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32-bit MSDOS (Announce)

posted by kerravon E-mail, Ligao, Free World North, 29.06.2021, 00:21

> > > > I guess I could create an INT 31H that just
> > > > redirects you to INT 21H if that would help.
>
> so you are completely clueless about the INT 31H interface.
> and unfortunately completely unwilling to learn.
Well, I am happy to learn about it when I actually
need it, but to date I've never actually needed it.

The first things I would like to know are:

1. Why didn't PDOS/386 need it?
2. Would PDOS/386 be better if it had used it?

> > There are multiple 32-bit DOS-extenders. DOS32A
> > comes close to what I decided was "clean" myself.
>
> there is no such thing as a DOS-extender standard.
Maybe there should be? What should be the
design goals?

> however, virtually all DOS extenders gave you a runtime library which gave
> you
>
> malloc(many MB);
> write(handle, buffer, many MB);
> 32-bit pointers without segments
> and so on, and translated this transparently to 16-bit MSDOS (or any other
> OS).
If "any other OS" includes "a 32-bit OS, maybe
even Linux", that is interesting.

But why write() instead of fwrite()? It is the
latter that is part of C90.

> the translation layer is absolutely undefined and is provided by some
> runtime library. but the boundaries are clear: DPMI and INT21H on one side,
> STDIO.H on the other.
Ok, rightly or wrongly (how do you prove
which one?), I look at the executable itself,
not just the application source code.

I don't like the idea of the "ds" or "es"
being manipulated inside an executable.

Don't forget I have my own C library, PDPCLIB,
so I actually have to implement any solution,
so I know what goes into it. I don't mind if
there are kludges *outside* the executable,
but I want every byte *inside* the executable
to "look nice".

I'm not an expert at this, so maybe I'm wrong
when I make a clean/unclean judgement.

> so basically you offer/implement your own DOS extender, and require
> everyone to recompile. this is simply not going to happen.
It happens to anything I am interested in, such
as micro-emacs.

If I don't win some popularity contest, so be it.

And regardless, Win32 executables don't require
recompilation.

> > Win32 doesn't use segments anywhere within the
> > application and I agree with Microsoft that
> > that is clean.
>
> DOS extender applications haven't used segments for what you intend to do
> for the last 30 years. 'hello world' applications don't need segment
> registers.
> GCC has been ported to DOS, 30 years ago.
GCC was only made C90-compliant recently.

PDOS/386 currently only runs C90-compliant
programs. Well, at least if you don't want
a warning to be printed.

BFN. Paul.

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