Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!spool.mu.edu!munnari.oz.au!metro!cluster!minnie.cs.su.OZ.AU!ronny
From: ronny@minnie.cs.su.OZ.AU (Ronald Cook)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.programmer
Subject: Re: C compilers (was a flame war : -)
Keywords: library hard disk shared
Message-ID: <2259@cluster.cs.su.oz.au>
Date: 4 Apr 91 02:51:18 GMT
Article-I.D.: cluster.2259
Sender: news@cluster.cs.su.oz.au
Reply-To: ronny@minnie.cs.su.OZ.AU (Ronald Cook)
Followup-To: comp.sys.amiga.programmer
Organization: Basser Department of Computer Science, University of Sydney
Lines: 41


>>Why hasn't someone made the entire c.lib into a loadable library
>>so all programs can share it instead of duplicating these routines
>>hundreds of times all over everyone's hard disks?  Why not even
>>just printf.library (this alone would save megabytes on my hard disk)?
>
>I think Matt's DICE library routines could be placed into a library,
>Matt?  This really is something that should have been done *a* *hell*
>*of* a long time ago...

NO! NO! PLEASE, NO!

Not all Amiga users have hard drives. In fact, a majority are limited to
floppies. The recent tendency of Amiga programmers to stick everything
into a shared library is disquieting (for me, at least) because most
people, when faced with adding yet another large file to their boot
disk, will not do so unless the program is one which they DESPERATELY
need. Every 10K library which you ask me to put on my boot disk chews up
better than 1% of a space which needs to hold -

1) Most of the commands which you often use.
2) Libraries and devices
3) Fonts (I get around this with a "assign FONTS: remove in my s-seq,
but most aren't so lucky).
4) drivers and other stuff (l: , s:, etc)

I have several good programs which I don't use because I don't have the
space for their shared libraries on my boot disk. There are ways of
getting around this sort of thing, but they are not really suitable for
the novice user. Most such libraries, also, are only iused by a relative
handful of programs.

Ideally, hard disk users could have a version which uses a shared
library, and floppy users could have a version which uses a compile-time
version. But this almost doubles the size of a distribution.

I'm not exactly rich, but I'll be getting a hard drive soon, and getting
into some serious programming. But any programs that I write will NOT
make it compulsory for ANY files to sit on the boot disk.

		....Ronny (Cook)