Re: [MiNT] distro cross-building

[Alan Hourihane <alanh@fairlite.co.uk>]

On Mon, 2008-10-13 at 18:58 +0200, Maurits van de Kamp wrote:
> > But the problem here, is that FreeMiNT (and MiNT) is designed to be  
> > TOS
> > compatible. You can take an executable written for MiNT and it should
> > (maybe with some restrictions) run on the Atari without MiNT installed
> > as well. You can't do that with shared libraries, obviously.
> 
> It's useful that MiNT can run TOS programs, but I fail to see why  
> this should be the other way around. Or what the point would be in  
> continuing to develop FreeMiNT if it has to stay compatible to a dead  
> OS. As far as Atari systems have a future, it's MiNT.
> 
> Maybe we should change the meaning back to "MiNT is now TOS" (instead  
> of "MiNT is not TOS").. the whole point is to have a modern system -  
> because we can. :o)
> 
> Besides, supporting shared libs doesn't even really kill TOS  
> compatibility, at least not structurally. If someone really needs  
> pine.ttp without MiNT (why on earth...) they can always build a  
> static version. Gcc runs under TOS too. ;o)

Sure applications can still be compiled statically to remain compatible.
I was merely stating that was the original goal of MiNT to be TOS
compatible. Heck, it's plastered all over the MiNTlib internals, to go
through all sorts of hoops to do TOS equivalents of Un*x function calls.

Additionally, adding ELF is no small feat. So unless someone is going to
stump up a fair bit of time it ain't gonna happen.

But, on the topic of a distro, I have some slightly good news.

I've been working on one for the last few months..... more in a new
thread.

Alan.