Re: Unlinking vectors

[Konrad Kokoszkiewicz <draco@piwo.bl.pg.gda.pl>]

> > Actually, I know *one* case when MiNT is unlinking all installed vectors
> > arbitrarily. Namely, this is the case when MiNT quits. And this case
> > applies only to TSR programs installed *after* MiNT. In other words,
> > when MiNT quits, it restores the state of vectors from the time before it
> > was loaded.
> 
> Hmm, IMHO that's hardly sensible ? There may be a good reason for it (if
> someone knows it, please ...), but it's not very consequent, given the
> newer notion that MiNT should run first in the AUTO folder. It's sensible
> only if programs could be divided into MiNT-supporting and not-MiNT-
> supporting, then the latter would run first, then MiNT, then the former
> programs. Then MiNT would unlink all stuff that "relies" on it when
> exiting.

Yes, there is (a reason). MiNT has own memory management which has nothing
to do with GEMDOS memory management. So after MiNT quits no program loaded
by MiNT can exist anyways.

> BTW.: MiNT was called an OS extension. Is it sensible in the first place
> that such a thing can terminate ? Probably yes, but only if it works
> on the system carefully enough that a consistent state of the system can
> be restored. That calls for refraining from unlinking foreign handlers
> too.

Yes, it is sensible (makes sense). MiNT quits when the init program quits.
Init program is a MiNT shell. It may be GEM or MiNTOS or whatever you
start as INIT. Init program quits at following conditions:
a) when superuser kills it "by hand"
b) when a unrecoverable system fault occurs, which makes further execution
impossible

When init quits, there's no shell left. So the best thing MiNT can do is
shutdown itself and all its processes gracefully. Since the underlying
system, TOS, can run standalone, MiNT just returns the control to it.
Otherwise, if MiNT was a standalone system, it would probably enter a halt
condition instead.

Konrad M.Kokoszkiewicz
mail:draco@bl.pg.gda.pl
http://www.orient.uw.edu.pl/~conradus/

** Quem Iuppiter vult perdere, dementat prius.
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