Message-Id:	<200304271410.h3REAaf01419@delorie.com>
Sender:	rich AT phekda DOT freeserve DOT co DOT uk
Date:	Sun, 27 Apr 2003 10:07:16 +0100
From:	Richard Dawe <rich AT phekda DOT freeserve DOT co DOT uk>
X-Accept-Language:	de,fr
To:	DJGPP announcements <djgpp-announce AT delorie DOT com>
Subject:	ANNOUNCE: DJGPP 2.04 alpha 1

Hello.

It gives me great pleasure to announce DJGPP 2.04 alpha 1. This has a large
number of changes over DJGPP 2.03, including:

* DJGPP programs no longer crash when selectors are leaked on Windows; 
* Windows 2000 and XP support (this has been retrofitted to 2.03 too); 
* support for large files on FAT32 partitions; 
* much-improved symlink support; 
* support for invoking Windows programs with longer command-lines; 
* more POSIX and Single Unix Specification functions added; 
* strlcat and strlcpy functions; 
* updated DXE (dynamically-loadable libraries), to enable shared NLS libraries
and provide a toolkit for shared modules (important for Python and other
projects); 
* lots of bugfixes. ;)

Hence it needs a lot of testing. Please test it if you have time and/or are
interested in any of the above features. Any level of testing would be
appreciated.

The alpha is not available via the Zip Picker interface. You can download it
from here:

    ftp://ftp.delorie.com/pub/djgpp/alpha

The structure under the alpha directory is the same as the DJGPP archive on
Simtel.NET.

Please see the README file for instructions on how to install the alpha:

    ftp://ftp.delorie.com/pub/djgpp/alpha/v2/readme.1st

A number of packages have been rebuilt with DJGPP 2.04 alpha 1, to take
advantage of its features. They can be downloaded from the FTP site above. If
you install the alpha, it is highly recommended that you upgrade to the
recompiled packages. Otherwise there may be interoperability problems, because
of the new symlink support in DJGPP 2.04.

A code-generation problem has recently been uncovered that means that code
compiled with gcc earlier 3.2.2 may not work with gcc 3.2.2 and vice-versa.
DJGPP 2.04 alpha 1 was compiled with gcc 3.2.2. Hence, you should only use gcc
3.2.2 with DJGPP 2.04 alpha 1, otherwise your programs may not function
correctly.

If you have any problems with DJGPP 2.04 alpha 1, please report them directly
to the DJGPP newsgroup comp.os.msdos.djgpp or via its e-mail gateway
djgpp AT delorie DOT com. Before reporting a problem, please check that it is not
already known - there is a DJGPP 2.04 status page that lists known problems:

    http://www.phekda.freeserve.co.uk/richdawe/djgpp/2.04/status204.html

A more detailed list of changes between 2.03 and 2.04 alpha 1 can be found
here:

    http://www.phekda.freeserve.co.uk/richdawe/djgpp/2.04/wc204.txt

After installing the alpha, you can see it by running this command:

    info kb 'what changed' 'changes in 2.04'

Thanks to all those who have contributed to DJGPP 2.04! Special thanks go to
Andrew Cottrell for his help with the release - he rebuilt all the packages
with DJGPP 2.04 alpha 1.

Bye, Rich =]

-- 
Richard Dawe [ http://www.phekda.freeserve.co.uk/richdawe/ ]

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