is close enough for my code to
work, or perhaps I can make some small changes to
my code. It depends what is possible. Also I don't
know if I can survive without "unsigned" (which I
currently define as nothing). I'll probably get
back to SubC soon, but as86 is the current priority
since it is being actively worked on.

> My original point was that not everything that corporations do should be
> attributed to nefarious intent. If you can easily end up doing the same
> things without nefarious intent, then why not other people?
Sure, I didn't mean to suggest that every corporate
action was due to nefarious intent. It's more just
the two monopolies (Microsoft and IBM) trying to
maintain their monopoly that is not so much nefarious -
it is not their job to break their own monopoly -
but needs to be recognized.

> So I will not be surprised if a lot of design decisions, such as recent
> versions of Windows requiring x86-64's with certain CPU features, turn out
> to be due to practical considerations.
I guess that's possible. But I don't like Microsoft
bragging about their carbon footprint when they're
the ones forcing people to upgrade PCs, which is
where they make money. I'd rather they just kept
quiet. If they're not going to keep quiet, they
should be exposed for their hypocrisy.

BFN. Paul.

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