Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!samsung!sdd.hp.com!hplabs!hpfcso!hpfelg!koren
From: koren@hpfelg.HP.COM (Steve Koren)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech
Subject: Re: SKsh Version 1.4 Stack Problems with Lattice "C" Programs..
Message-ID: <13920066@hpfelg.HP.COM>
Date: 8 Jun 90 14:41:17 GMT
References: <00237.AA00237@theweav.cts.com>
Organization: HP Elec. Design Div. -FtCollins
Lines: 47

> quite used to the way it works and I'm very happy with it.. However, I do
> get quite frustrated when I try to run virtually ANY "stock" program that
> was compiled under Lattice "C" and the program puts up a requester saying

Are you sure?  All of SKsh (including the external binaries) was compiled
with Lattice C.

> routine before the "C" code's 'main' is even called..  I don't believe that
> I am doing anything incorrect (please flame me if I've setup something
> incorrectly and don't know it!).. I'm just curious if anyone else is
> running into this problem.. (and yes, I'm running AmigaDos 1.3)

Sigh.  Assuming that you have your stack size set to something reasonable
(try 10000 bytes) then I don't think you're doing anything wrong.  But
this is enough of a problem that I am considering documenting it in the
SKsh manuals.  In short, SKsh does *not* do low level command invocation.
It uses arp's SyncRun() command.  Now, it turns out that without Arp,
invoking programs is a non-trivial thing to do on the Amiga; there are
bazillions of special cases to consider; Execute() is useless, Lattice's
System() crashes on BCPL programs, some methods work with programs
compiled under Lattice but not Manx or vice verca, etc.  Its really a
horrible situation; I was quite frustrated when I ran into it.  The
best solution I found that works in *most* cases is the arp ASyncRun()
command.  However, there are still a few that have problems; I don't
know if these problems are caused by ASyncRun() itself or something
that the Lattice startup code is producing, but in either case, I can't
do anything about it.  All SKsh does is call ASyncRun() after building
up a command line, and I'm pretty much 100% sure that this command
line is being built correctly.

Just out of curiousity, what are the programs you are having problems
with?  I haven't seen this problem with more than maybe 1% of all
programs.

Perhaps this situation will get better in AmigaDos 2.0 if there is a
*real* way to invoke *all* programs that is supported by Commodore.
Until then, I'm more or less stuck, unless I do alot of really
low level mucking around that I really don't want to do.


        - steve

PS - Just a brief note to all those who were asking for ARexx
     support in SKsh - its implemented and will appear in 1.5.
     Its asynchronous, too - you don't have to type a command to
     SKsh to get it to listen to Arp - it will do that anytime that
     is not doing something else.