C compatability between SCO UNIX and Altos 2000 XENIX

[Ti Kan]

In article <264 at twg.wimsey.bc.ca> bill at twg.wimsey.bc.ca (Bill Irwin) writes:
>I  have  received  a  request from one of our account  managers  about  a
>problem  that  one of his clients is having porting C code compiled on  a
>386  running  SCO UNIX to an Altos 2000 XENIX runtime  environment.

I am assuming that you are running the older Altos XENIX version 5.2C for
the Altos 2000 (Later OS versions (5.3x) for the 2000 are all
UNIX-derivative, not XENIX).

>2.      Does  the  Altos  C compiler for Altos XENIX 3.2c have  a  Medium
>        Model capability?

Yes, the Altos XENIX C compiler supports medium model.

>3.      If number 1 above can not work, how can the customer purchase a C
>        compiler  for Altos XENIX?  Buy development?

To get the compiler and all other development tools, you'll need the
Altos XENIX Development System package.

>Anyone  care  to  take  a crack at any or all of these  questions?   I've
>always  believed  that 386 *NIX were binary compatible.  Am I wrong?   If
>not, what is the trick when compiling on UNIX?

Well, you are only half wrong.  It is true that most 386 *UNIX*es are
binary compatible (supports both XENIX x.out and UNIX coff format
binaries), but an older XENIX system is not going to support the
newer UNIX binaries!  For example, The UNIX-derived Altos OSs
for the Altos 500, 1000, 2000, 4000, and 5000 support both coff and
x.out binaries, but the older Altos XENIX releases won't support
coff.  On a 386 UNIX system, most compilers and linkers have options
to allow you to generate x.out binaries (by default, they generate
coff).  Try "man cc" and "man ld".

Hope this helps.

-Ti
-- 
Ti Kan | vorsprung durch technik!                                       \\\
Internet: ti at altos.com                                                   \\\
UUCP: ...!{sun|sco|pyramid|amdahl|uunet}!altos!ti                     /// \\\
The opinions herein are not necessarily those of Altos.              ////////\