Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!bbn!uwmcsd1!ig!agate!ucbvax!ucsfcgl!pixar!bp
From: bp@pixar.UUCP (Bruce Perens)
Newsgroups: gnu.gcc,gnu.g++,ca.unix,comp.unix.wizards,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.misc,comp.lang.modula2,comp.lang.pascal,comp.lang.smalltalk
Subject: How would you design a new a.out format?
Summary: The a.out format, especially the symbol-table portion, has not aged well. How would you design a new one?
Keywords: a.out, ld, symbol table, name list, linker
Message-ID: <1797@pixar.UUCP>
Date: 12 May 88 22:00:47 GMT
Organization: Pixar -- Marin County, California
Xref: utzoo comp.unix.wizards:8416 comp.lang.c:10094 comp.lang.c++:1115 comp.lang.misc:1587 comp.lang.modula2:838 comp.lang.pascal:874 comp.lang.smalltalk:556
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!bbn!uwmcsd1!ig!agate!ucbvax!ucsfcgl!pixar!bp
From: bp@pixar.UUCP (Bruce Perens)
Newsgroups: gnu.gcc,gnu.g++,ca.unix,comp.unix.wizards,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.misc,comp.lang.modula2,comp.lang.pascal,comp.lang.smalltalk
Subject: How would you design a new a.out format?
Summary: The a.out format, especially the symbol-table portion, has not aged well. How would you design a new one?
Keywords: a.out, ld, symbol table, name list, linker
Message-ID: <1797@pixar.UUCP>
Date: 12 May 88 22:00:47 GMT
Lines: 19
Followup-To:

Recent net discussion has pointed out the deficiencies in the BSD a.out
format with extensions for DBX, and the ATT COFF format. Source-level
debugging, new languages, resource managers, run-time-linking, and
shared libraries make special demands on the a.out format.
Extensibility of existing Unix a.out formats has been a problem.

What do you want from a new a.out format?
How would you implement one?

DO NOT POST FOLLOW-UPs. Mail them, and I will post a summary.

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---
Bruce Perens - Pixar, Marin County, Ca. 415-258-8167
This posting contains the opinions of the author, which are not necessarily
those of the management of Pixar.