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clean dos extender executable format (Developers)

posted by kerravon, Ligao, Free World North, 08.01.2023, 18:15

> aout. Support 32 bit. I am dislike 16-bit (8-byte import/export names),
> lack of segmented memory model for 16-bit. Also, we have 2 type of aout:
> linux and bsd.
as86/ar/ld86 from here:

https://github.com/robertapengelly?tab=repositories

use 16-bit a.out. I'm not aware of any
8-byte limitation on externals.

The lack of segmentation (not supporting the
"seg" keyword in assembler code) is something
I am happy to work around. I changed my
assembler code that was using that, and will
make sure the C compiler doesn't generate that.

I think that is the proper (clean) technical solution.

> pe/lx/le. Support 32 bit only. over 100500 fields (non relevant for DOS)
> which make linker (and loader) not so simple.
Yeah. I'm after something simple too. And a.out
seems to be simple. There's no "fat" at all in it
that I can see.

> So... IMHO, all choices is bad. We live in legacy world. We need Hercules
> to clear these Augean stables.
>
> So far, producing rdf => pe/hx (or mz/exe) looks the most promising, for
> me.
> (i am don't care about win32 + dll import. It's more important not to lose
> the ability to link mz/exe).
You're not happy to have independent 16-bit and
32-bit links?

Maybe we just need a.out with an MSDOS stub.

Which in fact was what EMX 0.9d does, isn't it?

But change the stub to the same as what PE uses.

And load it the same way that HX does. I assume
HX is intercepting the load and looking for the
"PE" signature. Maybe we need an "AO" signature
for a.out?

BFN. Paul.

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