Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/26/83; site ihuxm.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!microsoft!uw-beaver!cornell!vax135!ariel!houti!hogpc!houxm!hocda!spanky!burl!we13!ihnp4!ihuxm!rck From: rck@ihuxm.UUCP Newsgroups: net.lang.c Subject: Re: Whitesmith and static variable init. Message-ID: <364@ihuxm.UUCP> Date: Fri, 15-Jul-83 12:30:27 EDT Article-I.D.: ihuxm.364 Posted: Fri Jul 15 12:30:27 1983 Date-Received: Tue, 19-Jul-83 12:55:43 EDT References: <413@ut-ngp.UUCP>, <140@ihu1f.UUCP>, <792@umcp-cs.UUCP> Organization: BTL Naperville, Il. Lines: 15 I've had some experience with Whitesmith's C compiler and support tools. Unfortunately, their variable initialization does not follow the accepted standard, but they don't have much of a choice. The Whitesmith package is designed for use on small "operating systems" like CP/M. CP/M does not support any kind of runtime loader that zeroes a program's bss section, so apparently Whitesmith's has taken the approach of forcing all statics to be initialized in order to force them into the data section of the program. So in this way, the initialized variables, be they scalar or array, are part of the program image and are copied in when the program is run. I don't know why Whitesmith's just didn't put ALL statics into the data section, even if they weren't explicitly initialized. Maybe someone else could respond. Ron Kukuk Bell Labs Naperville