Re: Re: [UnixOS2] libc

On Fri, Jun 27, 2003 at 08:48:35PM +0200, Andreas Buening wrote:
> Okay, just to summarize: Am I correct that
> 
> 1) Existing executables and dlls can still use the old API which
>    will be provided by the new libc using the old ordinal numbers,

Yes, this is extremely easy to implement: just preserve functions
sitting on old ordinals.

> 2) Existing static libraries can still be used if a) either the
>    compilation and linkage is done only with old libraries and
>    the old emx or b) the compilation and linkage is done with
>    old libraries or libraries generated by (-D_OLD_EMX_STYLE)
>    and the new libc,

This needs also a support from the header files (e.g., mapping tell()
to one of of tell32() and tell64()).  Some tools may break (those
which run nm on the object files, and expect to see _tell, not
_tell64); this may also be fixable, but I do not think such tools will
be widespread.

But I would object to the naming of your macro.  Which style is OLD,
and which is NEW changes when time goes.  It is much better to name
capability macros by the described capability, not by a timestamp.

> 3) On the long term all old libraries will (hopefully) vanish?

If a library has no linkage with changed functions, and has no
function with a changed typedef in the signature, there is no need to
obsolete this.  If a library is very specialized and would never be
critical in a big-file situation, there is also no need to fix it.

So I'd say it like this: libraries which better be recompiled would
eventually be recompiled ;-).

Hope this helps,
Ilya

P.S.   But unless EM says otherwise, I think that without a volunteer
       maintainer all this is going to be a pipe dream.

P.P.S. Carthage must be destroyed.