From:	Erik Max Francis <max AT alcyone DOT com>
Newsgroups:	comp.os.msdos.djgpp
Subject:	DJGPP installation README? (was DJGPP is in WAY too many pieces)
Date:	Sat, 21 Jun 1997 13:33:45 -0700
Organization:	Alcyone Systems
Lines:	54
Message-ID:	<33AC3AA9.52BA294F@alcyone.com>
References:	<199706202202 DOT AA292534148 AT typhoon DOT rose DOT hp DOT com>
NNTP-Posting-Host:	newton.alcyone.com
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To:	djgpp AT delorie DOT com
DJ-Gateway:	from newsgroup comp.os.msdos.djgpp

Andrew Crabtree wrote:

> Anything that cuts down on posts like
> 
> 'I got djgpp but when I run it I get
> 
> cannot exec as (ENOENT)'
> 
> Would be welcome.  How much of binutils did you cut out?  Objdump
> (maybe nm) could be useful if they are small.

Quite frankly I don't think that the number of pieces are the problem.
After all, there are a minimum of only six or so ZIP files that you need,
and all you need to do is unzip -d each in your DJGPP directory; this is
hardly difficult to do.

The point of confusion that I think is the biggest problem for installing
DJGPP is putting your DJGPP\BIN directory in the path and setting the
DJGPP environment variable.

Note that it's trivial to do this, but it's complicated by what else may
already be inside the AUTOEXEC.BAT file.  Most people don't bother
touching their AUTOEXEC.BAT files, with DOS installers that will
automatically tweak it for you.  The problem here, of course, is that the
different installers don't know what the other installers have done.

Particularly a problem I've seen is when installers run other .BAT files
to do secondary initialization (DJGPP 1.0 used to do this as well, as I
recall).  Unless the second .BAT file is executed with `call' in the
first, execution will not return to the first .BAT file.

There is no trivially easy way for an installer to check for these kind of
things, and so it's not done.  The result is that you may have sections of
AUTOEXEC.BAT that are never executed.

Another problem is with the placement of the PATH statements relative to
others; things can get overridden. 

Perhaps the installation README should be updated to go over these points
briefly, but start by saying, "put the SET DJGPP=C:\DJGPP\DJGPP.ENV at the
top of the file," as well as going through the description of putting it
in the right PATH statement, ensuring that there won't be any problems.

I had just helped a friend new to DJGPP with installation, and she had all
of these problems.  (You think helping someone with installation problems
over Usenet is difficult, try over the phone!)

-- 
       Erik Max Francis, &tSftDotIotE / email / max AT alcyone DOT com
                     Alcyone Systems /   web / http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, California, United States /  icbm / 37 20 07 N  121 53 38 W
                                   \
     "Covenants without the sword / are but words."
                                 / Camden

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