OpenBSD Journal

Experimental Support for a.out on ELF

Contributed by jose on from the backwards-compatability dept.

Marc Espie has prepared a patch for a.out support on ELF architectures. Specifically, this is a kernel patch which establishes an emulation layer to allow for ELF architectures to run dynamically linked a.out binaries. For people transitioning from a.out to ELF (such as i386 users who track -current), this could be useful. This is a patch for testing, so if you're feeling cutting edge try it out and help get it ready for prime time.

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Comments

  1. By Ray () ray.deadly@cyth.net on mailto:ray.deadly@cyth.net

    Does this mean that we can continue to run Mozilla (and now Phoenix/Firebird)?

    Comments

    1. By Kurt () on http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=openbsd-ports&m=10

      Jason Ish's update to redhat base and opera 6.12 seem to be the sweet spot right now acording to posts at ports@... http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=openbsd-ports&m=105121434616256&w=2

    2. By tedu () on

      yes, it will still work.
      you can build ELF mozilla, but you can't run it. and you can run a.out mozilla, but you can't build it. funny.

      Comments

      1. By mirabile () mirabile@bsdcow.net on http://MirBSD.BSDadvocacy.org/

        You can't use WineX either. I've played around
        with crtbegin/crtend tho, maybe Mozilla would
        work on my system.
        OTOH I don't like it, so I won't try it out *hehe*

  2. By Jeffrey () on

    Yay! Using it in order to run w3m. The reason for this is that devel/boehm-gc, which w3m needs seems to be slightly broken in the move to ELF.

    I better send a success report to Espie...

    Comments

    1. By Anonymous Coward () on

      If you read ports@, you will see that it is a known problem and "it has more or less been
      broken for all ELF platforms. There is no fix yet" -- Peter Valchev

      Comments

      1. By Jeffrey () on

        Right, I saw that post to the list (and your reply).
        At least, in this case for w3m, this is a funcional
        workaround. No biggie.

        Yay! =)
        I can't live without w3m ;)
        In fact, I'm using it now to post this.
        So, this a.out emulator will be useful
        for me.

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