Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!ria!uwovax.uwo.ca!7103_2622
From: 7103_2622@uwovax.uwo.ca (Eric Smith)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st.tech
Subject: Re: bug in GNU library
Message-ID: <1991Apr1.213235.8915@uwovax.uwo.ca>
Date: 2 Apr 91 02:32:35 GMT
References: <1991Mar27.152726.8444@doe.utoronto.ca> <1991Mar28.194823.2209@netcom.COM>
Lines: 35

>>> I've found a bug (or at least an unintuitive feature :-) ) in the
>>> library supplied with GNU C 1.37.1 found on atari.archive.  When I
>>> make a call to stat(), after the call, the address returned by
>>> Fgetdta() is different than it was before the call.  Is this a bug?
>>> If so, why would it be desirable for stat() to have this side-effect?

> I would argue that the stat() and all other such functions should have
> an Fgetdta() in the 1st line of their code and an Fsetdta() in the
> last.  That is just good practice.
>
You're quite correct. Actually, in the latest version of the GCC library
this *is* done, except that the function returns prematurely if the
file is not found (i.e. the DTA pointer is messed up if you do a stat()
on a file that doesn't exist). The MiNT library also has this bug at
patchlevel 7; it (and lots of other bugs) are fixed in patchlevel 8,
which is now available at atari.archive.

>>In general, you might want to switch to Eric Smith's MiNT library. It
>>is an update and improvement on the standard GCC library, and is
>>also available on atari.archive.
> 
> Yes, but you need MiNT to run a program compiled with that library,
> correct?  If not, that is definitely a win-win situation!
> 
No, not correct. The library works under TOS, except that some functions
that are MiNT specific (e.g. fork, pipe, spawnve(P_NOWAIT,...)) will
fail -- if you avoid those kinds of functions, e.g. by writing standard
ANSI C, then your program will work fine under either TOS or MiNT.

(NetHack 3.0j was compiled with the MiNT library, for example, and that
certainly exercises a lot of functions!)
-- 
Eric R. Smith                     email:
Dept. of Mathematics            eric.smith@uwo.ca
University of Western Ontario   7103_2622@uwovax.bitnet