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Old 8086 version of pcc spotted (cross-compiles to DOS) (Miscellaneous)

posted by Ibidem, 22.03.2012, 18:17

> > My point in mentioning the PCC-8086 compiler was:
> > 1-it's a BSD-ish 16bit compiler (mentioned for cm's sake)
>
> But is cm needing / wanting such a thing? All I knew of was him hacking at
> RxDOS in NASM, not expecting to use C for anything.
Comment made in private email: I asked about RxDOS because the fact that FreeDOS uses a "non-free" compiler to build means that dosemu is questionable for FSF-approved distros; he said it wasn't ready and probably would never be, and commented that a free compiler would be the best solution, then started pondering about whether there are any BSDish C compilers that could readily be ported to DOS or already target DOS.

> > 2-it might be helpful in porting the PCC "Ragge version" to target
> 16-bit
> > DOS
> > (the latter does support segmented modes to some extent-the PDP11 is a
> > 16-bit CPU with 6 extra bits for a 4MB total address space)
>
> The old 8086.zip one above from 1983? Or do you mean latest PCC 1.0 from a
> year or two ago? Unlikely to be ported either way, most people would just
> use OpenWatcom (whose license is still OSI approved, at least).
>
> The 16-bit memory models aren't as popular these days,
...
I mean, PCC 1.x still has support for cross-compiles to PDP11 (which is a segmented-mode 16-bit CPU). So you don't need to worry about whether 16-bit support is popular or feasible; it's already there even in the newer versions.
Perhaps the 8086.zip version could serve as a reference to retarget PCC 1.x for DOS/16; this might hypothetically allow a DOS/32 -> DOS/16 "cross-compiler".

> DJGPP can probably compile some kernels, but obviously not FreeDOS (compact
> model) without heavy tweaking. Is that what you wanted? What kernel did you
> want to build? Or are you writing from scratch?
 A compiler that could build a 16-bit DOS kernel (ie, real mode + supports segmented modes). Freedos is an example of the type of kernel.


> If you're only wishing to hack a bit for fun, something like EiC or PicoC
> (both interpreters) would be better. But that's not as helpful if you
> really want to write low-level kernel code natively.
 Just a toy project-- a C-ish compiler, an assembler, a BASIC compiler, etc.
The project could hypothetically run on an 8086, and provide an interesting setup for tinkering. I want compilers, though (and maybe also a BASIC interpreter).

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