Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!uunet!bu.edu!bu-cs!snorkelwacker!think!samsung!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ALDERAAN.SCRC.SYMBOLICS.COM!Ed From: Ed@ALDERAAN.SCRC.SYMBOLICS.COM (Ed Schwalenberg) Newsgroups: gnu.gcc Subject: compiling for MS-Dos Message-ID: <19900208183405.4.ED@PEREGRINE.SCRC.Symbolics.COM> Date: 8 Feb 90 18:34:00 GMT References: <9002081141.AA01591@wubios.wustl.edu> Sender: daemon@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu Distribution: gnu Organization: GNUs Not Usenet Lines: 32 Date: Thu, 8 Feb 90 5:41:20 CDT From: "David J. Camp" I know this is dredging up a forbidden subject, but I am seriously interested in pursuing it. I would like to have a version of gcc that generates code for the 8086 processor and MS-Dos. It's not a forbidden subject; it's just that it can't be done. You cannot make a native GCC for the 8086 because GCC requires over a megabyte of address space; the 8086 cannot be made to address more than a megabyte except by kludgery, and GCC cannot be made to stomach that kludgery. You *can* make a GCC cross-compiler for the 8086, but it is sufficiently hard and the rewards sufficiently meager that nobody has done it or shows any sign of wanting to. As I've said before in this forum, it is possible to make GCC run on 80386 machines running MS/DOS and a suitable extended-memory manager like Phar Lap's Dos-Extender; again, it's a task with a cost-benefit ratio that keeps it from being anyone's top priority. There are considerable economies to be accomplished by being able to develop in a common environment for both Unix and Dos, not to mention the ability to easily port many Unix packages to the Dos environment. There are perfectly fine (but not free) C compilers available for DOS. Having a GCC will not make porting typical Unix packages to DOS any easier; it's typically NOT easy.