Path: ...!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail
From: David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no>
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: is Vax addressing sane today
Date: Sun, 29 Sep 2024 14:18:54 +0200
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
Lines: 63
Message-ID: <vdbgjf$1o0lg$7@dont-email.me>
References: <vbd6b9$g147$1@dont-email.me>
 <2024Sep10.094353@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at> <vckf9d$178f2$1@dont-email.me>
 <O2DHO.184073$kxD8.113118@fx11.iad> <vcso7k$2s2da$1@dont-email.me>
 <efXIO.169388$1m96.45507@fx15.iad>
 <8f031f2b5082d97582b1231a060f2b9f@www.novabbs.org>
 <8DgJO.171468$1m96.17060@fx15.iad> <vd7peh$12kpl$2@dont-email.me>
 <KWUJO.41016$vtH3.33971@fx07.iad> <86msjr2bec.fsf@linuxsc.com>
 <vdaur7$1lr7j$1@dont-email.me>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Injection-Date: Sun, 29 Sep 2024 14:18:56 +0200 (CEST)
Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="1198f484935c984b353714505272c066";
	logging-data="1835696"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org";	posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1/hjZ5XFP1hiyKXbmk1YLbTeu0JvUr6idI="
User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird
Cancel-Lock: sha1:ggk71I3QsiMy4qS8ECHRXktd51w=
Content-Language: en-GB
In-Reply-To: <vdaur7$1lr7j$1@dont-email.me>
Bytes: 4136

On 29/09/2024 09:15, Thomas Koenig wrote:
> Tim Rentsch <tr.17687@z991.linuxsc.com> schrieb:
>> EricP <ThatWouldBeTelling@thevillage.com> writes:
>>
>>> Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Thu, 26 Sep 2024 13:13:02 -0400, EricP wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> I've always paid for mine.  My first C compiler came with the WinNT 3.5
>>>>> beta in 1992 for $99 and came with the development kit,
>>>>> editor, source code debugger, tools, documentation.
>>>>> A few hundred bucks is not going to hurt my business.
>>>>
>>>> Given that GCC offers more features and generates better code than
>>>> MSVC, the money may not matter to your business, but the quality of
>>>> the product will.
>>>
>>> GCC is a compiler collection not a integrated development kit for Windows.
>>> I have no knowledge of what state GCC was in in 1992 but it likely
>>> did not support the MS enhancements for Win32 programming:
>>> structured exception handling, various ABI's, inline assembler,
>>> defined behavior for some of C's undefined behavior,
>>> later first-class-type support for 64-bit signed and unsigned integers,
>>> and most important:  integration with the GUI source code debugger.
>>>
>>> Plus come with necessary API headers, various link libraries and DLL's,
>>> supporting applications, documentation.
>>> You know... what a product looks like.
>>
>> I am currently in the position of needing to take some code
>> written for Linux/Unix and get it running in MS Windows.
>>
>> My attempts to use MSVC have been frustrating, because of some
>> limitations of that environment.  The two most prominent are
>> these:  long double is only 64 bits, and there are no integer
>> types of 128 bits that I could find.
> 
> Depending on what you need to to, you can give MinGW-w64 a try.
> It works either as a cross-compiler from Linux or on Windows using
> msys2 or Cygwin.
> 
> Personally, I like Cygwin best because it gives you access to the
> usual UNIX tools like make or emacs, and you can immediately run
> the executable.  I just add -static-libgfortran for Fortran code
> to avoid the hassle of distributing a DLL with it.
> 

Personally, I prefer msys2 because it gives you access to the usual *nix 
tools like make - and does so far better than Cygwin.  (Here "better" 
means more native-like file access, and more efficient usage.)  And you 
don't get the DLL hell of Cygwin.

I think Cygwin is useful if you need more advanced or accurate POSIX 
semantics - such as "fork" calls.  But for most uses, msys2 is much 
simpler to work with.  Msys2 also has a more friendly license for many 
people.

However, I haven't had to do much compilation of any kind targetting 
Windows.


> Even gdb works.