Date: Thu, 11 May 2000 09:34:15 -0400 (EDT)
Message-Id: <200005111334.JAA13198@indy.delorie.com>
From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz AT delorie DOT com>
To: "Juan Manuel Guerrero" <ST001906 AT HRZ1 DOT HRZ DOT TU-Darmstadt DOT De>
CC: djgpp-workers AT delorie DOT com
In-reply-to: <32BAD842CE0@HRZ1.hrz.tu-darmstadt.de>
	(ST001906 AT HRZ1 DOT HRZ DOT TU-Darmstadt DOT De)
Subject: Re: old binaries recompiled with djdev203
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> From: "Juan Manuel Guerrero" <ST001906 AT HRZ1 DOT HRZ DOT TU-Darmstadt DOT De>
> Date: Mon, 8 May 2000 13:53:10 +0200
> 
> I would like to suggest the replacement of old binary packeges
> (compiled with djdev201 and djdev202) with new binary packages
> (compiled with djdev203).
[snip]
> I will wait some days for comments, suggestions, objections, etc.
> If I get no response at all I will assume that there is no interest
> at all and forget about this.

As promised, here are the comments I'v gathered from users since these
packages were released.  I'd suggest to correct the underlying
problems if that's possible without too much work.

 * Fileutils:

   - Martin Stromberg reported a crash in `df' for inaccessible
     drives.  The reason is this line in df.c (in function show_dev):

        if (strcmp (fstype, "join") == 0)

     It should instead read this:

        if (fstype && strcmp (fstype, "join") == 0)

   - There is a problem with `install': if you say something like
     "install foo /bin/foo", and `foo' already has a stub loader
     prepended to it, you get `foo' installed in the target directory
     instead of `foo.exe'.  I think `install' should be changed to
     make sure that executable files in the target directory have an
     executable extension (can be .com or .bat, in addition to .exe),
     since otherwise stock DOS shells will refuse to run them.

 * Findutils:

   - Some people fail to put DJGPP's bin subdirectory before DOS or
     Windows, and get the stock FIND.EXE instead of the GNU version.
     I suggest to mention this problem in the README file.  (Hmm, I
     see that there is no README file in find41b.zip.  So perhaps add
     one.)

   - When `find' is running, and you press Ctrl-C, it's almost
     impossible to interrupt `find' itself in the current port.  The
     reason is that I added code that is supposed to catch signals and
     exceptions triggered in the child programs, so that they don't
     crash `find' itself.  This code should handle SIGINT specially:
     it should simply exit, instead of returning.

 * Ispell:

   - ispell.el and ispell.elc should be removed from the Ispell's
     binary distro.  They are older than the files supplied with
     Emacs, and if users install Ispell after Emacs, they will have a
     disaster waiting to happen.

   - The iwhich script does not work with typical DJGPP environments:
     it sets PATH to /bin:/usr/bin and expects the previous value of
     PATH use : as directory separator.  Since iwhich is used by the
     build procedure, you cannot build Ispell without some major
     tinkering.  (I wonder how did Ispell built for you.)

     I think if iwhich says "PATH_SEPARATOR=:" as its first executable
     line, and does *not* change the value of PATH, it will work on
     any DJGPP system.  I suggest to make these changes (provided that
     they work ;-).

Thanks again for working on this.