derstad@CIM-VAX.HONEYWELL.COM ("DAVE ERSTAD") (01/03/90)
Flame-On I am currently one unhappy camper. In pre-SR10 releases, there was a compiler switch to the CC compiler, -nmgbl, which affects the way global symbols are mapped (essentially maps all globals to upper case) which is very handy in mixing modules in a case-sensitive language, such as C, with a case-unsensitive language, such as Pascal. At SR10, some pin-head in R&D decided that "we don't really think people should write code like that" and removed support for the switch. This was not a case where the switch had to be removed to provide some other capability; it was just deleted. Problem #1: There is no workaround. I (and others with the same problem) have to go revise all of our affected C source code. Problem #2: There is no basis for this change that I can see. Apollo can always recommend that we not use it if they like. One response I got was "We don't think very many people used it" to which my response was how do you know? There was no data to back that statement up, as far as I can tell. Problem #3: Apollo did a LOUSY job of handling the change, whether it was justified or not: o The release notes did not mention that the switch was deleted o The compiler still accepts the switch - it just does nothing o The help file still describes the option. As far as I can tell, the only documentation updated was the reference manual (surely the last thing a typical user looks at :-) Needless to say, this is very annoying. Every major system I've ported to SR10 has run into some undocumented glitch, bug, or "feature". Flame-Off Dave Erstad Honeywell SSEC DERSTAD@cim-vax.honeywell.com