Re: 80386 C compiler

"Kaz Kylheku" <643-408-1753@kylheku.com> wrote in message
news:20241125101701.894@kylheku.com...

On 2024-11-24, Paul Edwards <mutazilah@gmail.com> wrote:

"Janis Papanagnou" <janis_papanagnou+ng@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:vhvsm9$2bmq9$1@dont-email.me...

On 24.11.2024 15:00, Paul Edwards wrote:

>
I have been after a public domain C compiler for decades.
[...] I'm after C90 written in C90.

>
Why formulate the latter condition if you can bootstrap?
(Did you mean; written in a "C" not more recent than C90?)

>
Yes - written in C90 so that it can be maintained with
just knowledge of C90.
>
And also written in C90 so that it is written naturally
for a C90 programmer, not using a subset of C90

>
But, do yourself a favor and, have it as an extension to allow
non-constant expressions to allow block scoped aggregates:
>
 void fn(int a)
 {
   int x[3] = { foo(), bar(), a }; /* not in C90 */
>
(You don't have to use it in the source code of the thing,
so it can be boostrapped by other C90 compilers without
the extension.)
>
Also, pin down the truncation behavior of / and % to match C99.
(Though, again, without relying on that in the C90 source
of the compiler.)
>
Define the behavior of a [0] array at the end of a struct,
so that the C90 struct hack is "blessed" in your implementation.
The C99 flexible array member cannot be used, after all.
You can have it so that [0] has the same semantics as C99 []
in that role.

I don't have any such code in PDOS, so it is very unlikely I
will be doing anything along those lines.

My goal is to get the existing PDOS source code to compile.
Plus the tools, including the new C compiler. So that there is
a completely public domain infrastructure that can be used as
a base to produce all of the above, and more.

If I was to enhance it to do the above to meet some market
need, it is more likely that it would be a commercial derivative
rather than being public domain.

BFN. Paul.