jchapman@watcgl.UUCP (john chapman) (02/05/85)
I would like to solicit peoples opinions of Modula inplementations
for MS-DOS systems. If there is sufficient response I'll post a
summary. Of particular interest to myself are opinions on the
quality of the Volition (do they still exist?) and Logitech versions,
or any other implementations (I don't know of any other than Mod.Corp.
which I am now trying out). Useful info/comments might/would be:
1. price, availability etc.
2. available utilities (debugger?)
3. level of company support
4. compatibility/extensions etc.
5. memory, disk requirements
6. speed of compiler
7. speed of code produced
8. native code or m-code?
9. Is the compiler just another DOS program or do you have
to enter a subsystem to use it?
10. If you have to enter a subsystem how good is it?
11. support for 8087, support for systems without 8087s
12. large memory model supported?
13. reasonable access to assembler routines when necessary (relinking the
whole runtime system with the routine and then accessing it through
a jump table is not my idea of reasonable).
14. known bugs?
15. char array elements legal as var parameters? is 'x' a char array?
and, of course, any other comments you might wish to tender.
Thanks in advance!tapia@uiucdcs.UUCP (02/15/85)
In december we finished the porting of the M2M Modula-2 compiler onto an
IBM-PC/XT. Documentation is now in preparation. To answer your points:
1. price. None, the cost of a floppy and mailing
2. yes, we have a debugger at the M-code level
3. support. Not reliable, students come and go.
4. probably most compatible with Lilith's implementation of Modula-2
5. can run off a floppy/hard disk
6. 2.5 mins. for a 1 page program (typical Sieve of Eratosthenes)
7. speed. Not too fast
8. Interpreted M-code
9. Yes, you must enter a subsystem to use it.
10. Subsystem is as good as you want it, hooks are provided for you to
write your own shell. We have a primitive shell that runs programs
directly or from a batch file.
11. Support for 8087 will exist when we get an assembler that handles
8087 instructions.
12. runs of 200K. One module can't be larger than 32KB.
13. There is a way to get to assembly routines using the CODE keyword
in a procedure declaration.
14. Bugs. No REAL type available
15. A single char is not considered to be an array of type char.
16. Except for REALs it's a full implementation as described by Wirth in
Programming in M-2. (sorry, no IOTRANSFER routine)
Cris Tapia/ Prof. M. Harandi
Univ. of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana
222 Digital Computer Lab
1302 W. Springfied Ave.
Urbana, IL. 61801