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From: craig@srs.UUCP (Craig Schmackpfeffer)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: multiple-machine executables for Suns?
Message-ID: <267@srs.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 8-Aug-87 12:58:56 EDT
Article-I.D.: srs.267
Posted: Sat Aug  8 12:58:56 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 9-Aug-87 12:38:05 EDT
References: <1853@megaron.arizona.edu>
Organization: S.R. Systems, Rochester NY
Lines: 26


    > I find myself frequently inconvenienced by the incompatibilities between
    > different Sun binaries.  Sun-2 binaries will work on a Sun-3, but not
    > vice-versa and I expect that Sun-4 binaries work iff they're on a Sun-4.
    > A fairly straightforward solution to this problem seems to be to extend
    > the executable format so that multiple executables can be contained in a
    > single file.  Thus, if you've got Sun-2s and Sun-3s lying around, it'd be
    > nice to have an executable that contains both Sun-2 and Sun-3 versions of
    > the same program.  If you run it on a Sun-3, it fishes out the Sun-3 code
    > and if you run it on a Sun-2, it fishes out the Sun-2 code.

The cost in disk space and major rewrites wouldn't be worth it.  Since
Sun-2 binaries run on the Sun-3, why not just compile everything to Sun-2
format?  If there is an application that needs the speed boost from the
68020's larger instruction set, then have a spare copy compiled on the Sun-3
(you can append a '20' to the name like dbx does).

Craig Schmackpfeffer
seismo!rochester!srs!craig
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