On 2024-01-27, bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
> On 27/01/2024 17:36, David Brown wrote:
>> On 27/01/2024 14:24, Paul Edwards wrote:
>
>> If you can get this down to a C question, this would be a perfectly good
>> place to come.  If you are having trouble building software, posting a
>> heap of meaningless build errors is not helpful.
>
> But in the end it did come down to a C question.
>
> I'm curious however as to what you think this newsgroup is for.
>
> The C group on Reddit, which is moderated, is far more diverse in what
> is allowed.

The difference is that here, people can only express their opinion
on what is allowed.

In Reddit, if you carry on like you do here, you will be, firstly,
downvoted to invisibility. Secondly, likely kicked out of the
subreddit.

In Reddit, there are times where you will be downvoted to the basement
while posting something relevant and factual, just because people can't
handle it.

--
TXR Programming Language: http://nongnu.org/txr
Cygnal: Cygwin Native Application Library: http://kylheku.com/cygnal
Mastodon: @Kazinator@mstdn.ca

On 27/01/2024 19:57, Kaz Kylheku wrote:
> On 2024-01-27, bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
>> On 27/01/2024 17:36, David Brown wrote:
>>> On 27/01/2024 14:24, Paul Edwards wrote:
>>
>>> If you can get this down to a C question, this would be a perfectly good
>>> place to come.  If you are having trouble building software, posting a
>>> heap of meaningless build errors is not helpful.
>>
>> But in the end it did come down to a C question.
>>
>> I'm curious however as to what you think this newsgroup is for.
>>
>> The C group on Reddit, which is moderated, is far more diverse in what
>> is allowed.
>
> The difference is that here, people can only express their opinion
> on what is allowed.
>
> In Reddit, if you carry on like you do here,

You mean, expressing a contrary opinion to yours and defending that
opinion on multiple fronts?

What was happening to me in this group was just bullying and
intimidation by a mob.

In fact, you're doing it even now, wagging a finger and admonishing me
for some perceived ill-doing. Because your behaviour of course is
impeccable:

> Bart ... git ... think about it. 🙂

> you will be, firstly,
> downvoted to invisibility. Secondly, likely kicked out of the
> subreddit.

They don't like rants, but they also don't like people being uncivil and
disrepectful. So I don't think it'll be me being kicked out.

> In Reddit, there are times where you will be downvoted to the basement
> while posting something relevant and factual, just because people can't
> handle it.

That's true. Voting on Reddit is the worst aspect of it. People get lots
of votes for saying something incorrect (factually not just opinions),
and those who correct them can get downvoted.

Still, I've probably amassed 11-12,000 karma points over a few years,
even in the low-volume subreddits I frequent. However I get fed up with
it every do often and delete my account. Then I need to start again. The
points don't matter unless you get downvoted.

On 27/01/24 03:35, David Brown wrote:
> On 26/01/2024 19:00, bart wrote:

>> For the past month the discussion here has been about everything under
>> the sun, except actual C.
>
> A lot of it was off-topic, yes. But a lot of it was at least of
> interest to a number of people here.
>
> You are free to complain that people have been talking too much about
> COBOL, C++, or whatever - and that would be a valid complaint, and
> something that people in the group should respect.

More to the point - why didn't YOU complain about
people talking about COBOL, and telling them where
to find the appropriate COBOL groups, and the
philosophical underpinnings of why any mention of
COBOL matters belongs purely in a COBOL group.

And then repeat that with the C++ talk.

And then, when one of those people responds along
the lines of "what about that guy who has a public
domain C compiler written in C that you and I don't
use - he posted here!", you can respond with this:

> Two wrongs, however, do not make a right.

Concentrate on the COBOL guys. You're more
likely to get them to stop posting about
COBOL than you are likely to get me to stop
posting about a C compiler written in C.

BFN. Paul.

On 28/01/24 01:36, David Brown wrote:
>>>> It's public domain. You're the owner as much as
>>>> anyone else. And if you think it's a bug, then
>>>> I've just given you a bug report.
>>>
>>> It is public domain, but it is software written solely by Bart, and used
>>
>> Doesn't make any difference who wrote it.
>
> It makes a very big difference in regard to who can help you with it,
> and who might be interested in its details.

Bart has point blank said he is not interested
in it and made an effort to delete every vestige
of it from his system.

So if he chimes in, it's just luck.

>>> (AFAIK) only by you and Bart,
>>
>> It's not used by Bart at all that I am aware of.
>
> That just makes it even less appropriate to post it here.

I have a different opinion about whether a
C compiler written in C is on-topic in a C
support forum.

You're about as unlikely to change my mind
about that as vice-versa.

>>> and it's mainly of interest to you two.
>>
>> No. It's of interest to me and some other people,
>> not Bart.
>
> Who else?

There are a handful of people who are interested
in public domain software. I can give some names
if that is of any relevance (if you tell me what
the relevance is first - like - what action will
you take when I give you the first name).

> And is this the appropriate place to talk to them about your
> issues?

Any C forum is. I prefer newsgroups. I used to
use Fidonet C_ECHO when I didn't have internet
access. When I did have internet access I didn't
post here because I was dealing with other things.
I did occasionally post. But even though I didn't
post, this forum was always on my mind as a place
I would eventually call home.

> If you were announcing the availability of a new C compiler, that could
> be of interest to the group even if no one wanted to use it.

This is trying to get that announcement.

And indeed, as of an hour or so ago, Robert
(there's the first name for you to take
action on) sent in a fix for the 386 assembler
support code (that he wrote), which allowed
cc32n.c to compile using my flavor of gcc 3.2.3.

So the announcement is that you can have a
reasonable C90-compliant public domain
compiler that runs on a 32-bit system (I am
using Windows 2000 but you can also use
PDOS/386). It produces 64-bit code though.
Using the Microsoft calling convention.

However, also an hour ago (here's the next
announcement), you can run (certain) 64-bit PE
Win64 executables (that are dependent on
msvcrt.dll) on Linux - even though Linux uses
a different function call convention.

Originally I thought that wasn't possible (I
had it working with win32lin at pdos.org
though), but I managed to combine Linux and
PE into a single thing, and then:

kerravon@kerravon-pc:~/w2kshare$ objcopy -O elf64-x86-64 pdptest.exe
pdptest2.exe;./pdptest2.exe abc def
welcome3 to pdptest
main function is at 0000000002353070
allocating 10 bytes
m1 is 0000000000401008
allocating 20 bytes
m2 is 0000000000401008
stack is around 00000000E2C72D68
printing arguments
argc = 3
arg 0 is <./pdptest2.exe>
arg 1 is <abc>
arg 2 is <def>
kerravon@kerravon-pc:~/w2kshare$

I am hoping to avoid the objcopy step by directly
producing ELF, but just one executable - a pseudo-bios
for Linux, so that those Win64 executables run
under it. I'm still fleshing it out and proving
the concept.

> But you
> are talking about some details of problems you are having compiling it -
> that's a different matter.

No. I could compile it fine - albeit with warnings.

But it didn't run.

> Just because it is a C compiler, does not
> make it on-topic for the group.

Conversely, just because you say a particular
C compiler is not on-topic for the group,
doesn't make it so.

> Someone having trouble compiling
> "sqllite" (to pick a random example) would not post here even though the
> program was written in C and released in the public domain.

They could well be porting sqlite to a different
platform, and the C compiler there is complaining
about some C syntax used by sqlite, and wondering
whether the code is at fault or the compiler is
at fault.

Or instead of a compile error, it may be an
execution error.

In my case I had both compile warnings and
execution errors and was wondering if
someone was interested in helping.

> They would
> post in a place where they would find users people that might be able to
> help them, and where it is on topic - such as a a mailing list or
> project issue handler for sqllite.

If the new platform was not supported by sqlite,
it may well have been off-topic. It depends on
the forum.

>> There's nowhere else for me to go.
>
> If you can get this down to a C question, this would be a perfectly good
> place to come.

It was a C question. I have 36,000 lines of C
code that constitutes a C compiler. It isn't
working in this particular environment. Is
anyone interested in helping?

> If you are having trouble building software, posting a
> heap of meaningless build errors is not helpful.

I am having trouble making this 36,000 lines of
C code behave correctly. The original author (who
explicitly abandoned it), said that it should work
(if I remember correctly). But it's not working
for me as I remember it was meant to work. And I
could try something else if this C library support
code over here worked.

In other words, C, C and C.

Again - I've already heard your opinion that this
particular C question is off-topic in your opinion.

There's no particular point repeating that again
and again.

I have a different opinion on whether C libraries
and C compilers written in C are on-topic or not,
and it is unlikely that either of us are going to
change our minds about that.

> People can help here with C questions. We can't, generally, help with
> build issues with random bits of software.

I don't know what you're calling a "build issue".

The fix was not to change the way that I build.
The fix was to put an explicit LL that would
make it work on a C90 compiler with C99 extensions
but not the full C99 rules.

ie some C code was faulty.

> Keith didn't answer your
> question - he helped with /Bart/'s question.

Keith posted the information that allowed me
to fix the code. That was in fact my original
question. My question was "this code doesn't
work for me - any ideas?". Keith didn't reply
"yeah, stick an LL on lines 12456, 23275 and
32959". But that's what I needed to do (or
similar). A combination of myself, Bart and
Keith resolved the problem.

> Bart posted some C code,
> which Keith was able to comment on.

Yes, the problem was debugged by 3 people.

And then there were an equal number of people
hurling abuse from the sidelines - but that
abuse wasn't off-topic apparently.

>> The GNU people have no interest in supporting
>> gcc 3.2.3, in fact, they were "keen to delete"
>> the precious (to me) i370 target, displaying
>> the massive contempt for one of the most
>> important machines in the world.
>
> Of course the GNU folks have no interest in supporting gcc 3.2.3 - it's
> ancient history.

I disagree. I am using that to produce z/PDOS
to run on real z/Arch hardware.

The latest version was only released a month
or so ago.

> The i370 may have been an important machine in its
> time, now it is a museum article.

Nope. Thanks to upward compatibility it works
*just fine* on modern hardware.

Again, I'm not expecting you to change your
mind on this. But I will continue happily
targeting z/Arch hardware regardless of your
opinion.

> So I understand that you are interested in the history of old computers.

I'm interested in new computers too. I
ported PDPCLIB to macOS ARM (M1/Silicon)
a few days ago.

I ran into an issue though. I can't use
mprotect() to make the BSS executable, so
PDOS-generic won't work as a concept.

However, apparently I can run a virtual
machine running Linux or whatever, and then
it will still run at near-native speeds,
and PDOS-generic can run under that instead.

That work is paused for the moment as I want
to get a new machine for development if I am
going to start installing VM software.

Also - that work sort of triggered off this
current work involving cc64.

> I don't understand that you think other people should have any kind of
> duty or obligation to do so too.

Strawman. I didn't say that other people have
any duty/obligation to do anything at all.

Unless you're talking about my counter to
someone attempting to say that Bart had an
obligation. He doesn't. No-one has any
obligation. There's no contract.

On 28/01/2024 08:13, Paul Edwards wrote:
> On 27/01/24 03:35, David Brown wrote:
>> On 26/01/2024 19:00, bart wrote:
>
>>> For the past month the discussion here has been about everything under
>>> the sun, except actual C.
>>
>> A lot of it was off-topic, yes.  But a lot of it was at least of
>> interest to a number of people here.
>>
>> You are free to complain that people have been talking too much about
>> COBOL, C++, or whatever - and that would be a valid complaint, and
>> something that people in the group should respect.
>
> More to the point - why didn't YOU complain about
> people talking about COBOL, and telling them where
> to find the appropriate COBOL groups, and the
> philosophical underpinnings of why any mention of
> COBOL matters belongs purely in a COBOL group.
>

If I felt there was too much COBOL, then I would complain. But the
people talking about it knew perfectly well it was off-topic, and just
idle chat. And that's okay, as long as it doesn't go overboard.

> And then repeat that with the C++ talk.

The same applies to C++, though C++ and C are tied much tighter than
most languages, and there's more overlap. A fair proportion of the
people here use both languages regularly - comparisons between these
languages are therefore important topics.

However, as I said, you are free to complain if you think the COBOL or
C++ discussions are overwhelming the group.

>
> And then, when one of those people responds along
> the lines of "what about that guy who has a public
> domain C compiler written in C that you and I don't
> use - he posted here!", you can respond with this:
>

My first post in this thread was in support of Janis' suggestion that
you're more likely to get more helpful responses in an appropriate forum.

>> Two wrongs, however, do not make a right.
>
> Concentrate on the COBOL guys. You're more
> likely to get them to stop posting about
> COBOL than you are likely to get me to stop
> posting about a C compiler written in C.
>

The compiler in question is not, AFAIUI, written in C. C is merely an
output format.

But any post about C is on topic. Posts about the details of C tools,
or software that happens to be written in C, are not on topic.
Off-topic posts might still be interesting, and it is not uncommon for
long threads to wander off-topic before they fade away - that does not
stop them being off-topic.

On 28/01/2024 09:15, Paul Edwards wrote:
> On 28/01/24 01:36, David Brown wrote:
>>>>> It's public domain. You're the owner as much as
>>>>> anyone else. And if you think it's a bug, then
>>>>> I've just given you a bug report.
>>>>
>>>> It is public domain, but it is software written solely by Bart, and
>>>> used
>>>
>>> Doesn't make any difference who wrote it.
>>
>> It makes a very big difference in regard to who can help you with it,
>> and who might be interested in its details.
>
> Bart has point blank said he is not interested
> in it and made an effort to delete every vestige
> of it from his system.
>
> So if he chimes in, it's just luck.
>
>>>> (AFAIK) only by you and Bart,
>>>
>>> It's not used by Bart at all that I am aware of.
>>
>> That just makes it even less appropriate to post it here.
>
> I have a different opinion about whether a
> C compiler written in C is on-topic in a C
> support forum.
>

The BCC compiler is not written in C - it is, AFAIUI, written in Bart's
own language. (gcc was, at that time, written in C.)

This is a C /discussion/ group, not a support group. It is primarily
for discussing the C language, standards, and standard library, and for
discussing bits of C code. We don't support compilers or C software.
We might try to help if it is tools we are familiar with, but we are not
a support group. The primary support forum for gcc is the "gcc-help"
mailing list. I don't know where the primary support forum is for BCC,
but it is not here.

None of this means you can't make off-topic posts - there is nothing to
stop you doing so. But you should be aware about what is on-topic and
what is not, and how you can make your posts closer to topical, and
better suited to getting help. For example, instead of posting a pile
of compiler error messages, you could have looked at the code and tried
to see what C code in "cc32n.c" was the cause of the problem. Isolate
an example, add the minimum required typedefs and surrounding code to
get something that is comprehensible to any C programmer. Try it with
different compilers - <https://godbolt.org> is perfect for this. Then
you'd have something that is on-topic, and which people can answer.

> You're about as unlikely to change my mind
> about that as vice-versa.

I'm hoping to help you help yourself.

>
>>>> and it's mainly of interest to you two.
>>>
>>> No. It's of interest to me and some other people,
>>> not Bart.
>>
>> Who else?
>
> There are a handful of people who are interested
> in public domain software. I can give some names
> if that is of any relevance (if you tell me what
> the relevance is first - like - what action will
> you take when I give you the first name).
>

No need for names, of course. I am just trying to get an idea if there
are actually other people involved in this. And if so, then details of
your tools and work on outdated compilers, outdated computers, and
outdated languages would be best handled in a group who are interested
in that. You'd be helping them, and they would be helping you. Surely
that would be a good thing?

>> And is this the appropriate place to talk to them about your
>> issues?
>
> Any C forum is. I prefer newsgroups. I used to
> use Fidonet C_ECHO when I didn't have internet
> access. When I did have internet access I didn't
> post here because I was dealing with other things.
> I did occasionally post. But even though I didn't
> post, this forum was always on my mind as a place
> I would eventually call home.
>
>> If you were announcing the availability of a new C compiler, that could
>> be of interest to the group even if no one wanted to use it.
>
> This is trying to get that announcement.
>
> And indeed, as of an hour or so ago, Robert
> (there's the first name for you to take
> action on) sent in a fix for the 386 assembler
> support code (that he wrote), which allowed
> cc32n.c to compile using my flavor of gcc 3.2.3.
>
> So the announcement is that you can have a
> reasonable C90-compliant public domain
> compiler that runs on a 32-bit system (I am
> using Windows 2000 but you can also use
> PDOS/386). It produces 64-bit code though.
> Using the Microsoft calling convention.
>

I don't see anything against making such an announcement in this group,
but you can expect that no one will care (and that people will tell you
they don't care). There will not be many people for whom this is
remotely relevant or interesting - that's why you should work with your
community of people who /have/ expressed an interest. (Again, there's
nothing wrong with being interested in niche history or having a hobby
like this - but it does not mean it is of interest to many other people.)

> However, also an hour ago (here's the next
> announcement), you can run (certain) 64-bit PE
> Win64 executables (that are dependent on
> msvcrt.dll) on Linux - even though Linux uses
> a different function call convention.
>

Hasn't wine supported this for a decade or two?

>>>> And no, none of us are "owners" of the software in any sense of that
>>>> word.
>>>
>>> Yes you are. As much as anyone else in the world is.
>>> That's the exact definition of public domain.
>>
>> No, it is not.  For someone who is so obsessed with "public domain", you
>> are remarkably ignorant about it.
>
> Or maybe you are.
>
>> /No one/ owns the software released
>> into the public domain, at least in countries that recognise such the
>> concept of relinquishing ownership.  (Not all countries accept that as a
>> legal concept.)
>
> First of all, please explain to me the difference
> between "no-one owns it" and "everyone owns it".
>

It's much like the difference between "no one has a head shaped like a
banana" and "everyone has a head shaped like a banana".

> You seem to insist there is a difference.

Yes. The point of having something in the public domain is that /no
one/ owns it. "Own" is a legal concept.

>
> So - in the case of Macbeth - if EVERYONE owned
> it (as opposed to NOONE owning it - as you say
> the definition of public domain is), then what
> exactly would that mean?
>

Everyone would be entitled to a share of any royalties when the play was
performed. Everyone would have a say in when and how the text could be
used - who could publish it, who could perform it. They would all have
a say in the license(s) for its use. Everyone would all have
responsibility if there is something in the play that was considered
defamatory, hate speech, or otherwise problematic.

At the very least, please read
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain>. It is not a legal
reference, but neither am I, and neither are you.

I believe that what you think of as the practical implications of
"everyone owns it" are quite like the practical implications of
real-world "no one owns it" public domain. But I think you are mixing
up your terms, and probably misunderstanding what "ownership" means for
intellectual works.

>>>> we are not responsible for it or its uses,
>>>
>>> Nobody is responsible, or everyone is equally
>>> responsible, whichever way you look at it.
>>
>> These are hugely different ways of looking at it.  If I were to say "I
>> think some people in your family are murderers", would you respond with
>> "No one in my family is a murderer", or "Everyone in my family is
>> equally murderous" ?
>
> Both are technically correct answers. It is you
> who insists that the latter is not technically
> correct, so the burden is on you to demonstrate
> that.

One answer is technically correct, and useful because it conveys
information. The other is technically correct, and useless - giving no
information, but implying (strongly) something that is false. This can
be hugely relevant in legal situations.

And note that the two statements are not equivalent. The first implies
the second - but the second does not imply the first.

(And this discussion is definitely getting /way/ off topic. I recommend
you view the term "public domain" loosely, based on the Wikipedia
definition, and avoid talking about what it actually means. It's fine
to say that your intention is that anyone can take the software and use
it as they want. For anything beyond that, you should probably talk to
a lawyer that works in intellectual property rights - preferably one
with international law experience. An alternative, that is not absurdly
expensive, would be to look at things like the Creative Commons CCO
license as a way of getting the effect you want.)

On 28/01/2024 12:11, David Brown wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 08:13, Paul Edwards wrote:

>> And then, when one of those people responds along
>> the lines of "what about that guy who has a public
>> domain C compiler written in C that you and I don't
>> use - he posted here!", you can respond with this:
>>
>
> My first post in this thread was in support of Janis' suggestion

Anything written by that poster is clearly motivated by animosity
towards me.

> that
> you're more likely to get more helpful responses in an appropriate forum.
>
>>> Two wrongs, however, do not make a right.
>>
>> Concentrate on the COBOL guys. You're more
>> likely to get them to stop posting about
>> COBOL than you are likely to get me to stop
>> posting about a C compiler written in C.
>>
>
> The compiler in question is not, AFAIUI, written in C.  C is merely an
> output format.
>
> But any post about C is on topic.

What, just about the C language? That would be very restictive. But what
would that entail: learning about C? Endless posts about whether
something is an operator or not?

>  Posts about the details of C tools,
> or software that happens to be written in C, are not on topic.

What about some C code that has a bug in it? For example, the thread
"Inconsistent..." from 30-Oct-2023.

Or "Detect wrap-around on array" from 6-Nov-2023, which is about general
coding advice, but the language used happens to be C. Was that one on-topic?

Or "A Hacker Went to C" from 6-Dec-2023. Some lyrics or poetry.

Here's an interesting one: "Compile public library on mingw64 error!"
from 13-Dec-2023. About problems compiling some C code on a specific
compiler (sound familiar?).

The first reply was from somebody called 'Janis Papanagnou', who gave
helpful advice rather than tell them the software was a pile of shit and
teling then to fuck off to a different forum.

AFAICT that was NOT about the C language.

Another thread by Janis Papanagnou was about debugging C programs using
gdb on Linux.

You said elsewhere that posts about a new C compiler might be welcome.
Well I did that with "MCC Compiler" on 28-Sep-2023. This was the
response from a certain "Tim Rentsch":

> Please confine your postings in comp.lang.c to topics and subjects
> relevant to the C language. None of what you say in your posting
> is topical in comp.lang.c. An obvious suggestion is the newsgroup
> comp.compilers instead.

All I can see is clear discrimination, under the guise of 'topicality',
but when it suits them, others post and talk about stuff all the time
that doesn't come under your guidelines.

On 28/01/2024 13:05, David Brown wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 09:15, Paul Edwards wrote:
>> On 28/01/24 01:36, David Brown wrote:
>>>>>> It's public domain. You're the owner as much as
>>>>>> anyone else. And if you think it's a bug, then
>>>>>> I've just given you a bug report.
>>>>>
>>>>> It is public domain, but it is software written solely by Bart, and
>>>>> used
>>>>
>>>> Doesn't make any difference who wrote it.
>>>
>>> It makes a very big difference in regard to who can help you with it,
>>> and who might be interested in its details.
>>
>> Bart has point blank said he is not interested
>> in it and made an effort to delete every vestige
>> of it from his system.
>>
>> So if he chimes in, it's just luck.
>>
>>>>> (AFAIK) only by you and Bart,
>>>>
>>>> It's not used by Bart at all that I am aware of.
>>>
>>> That just makes it even less appropriate to post it here.
>>
>> I have a different opinion about whether a
>> C compiler written in C is on-topic in a C
>> support forum.
>>
>
> The BCC compiler is not written in C - it is, AFAIUI, written in Bart's
> own language.  (gcc was, at that time, written in C.)

Nevertheless, the software now only exists as a file of C source code.

I'm sure it can't be the first time that some software has been
transpiled or ported into C from another language, by programmatic means.

> This is a C /discussion/ group, not a support group.  It is primarily
> for discussing the C language, standards, and standard library, and for
> discussing bits of C code.  We don't support compilers or C software. We
> might try to help if it is tools we are familiar with, but we are not a
> support group.  The primary support forum for gcc is the "gcc-help"
> mailing list.  I don't know where the primary support forum is for BCC,
> but it is not here.

It is just a program that showed compile errors and that didn't work as
expected.

A month ago somebody on Reddit posted about a problem with their C
program, which worked on Linux, but didn't work on Windows.

It was a graphical game, about 7000 lines of code in all, in 30-odd
modules, and used the SDL2 library. It was crashing out in random places
soon after it got into the main event loop.

I downloaded the sources (no build system was provided; that helped) and
managed to eventually find the problem. I primarily used my MCC compiler
for the purpose too (I was able to do a temporary mod to it to log
function entries to help narrow then the failure point).

The main issue turned out to be a line like this:

string String;
String = (string)malloc(sizeof(*String));

Originally the * was missing, so malloc allocated only 8 bytes instead
of the 16 bytes that were necessary.

But why did it work fine on Linux for months? Because on Linux, even an
8-byte allocation takes up 32 byte of heap. Plenty of of extra room for
the struct.

On Windows, an 8-byte allocation uses 16 bytes of heap. Take away the
overhead necessary to track the size, and there are not enough spare
bytes to make it work. It will crash in unexpected places. (And yes I
did suggest trying to use a memory tracking tool.)

The point of relating this: you would ban people posting such appeals
for help in this forum. It's more important to discuss the ins and outs
of C++'s << operators; THAT is apparently more on topic.

>> You're about as unlikely to change my mind
>> about that as vice-versa.
>
> I'm hoping to help you help yourself.

So patronising. I don't necessarily agree with PE's aims, but admire
what he does. He already liaises with many other support groups and
individuals. Until he posts in this group, apparently as a last resort,
and is firmly told to go away.

On 28/01/2024 14:32, bart wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 12:11, David Brown wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 08:13, Paul Edwards wrote:
>
>>> And then, when one of those people responds along
>>> the lines of "what about that guy who has a public
>>> domain C compiler written in C that you and I don't
>>> use - he posted here!", you can respond with this:
>>>
>>
>> My first post in this thread was in support of Janis' suggestion
>
> Anything written by that poster is clearly motivated by animosity
> towards me.
>

I can't really comment on motivation or other people's posts - I try to
take one post at a time.

>> that you're more likely to get more helpful responses in an
>> appropriate forum.
>>
>>>> Two wrongs, however, do not make a right.
>>>
>>> Concentrate on the COBOL guys. You're more
>>> likely to get them to stop posting about
>>> COBOL than you are likely to get me to stop
>>> posting about a C compiler written in C.
>>>
>>
>> The compiler in question is not, AFAIUI, written in C.  C is merely an
>> output format.
>>
>> But any post about C is on topic.
>
> What, just about the C language? That would be very restictive. But what
> would that entail: learning about C? Endless posts about whether
> something is an operator or not?

Sometimes topical threads can get tedious, sometimes non-topical threads
can get tedious.

I don't object to a bit of off-topic posting, within reason. ("Within
reason" is highly subjective.)

The first post in this thread was, as I see it, off-topic. But more
importantly, it was not the best place for the person in question to get
help or an answer to his question. If only one person can help, as was
the case here, email is likely to be better unless the discussion would
be interesting to others. And the other people that might be interested
in the discussion are those in Paul's circle of public domain software
enthusiasts. As I see it, the main point is "you'd be better asking
elsewhere" rather than "please don't ask here". (After you had turned
the matter from a program build issue into a C issue, then it was
topical here.) I may have come across badly, but I'm actually trying to
be helpful.

>
>>   Posts about the details of C tools, or software that happens to be
>> written in C, are not on topic.
>
> What about some C code that has a bug in it? For example, the thread
> "Inconsistent..." from 30-Oct-2023.
>

(Just to be completely clear - my understanding of what is topical here
is no more than that - /my/ understanding.)

Questions about C code are topical. Questions about software written in
C are not.

To try to make this more concrete, if you can write the code in less
than, say, 20 lines of standard C, that code is on topic. (We can be a
bit more flexible than pure standard C - commonly understood extensions
or variants should be fine.) Basically, people can read and understand
the C code in question. If there's an error, we can perhaps see it
directly. Or we can try to compile it and look at the output or errors.
No one, however, can be expected to guess about a problem on line
10,000 of some C code found somewhere on the internet.

>
> You said elsewhere that posts about a new C compiler might be welcome.
> Well I did that with "MCC Compiler" on 28-Sep-2023. This was the
> response from a certain "Tim Rentsch":
>

I can't be responsible or answer for posts by Tim or Janis.

In article <up5l18$3uf12$1@dont-email.me>, bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
>On 28/01/2024 12:11, David Brown wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 08:13, Paul Edwards wrote:
>
>>> And then, when one of those people responds along
>>> the lines of "what about that guy who has a public
>>> domain C compiler written in C that you and I don't
>>> use - he posted here!", you can respond with this:
>>>
>>
>> My first post in this thread was in support of Janis' suggestion
>
>Anything written by that poster is clearly motivated by animosity
>towards me.

I have to admit that I don't agree with your stance on JP. Although I have
tussled a bit in the past with him, I think that JP is basically a good
person, but who is hampered, and sometimes ties himself in knots, by the
language problem (English not being his first language).

Unlike, say, Keith T. and Dave B, who are both clearly human garbage.

Incidentally, I've noticed that Keith hasn't been posting much lately (and
when he does post, it tends to be more substantive and less topic-cop,
which is a good thing). Dave though, seems to be rushing in to fill the
void, and has set himself up as the new arbiter of what is and isn't
acceptable on this group.

And you are right, that it is entirely "Things I like from people I like
are OK, but things from people I don't like, I will whine like a baby
about..."

--
When I was growing up we called them "retards", but that's not PC anymore.
Now, we just call them "Trump Voters".

The question is, of course, how much longer it will be until that term is also un-PC.

On 28/01/2024 15:02, bart wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 13:05, David Brown wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 09:15, Paul Edwards wrote:
>>> On 28/01/24 01:36, David Brown wrote:
>>>>>>> It's public domain. You're the owner as much as
>>>>>>> anyone else. And if you think it's a bug, then
>>>>>>> I've just given you a bug report.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It is public domain, but it is software written solely by Bart,
>>>>>> and used
>>>>>
>>>>> Doesn't make any difference who wrote it.
>>>>
>>>> It makes a very big difference in regard to who can help you with it,
>>>> and who might be interested in its details.
>>>
>>> Bart has point blank said he is not interested
>>> in it and made an effort to delete every vestige
>>> of it from his system.
>>>
>>> So if he chimes in, it's just luck.
>>>
>>>>>> (AFAIK) only by you and Bart,
>>>>>
>>>>> It's not used by Bart at all that I am aware of.
>>>>
>>>> That just makes it even less appropriate to post it here.
>>>
>>> I have a different opinion about whether a
>>> C compiler written in C is on-topic in a C
>>> support forum.
>>>
>>
>> The BCC compiler is not written in C - it is, AFAIUI, written in
>> Bart's own language.  (gcc was, at that time, written in C.)
>
>
> Nevertheless, the software now only exists as a file of C source code.
>
> I'm sure it can't be the first time that some software has been
> transpiled or ported into C from another language, by programmatic means.
>

Not at all, no.

But if the original source is not available, or the means to compile (or
transpile) it is not available, then it's more "binary only" or
"abandonware" than C source. I don't view compiled binaries as
"assembly files", just because you can view them as assembly code.

Your transpiler generated C code might be a bit easier to follow - I
don't know how much you try to keep structure, identifiers, comments,
etc., in place - but it's still quite different from code written and
maintained in C.

>> This is a C /discussion/ group, not a support group.  It is primarily
>> for discussing the C language, standards, and standard library, and
>> for discussing bits of C code.  We don't support compilers or C
>> software. We might try to help if it is tools we are familiar with,
>> but we are not a support group.  The primary support forum for gcc is
>> the "gcc-help" mailing list.  I don't know where the primary support
>> forum is for BCC, but it is not here.
>
> It is just a program that showed compile errors and that didn't work as
> expected.
>
> A month ago somebody on Reddit posted about a problem with their C
> program, which worked on Linux, but didn't work on Windows.
>

There are lots of Reddit groups - this is not one of them.

It's possible that there would be advantages in widening the topicality
of this group. It's possible that it will fade away if it does not
become more like other forums. But that's another matter than what this
group is /today/. Perhaps this is all something that is worth
discussing (discussions about topicality are, by Usenet tradition,
always on-topic).

> It was a graphical game, about 7000 lines of code in all, in 30-odd
> modules, and used the SDL2 library. It was crashing out in random places
> soon after it got into the main event loop.
>
> I downloaded the sources (no build system was provided; that helped) and
> managed to eventually find the problem. I primarily used my MCC compiler
> for the purpose too (I was able to do a temporary mod to it to log
> function entries to help narrow then the failure point).
>
> The main issue turned out to be a line like this:
>
>     string String;
>     String = (string)malloc(sizeof(*String));
>
> Originally the * was missing, so malloc allocated only 8 bytes instead
> of the 16 bytes that were necessary.
>
> But why did it work fine on Linux for months? Because on Linux, even an
> 8-byte allocation takes up 32 byte of heap. Plenty of of extra room for
> the struct.
>
> On Windows, an 8-byte allocation uses 16 bytes of heap. Take away the
> overhead necessary to track the size, and there are not enough spare
> bytes to make it work. It will crash in unexpected places. (And yes I
> did suggest trying to use a memory tracking tool.)

(Note that this is all a matter of the library, not the OS.)

Memory tracking tools, or something like gcc/clang's address sanitizer,
are helpful for this kind of thing, so that was a good suggestion.
Another is good static warnings - "gcc -Wall -Wextra" should catch this one.

>
> The point of relating this: you would ban people posting such appeals
> for help in this forum. It's more important to discuss the ins and outs
> of C++'s << operators; THAT is apparently more on topic.
>

I'm not /banning/ anything. It's not my group to control.

I'm glad that there are places where people can go with problems like
that person's, where they can get help.

No group can cover everything. A Reddit group is organised differently
from a Usenet group, which is different again from a mailing list, or an
issue tracker on github or sourceforge. Every group has to find a
balance for what they cover, with a view to what is of interest to the
group members, its original charter, what works within the format of the
group, and any changes over time.

<https://clc-wiki.net/wiki/C_community:comp.lang.c:Introduction>

Different groups and different places do different things. And it is
helpful when someone posts something that is better suited in a
different place, for someone to let them know. If someone posts here
with an issue in their 7000 line code, you could suggest they would get
better answers on that Reddit group. If someone posts in the Reddit
group with a difficult C standards question, you could direct them here.

I'm not saying this groups topicality is ideal for any particular
purpose. I am not saying that others do not post off-topic. I am not
saying the topicality of the group should not be changed. I am just
saying that I thought the original post was off-topic, and that the OP
was more likely (not guaranteed, but more likely) to get help in a
different way.

>>> You're about as unlikely to change my mind
>>> about that as vice-versa.
>>
>> I'm hoping to help you help yourself.
>
> So patronising.

It's not patronising. It's giving what I hope is helpful advice. Have
you never asked someone - online or in real life - for help, and been
told that they can't do much there, but you might get an answer over there?

> I don't necessarily agree with PE's aims, but admire
> what he does. He already liaises with many other support groups and
> individuals. Until he posts in this group, apparently as a last resort,
> and is firmly told to go away.
>

I certainly didn't tell him to go away. I told him that we can try and
help with C issues, but it's unlikely that this is the best place to
help with build issues for some large lump of C code.

Paul is welcome to his philosophies and aims, and to his projects - just
as you are, and anyone else is. If this is something that he cares
about, then I wish him success with it.

This is just like my attitude to your compiler(s) for your own
language(s). I can tell you they are off-topic here, of no significant
interest or relevance to C programmers, and in no way a substitute for C
- that's all factual. But I can also recommend talking about it in
comp.lang.misc or comp.compilers, but it /is/ on topic there, and those
are places where you might get useful advice. (Maybe there are other
better places too - the internet is a big place.) And I can do that
while being seriously impressed (and maybe a touch envious) that you
have made your own language, and made your own compiler. I can respect
the achievement, the dedication, and your interest in it - without
pretending that I think it is important to anyone else.

On 28/01/2024 14:41, Kenny McCormack wrote:
> In article <up5l18$3uf12$1@dont-email.me>, bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 12:11, David Brown wrote:
>>> On 28/01/2024 08:13, Paul Edwards wrote:
>>
>>>> And then, when one of those people responds along
>>>> the lines of "what about that guy who has a public
>>>> domain C compiler written in C that you and I don't
>>>> use - he posted here!", you can respond with this:
>>>>
>>>
>>> My first post in this thread was in support of Janis' suggestion
>>
>> Anything written by that poster is clearly motivated by animosity
>> towards me.
>
> I have to admit that I don't agree with your stance on JP. Although I have
> tussled a bit in the past with him, I think that JP is basically a good
> person, but who is hampered, and sometimes ties himself in knots, by the
> language problem (English not being his first language).

I don't think language is the problem. Below are a selection of comments
he has made to me.

You can hardly be more sneering, patronising and supercilious.

And that's on top of calling my software a pile of shit and suggesting I
ought to be sued for it.

A nice chap, indeed!

Meanwhile is a comment from DB:

> No one, however, can be expected to guess about a problem on line
10,000 of some C code found somewhere on the internet.

10K lines or more? Surely that barely counts as a toy program according
to JP; I'm sure he'd make short work of it.

JP:

"It's very interesting that despite your very small and restricted
experience

Why don't you just read about those two tools and learn, instead
of repeatedly spouting such stupid statements of ignorance.

Yes, we know. You've repeatedly shown that you are actually doing
small one-man-shows in projects that I can only call toy-projects.

Clearly your imputations are based on ignorance.

My suspicion had been that he's maybe no person but an AI bot.
It's just too pathological what he writes and how he behaves to be
sure that he's a human poster. - On the other hand, this is Usenet,
and everything is possible.

I propose that you try to give up what you think is "normally" and
base your knowledge and opinions on facts. Honestly, it will make
communication generally easier and not make you look like a moron.

That was actually just a thought that popped up. But after thinking
about it I got aware that AI bots (despite their inherent problems)
are more fact-oriented and operate on a much larger knowledge base.

Clueless as you are you are not in the position to be cynical."

On 28/01/2024 14:41, Kenny McCormack wrote:
>
> Unlike, say, Keith T. and Dave B, who are both
>
Please.
I enjoy debating with both these people. We don't need this sort of
thing in comp.lang.c.
--
Check out Basic Algorithms and my other books:
https://www.lulu.com/spotlight/bgy1mm

On 28/01/2024 17:15, Malcolm McLean wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 14:41, Kenny McCormack wrote:
>>
>> Unlike, say, Keith T. and Dave B, who are both
> >
> Please.
> I enjoy debating with both these people. We don't need this sort of
> thing in comp.lang.c.

I'm also not at all keen on digging up previous posts, grievances,
insults, etc., unless it can really shed light on something current.
Sometimes people say things that get a bit out of hand - it's not good,
but it is hard to avoid in a medium like this. (I know I am at least as
guilty of that as anyone else.)

Maybe we just call this whole branch off-topic, and leave it there? The
OP has got a solution to his problem for now, and we can be happy about
that. We'll take the next thread as it comes along - agreeing or
disagreeing as always, but with at least an aim of helping others.

On 28.01.2024 15:11, David Brown wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 14:32, bart wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 12:11, David Brown wrote:
>>>
>>> My first post in this thread was in support of Janis' suggestion
>>
>> Anything written by that poster is clearly motivated by animosity
>> towards me.

Not the least. - Be assured I'm _not interested_ in your person
in any way, neither to the positive nor to the negative, and I'm
also not interested concerning what you think to be interesting
you have to say. - I think I had it explained that I will not see
your posts any more unless someone thinks it is worth responding
to your post and thus see a followup. - This is a clear indication
that I have no animosity or other feelings, besides disinterest.

>
> I can't really comment on motivation or other people's posts - I try to
> take one post at a time.

Bart's habit is meanwhile well known; to assume things, wrongly,
and build his responses based on false suppositions.

Janis

On 2024-01-28, bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 12:11, David Brown wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 08:13, Paul Edwards wrote:
>
>>> And then, when one of those people responds along
>>> the lines of "what about that guy who has a public
>>> domain C compiler written in C that you and I don't
>>> use - he posted here!", you can respond with this:
>>>
>>
>> My first post in this thread was in support of Janis' suggestion
>
> Anything written by that poster is clearly motivated by animosity
> towards me.

But, in spite of your by now long history of posting to this newsgroup,
pretty much none of it has been topical.

You're like, let's see, a guitar enthusiast posting to a violin
newsgroup.

Man, violins are so unfriendly, how can anyone in their right mind waste
their time on them. Frets, people! Have you heard of these things? You
just hold down a string, and get the right pitch instantly. And look at
the sustain; the string goes on ringing clearly, no bow required.
Pizzicato playing is a joke by comparison: it sounds like chickens
clucking.

I'm totally on topic: I'm telling you how violins suck compared
to guitars! And ... I've built a bowed instrument closely resembling a
violin. It has three strings tuned a minor sixth apart, and features
frets. You wear it around your neck on a strap, and use a bow.

--
TXR Programming Language: http://nongnu.org/txr
Cygnal: Cygwin Native Application Library: http://kylheku.com/cygnal
Mastodon: @Kazinator@mstdn.ca

On 28.01.2024 15:41, Kenny McCormack wrote:
>
> I have to admit that I don't agree with your stance on JP. Although I have
> tussled a bit in the past with him, I think that JP is basically a good
> person, [...]

Be careful with such statements... - I'm an Angry Old Man!

Janis

PS: ...but thanks!

On 28/01/2024 16:01, David Brown wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 15:02, bart wrote:

>> A month ago somebody on Reddit posted about a problem with their C
>> program, which worked on Linux, but didn't work on Windows.
>>
>
> There are lots of Reddit groups - this is not one of them.

The one in question is called C_Programming
(https://www.reddit.com/r/C_Programming/).
> It's possible that there would be advantages in widening the topicality
> of this group.  It's possible that it will fade away if it does not
> become more like other forums.  But that's another matter than what this
> group is /today/.

If you were new to C and needed help with any aspect, which one would
you go for? Which others are there? It's seems extremely churlish to me
that this group, populated mostly by old-timers, should draw such sharp
lines as to what should be allowed.

Until six months ago, it had been moribund for a couple of years.
Although it didn't stop Keith claiming the rare odd post being
off-topic, as though it would affect the signal-to-noise ratio.

It is partly due to people like me who stir things up, or who have
minority views, that brought some life back to it.

Why not open just open it up a bit more? Although the worst for mostly
posting off-topic material right now is JP. But I see you're all very
chummy so I doubt he's going to get a ticking off; he's a Professional
you know.

>>      String = (string)malloc(sizeof(*String));
>>
>> Originally the * was missing, so malloc allocated only 8 bytes instead
>> of the 16 bytes that were necessary.

> Memory tracking tools, or something like gcc/clang's address sanitizer,
> are helpful for this kind of thing, so that was a good suggestion.
> Another is good static warnings - "gcc -Wall -Wextra" should catch this
> one.

It didn't help in this case. The example can be reduced to this:

typedef struct {int d,m,y,x;}* date;
date Date;

Date = (date)malloc(sizeof(Date));

The naming choices made it difficult to spot; Date is an instance of a
pointer, not of a struct as it appears.

> <https://clc-wiki.net/wiki/C_community:comp.lang.c:Introduction>

Wow, they take it pretty seriously. So, meta-discussion about the
language, so long as it doesn't involve any practical aspects of using C?

The Reddit topicality rule is one short paragraph.

>> I don't necessarily agree with PE's aims, but admire what he does. He
>> already liaises with many other support groups and individuals. Until
>> he posts in this group, apparently as a last resort, and is firmly
>> told to go away.
>>
>
> I certainly didn't tell him to go away.  I told him that we can try and
> help with C issues, but it's unlikely that this is the best place to
> help with build issues for some large lump of C code.

A toy program according to JP!

On 2024-01-28, bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
> If you were new to C and needed help with any aspect, which one would
> you go for?

I'd find the forum which has the most people critizing C and talking
at length about makefiles, with digressions into COBOL, and trolls
advocating C++.

--
TXR Programming Language: http://nongnu.org/txr
Cygnal: Cygwin Native Application Library: http://kylheku.com/cygnal
Mastodon: @Kazinator@mstdn.ca

On 28/01/2024 19:34, bart wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 16:01, David Brown wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 15:02, bart wrote:
>
>>> A month ago somebody on Reddit posted about a problem with their C
>>> program, which worked on Linux, but didn't work on Windows.
>>>
>>
>> There are lots of Reddit groups - this is not one of them.
>
> The one in question is called C_Programming
> (https://www.reddit.com/r/C_Programming/).

Maybe I should join Reddit sometime...

>> It's possible that there would be advantages in widening the
>> topicality of this group.  It's possible that it will fade away if it
>> does not become more like other forums.  But that's another matter
>> than what this group is /today/.
>
> If you were new to C and needed help with any aspect, which one would
> you go for? Which others are there? It's seems extremely churlish to me
> that this group, populated mostly by old-timers, should draw such sharp
> lines as to what should be allowed.
>

I'm not sure this group is a great place for C newbies. I'm not sure
that's its purpose - and I certainly don't think it is a place people
will arrive at when first looking for a place for learning C. Yes, it
is mostly full of old-timers (at a mere 51 years, I am probably well
below average). Usenet is old-fashioned - it appeals primarily to
people who have used it for decades.

Of course we welcome new programmers, and people new to Usenet, but they
will always be the minority here - no matter how much we help any
on-topic or off-topic poster.

> Until six months ago, it had been moribund for a couple of years.

The number of posts comes and goes, increasing when there are threads
that engage the group members.

> Although it didn't stop Keith claiming the rare odd post being
> off-topic, as though it would affect the signal-to-noise ratio.
>
> It is partly due to people like me who stir things up, or who have
> minority views, that brought some life back to it.
>

A lot of what you post is interesting. Some of it is even on-topic :-)

> Why not open just open it up a bit more? Although the worst for mostly
> posting off-topic material right now is JP. But I see you're all very
> chummy so I doubt he's going to get a ticking off; he's a Professional
> you know.

It is not closed (excluding Google's latest "solution" to their own spam
problem). No one has stopped Paul posting.

>
>>>      String = (string)malloc(sizeof(*String));
>>>
>>> Originally the * was missing, so malloc allocated only 8 bytes
>>> instead of the 16 bytes that were necessary.
>
>> Memory tracking tools, or something like gcc/clang's address
>> sanitizer, are helpful for this kind of thing, so that was a good
>> suggestion. Another is good static warnings - "gcc -Wall -Wextra"
>> should catch this one.
>
> It didn't help in this case. The example can be reduced to this:
>
>     typedef struct {int d,m,y,x;}* date;
>     date Date;
>
>     Date = (date)malloc(sizeof(Date));
>

It turns out that the relevant warning (-Walloc-size, included in
-Wextra) is not in gcc until version 14. That could be why it didn't
trigger! (I knew the warning was recent - I didn't know it was /that/
recent.)

> The naming choices made it difficult to spot; Date is an instance of a
> pointer, not of a struct as it appears.

I agree that the naming choices are terrible here. I'm okay with
typedefing pointers in some cases, but this looks almost designed to be
confusing. I am also sceptical to the use of type and variable
identifiers that differ only in letter cases - but /if/ you are going to
do that, I would say the more common idiom is that the type gets a
capital and the variable gets small letters. And spaces help readability.

So it would be easier to see the problem with this:

typedef struct { int d,m,y,x; } Date;
typedef Date * pDate;

pDate pdate;

pdate = (pdate) malloc(sizeof(Date));

(I'm not suggesting typedefing the pointer is a good idea here, just a
better way to write it if that was what you wanted.)

The more idiomatic "Date = malloc(sizeof *Date)" would have been a good
alternative.

>
>> <https://clc-wiki.net/wiki/C_community:comp.lang.c:Introduction>
>
> Wow, they take it pretty seriously. So, meta-discussion about the
> language, so long as it doesn't involve any practical aspects of using C?
>

Usenet used to be a serious place!

> The Reddit topicality rule is one short paragraph.
>
>>> I don't necessarily agree with PE's aims, but admire what he does. He
>>> already liaises with many other support groups and individuals. Until
>>> he posts in this group, apparently as a last resort, and is firmly
>>> told to go away.
>>>
>>
>> I certainly didn't tell him to go away.  I told him that we can try
>> and help with C issues, but it's unlikely that this is the best place
>> to help with build issues for some large lump of C code.
>
> A toy program according to JP!
>

Toys can be big, can't they? (Again, I can't answer for JP.)

On 28/01/2024 18:27, Kaz Kylheku wrote:
> On 2024-01-28, bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 12:11, David Brown wrote:
>>> On 28/01/2024 08:13, Paul Edwards wrote:
>>
>>>> And then, when one of those people responds along
>>>> the lines of "what about that guy who has a public
>>>> domain C compiler written in C that you and I don't
>>>> use - he posted here!", you can respond with this:
>>>>
>>>
>>> My first post in this thread was in support of Janis' suggestion
>>
>> Anything written by that poster is clearly motivated by animosity
>> towards me.
>
> But, in spite of your by now long history of posting to this newsgroup,
> pretty much none of it has been topical.

You're wrong.

I've looked at my contributions for a dozen random threads over the last
couple of years.

4 out 5 were firmly on-topic as generally agreed by most here.

The ones that weren't were usually because the thread itself (not
started by me) was off-topic or had wandered off-topic. And in those
cases, the usual regulars joined in as well.

I've just checked one more post from 5 years ago ("Function to trim
leading spaces", technically off-topic according to the rules
established today, but everyone joined in anyway).

My constribution consisted of some C code. These are the contribitions
from Scott Lurndal:

"Most demons will re-open "/dev/null" on fd0."

"In over forty years of C and Posix programming, I've never
needed to use fseek(3) at all. seek(2) and later lseek(2) yes, fseek(3)
never. But then,
I typically avoid stdio for most real world usage scenarios; favoring mmap()
or pread(2)/pwrite(2) for most cases"

"We ran into the same issues when porting a lot of the BSD utilities to
SVR4 back in the day when the two camps started to get along...."

You can draw your own conclusions about who posts more about actual C
code and without dragging UNIX specifics into every post. They do
however tend to be one-liners, unless posting swathes of listings which
are never C source code.

For fairness, I checked one more thread in which SL had posted, and sure
enough, his post was a few dozen lines of BPL script, in upper case.

It's funny that no one has ever complained about that.

> You're like, let's see, a guitar enthusiast posting to a violin
> newsgroup.
>
> Man, violins are so unfriendly, how can anyone in their right mind waste
> their time on them. Frets, people! Have you heard of these things? You
> just hold down a string, and get the right pitch instantly. And look at
> the sustain; the string goes on ringing clearly, no bow required.
> Pizzicato playing is a joke by comparison: it sounds like chickens
> clucking.

>
> I'm totally on topic: I'm telling you how violins suck compared
> to guitars! And ... I've built a bowed instrument closely resembling a
> violin. It has three strings tuned a minor sixth apart, and features
> frets. You wear it around your neck on a strap, and use a bow.

Perhaps I shouldn't be replying to somebody who seems to under the
influence of something.

On 28/01/24 21:05, David Brown wrote:

> The BCC compiler is not written in C - it is, AFAIUI, written in Bart's
> own language. (gcc was, at that time, written in C.)
>
> This is a C /discussion/ group, not a support group. It is primarily
> for discussing the C language, standards, and standard library, and for
> discussing bits of C code. We don't support compilers or C software. We
> might try to help if it is tools we are familiar with, but we are not a
> support group. The primary support forum for gcc is the "gcc-help"
> mailing list. I don't know where the primary support forum is for BCC,
> but it is not here.

I'm not sure this is considered to be "bcc".

BCC was actually on github or something. The
code that I am using was only temporarily
placed somewhere so that I could download it.

Again - if anyone supports this code, it's me.

I can report a problem - to myself.

I already did that. And it was beyond my ability
to solve in a reasonable timeframe so I tried my
luck here, and got exactly what I needed within
24 hours flat.

This is quite literally the best support forum
for this (unnamed software) that I am aware of.

> None of this means you can't make off-topic posts - there is nothing to
> stop you doing so. But you should be aware about what is on-topic and
> what is not, and how you can make your posts closer to topical, and
> better suited to getting help. For example, instead of posting a pile
> of compiler error messages, you could have looked at the code and tried
> to see what C code in "cc32n.c" was the cause of the problem.

I had already looked at it. But I wasn't even sure
I was expecting a result I shouldn't be expecting.
I knew what cc64.c did, but this was the first
at least recent attempt at running cc32n.c.

> Isolate
> an example, add the minimum required typedefs and surrounding code to
> get something that is comprehensible to any C programmer. Try it with
> different compilers - <https://godbolt.org> is perfect for this. Then
> you'd have something that is on-topic, and which people can answer.

I already did try with different compilers which
is why I started wondering whether I had incorrect
expectations from the software.

>> You're about as unlikely to change my mind
>> about that as vice-versa.
>
> I'm hoping to help you help yourself.

I am already doing that.

>> There are a handful of people who are interested
>> in public domain software. I can give some names
>> if that is of any relevance (if you tell me what
>> the relevance is first - like - what action will
>> you take when I give you the first name).
>
> No need for names, of course. I am just trying to get an idea if there
> are actually other people involved in this. And if so, then details of
> your tools and work on outdated compilers, outdated computers, and
> outdated languages would be best handled in a group who are interested
> in that. You'd be helping them, and they would be helping you. Surely
> that would be a good thing?

It's a question of technical expertise. In
that circle, I'm the one most likely to be
able to solve the problem.

>> So the announcement is that you can have a
>> reasonable C90-compliant public domain
>> compiler that runs on a 32-bit system (I am
>> using Windows 2000 but you can also use
>> PDOS/386). It produces 64-bit code though.
>> Using the Microsoft calling convention.
>
> I don't see anything against making such an announcement in this group,
> but you can expect that no one will care (and that people will tell you
> they don't care).

That's all fine by me.

> There will not be many people for whom this is
> remotely relevant or interesting - that's why you should work with your
> community of people who /have/ expressed an interest.

The bottleneck is technical expertise, not interest.

>> However, also an hour ago (here's the next
>> announcement), you can run (certain) 64-bit PE
>> Win64 executables (that are dependent on
>> msvcrt.dll) on Linux - even though Linux uses
>> a different function call convention.
>
> Hasn't wine supported this for a decade or two?

Theoretically yes. I tried installing it on a
few different Linux machines and after doing
massive downloads, it didn't work. And any
issue in it would probably take months of
effort trying to understand (or even build
the code from source).

As of an hour or so ago, you can now get a
103k executable that does that (limited, but
what I need) task. It's UCX64L from the UCARM
section (as opposed to UCX64 from the UCX64
section) at http://pdos.org .

>> So - in the case of Macbeth - if EVERYONE owned
>> it (as opposed to NOONE owning it - as you say
>> the definition of public domain is), then what
>> exactly would that mean?
>
> Everyone would be entitled to a share of any royalties when the play was
> performed.

Everyone effectively can do that. The
government in your country can effectively
get royalties from the play and distribute
them according to the democratic wishes of
the people who own it.

But regardless, yes, I see why you prefer
the term unowned.

> with international law experience. An alternative, that is not absurdly
> expensive, would be to look at things like the Creative Commons CCO
> license as a way of getting the effect you want.)

I already do mention you can follow CC0 if
you wish and provide a link.

BFN. Paul.

On 29/01/24 00:01, David Brown wrote:

> But if the original source is not available, or the means to compile (or
> transpile) it is not available, then it's more "binary only" or
> "abandonware" than C source.

Yes, you can consider it to be "binary only",
although that would be a too-harsh categorization,
as I have indeed been able to make changes to
the code to fix other issues.

And yes, you can also consider it to be
"abandonware", although that is also probably
too harsh also, as I haven't abandoned it. I
used it an hour or so ago. It's normal for
original authors of any bit of software to die,
or move on (even at a company).

But all software obtained for free can probably
fit the definition of "abandonware", as there
can't be any expectation of support.

If the support model is "you pay me full western
contract rates for an unlimited time and I'll
see what I can do", then cc32n.c isn't abandoned
either.

> Your transpiler generated C code might be a bit easier to follow - I
> don't know how much you try to keep structure, identifiers, comments,
> etc., in place - but it's still quite different from code written and
> maintained in C.

Absolutely, which is why the quest to get
SubC up to C90 standard continues. Jean-Marc
is the one doing that, as the original author -
Nils Holm - isn't really interested in this
software anymore - possibly as a spectator is ok.

I've also made changes myself. And also paid
for someone else to make changes (as an
individual - I don't have a company).

> I'm not saying this groups topicality is ideal for any particular
> purpose. I am not saying that others do not post off-topic. I am not
> saying the topicality of the group should not be changed. I am just
> saying that I thought the original post was off-topic, and that the OP
> was more likely (not guaranteed, but more likely) to get help in a
> different way.

"more likely" based on what statistics or analysis?

I'm not aware of anywhere that can beat 24 hours.

> It's not patronising. It's giving what I hope is helpful advice. Have
> you never asked someone - online or in real life - for help, and been
> told that they can't do much there, but you might get an answer over there?

You haven't provided an "over there" that has a
snowball's chance in hell of producing a solution
in 24 hours.

> I certainly didn't tell him to go away. I told him that we can try and
> help with C issues, but it's unlikely that this is the best place to
> help with build issues for some large lump of C code.

Unlikely based on what analysis or statistics?

And your prediction was totally incorrect regardless.
This is a proven good place.

Partly because Bart hangs out here of course.

Because you're hitting something different now.

A public post saying "can anyone help" is very
different from harassing a specific individual
(who you haven't paid either) who has told you
"I'm not interested in this software - don't
come to me for support" (or words to that effect).

I haven't violated that wish. I posted in public,
not email. Unless you want to quibble that I
shouldn't have mentioned his name at all in the
public post.

I consider I did the right thing. And I got the
result I wanted.

And now maybe you have a result that is useful
to you (or someone you know, or at a future
workplace) - you can write a Win64 utility and
if you do it a certain way, you can run it on
Linux with ridiculously small overhead.

BFN. Paul.

On 28.01.2024 20:10, David Brown wrote:
> On 28/01/2024 19:34, bart wrote:
>
>> Why not open just open it up a bit more? Although the worst for mostly
>> posting off-topic material right now is JP.

You missed that you were initially and still are amongst the ones who
contributed most to recent off-topic'ness to this group. And I'm not
(primarily) speaking about your tool (or the repeated advertisement
for it). My third post ever in this group, a question about CPP tags,
was hijacked (without the subject changed or the posts marked as OT),
and I posted a note that it had already been completely answered after
a dozen posts; despite that you (and some others) "misused" (sort of)
that thread. The thread was filled with non-topical trash, and all
hundreds of posts (and your posts even with hundreds [of non-topical]
lines) since then and still named under my subject. It appears to be
related to my question, so I have to look into them. It may happen
that a thread goes stray, but after the hint I consider it rude.

Mind that I don't cares if folks post about OT stuff, if it is marked
as such [OT] or/and the subject changed so that we can identify (and
skip) such threads. (I've tried a few times, but some here just don't
care despite hinted to; you included as one of the most prominent
members.)

>>
>> A toy program according to JP!

I haven't read your post, just noticed the personal ("JP") references,
so I don't know whether your post is still concerning your personal
toy project from many weeks ago (or something else I haven't seen).

I think we've already identified a couple factors of professional
software projects and about toy software projects upthread. If you
lack personal expertise and don't understand what had been written,
I can't help you; I won't repeat it, nor explain it again (you seem
anyway not showing interest).

From David's response below I infer that you are speaking about a
piece of code that you think is a professional work because it has
many lines. So I assume that you are still speaking about that one
C file with, what?, 50.000+ lines all in one monolithic source file.
(I've seen it when you posted the link some weeks ago. *shudder*)

>
> Toys can be big, can't they? (Again, I can't answer for JP.)

I'm not sure I'd have found a better reply of appropriate terseness.

Janis

On 29/01/2024 05:38, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> On 28.01.2024 20:10, David Brown wrote:
>> On 28/01/2024 19:34, bart wrote:
>>
>>> Why not open just open it up a bit more? Although the worst for mostly
>>> posting off-topic material right now is JP.
>
> You missed that you were initially and still are amongst the ones who
> contributed most to recent off-topic'ness to this group. And I'm not
> (primarily) speaking about your tool (or the repeated advertisement
> for it). My third post ever in this group, a question about CPP tags,
> was hijacked (without the subject changed or the posts marked as OT),
> and I posted a note that it had already been completely answered after
> a dozen posts; despite that you (and some others) "misused" (sort of)
> that thread. The thread was filled with non-topical trash, and all
> hundreds of posts (and your posts even with hundreds [of non-topical]
> lines) since then and still named under my subject.

Hijacking of threads occurs all the time. Including some of mine; then I
just leave people to it.

See "you think that rust may outthone c?" from Jul 2023 for example,
with nearly 1000 posts.

Or "bart again (UCX 64)" (not my thread) with nearly 600.

I didn't even know you were the OP of the "Effect of CPP Tags" thread.

My first post there was replying to LDO's comment about C's header files
and macro processing. (I view all posts linearly, not structured by thread.)