Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!newstop!exodus!appserv!sun!imagen!atari!apratt From: apratt@atari.UUCP (Allan Pratt) Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st Subject: Re: TOS Command Line Message-ID: <2932@atari.UUCP> Date: 9 May 91 18:54:28 GMT References: Organization: Atari Corp., Sunnyvale CA Lines: 43 >[In article , > ersys!mforget@nro.cs.athabascau.ca (Michel Forget) writes ... ] >> Does anyone know how to use the Pexec function so that it will take a >> command line longer than 80 charactes. I am writing a program that will >> require longer command lines, but I'm stumped on this one. The >> documentation that I have does not mention anything about command lines >> longer than 80 characters, yet they are possible... steve@thelake.mn.org (Steve Yelvington) writes: >Command lines can be up to 125 characters long. >If you need to pass more information than that, there are three currently >used methods, of which one, XARG, is currently endorsed by Atari Corp. The >file EXARG.DOC in the Gemini distribution (see comp.binaries.atari.st) >will tell you all you need to know. There's some code in the samples >folder to show how it's done. >The Sozobon C compiler and dlibs support another method called ARGV. >See the dlibs sources. >Mark Williams Co. uses a third method with its C compiler [...] This is a badly confused accounting of the extended-argument stuff going around for TOS. ARGV and MWC's trick are nearly identical; ARGV is a superset which adds validation that the args in your environment are really intended for you. This is the method that's approved by Atari Corp. (at least by THIS part of Atari) and it's the method used by Bammi's GCC tools, Gulam (if you set env_style mw), and MiNT's shell, among others. XARG may or may not be endorsed by Atari Germany, but nobody here at Atari in Sunnyvale (to my knowledge) has endorsed it. The reason I hate it is that you have to poke through your parent's data space to find your arguments, and that is a no-no. It will be a much bigger no-no when memory protection and/or virtual memory come along. ARGV has no such problems. I don't know where the ARGV spec is -- I'll try to dig up a copy of it and post it again. ============================================ Opinions expressed above do not necessarily -- Allan Pratt, Atari Corp. reflect those of Atari Corp. or anyone else. ...ames!atari!apratt