vbcc 0.9f released

[phx]

Hightlights:

• Possibility to create residentable (pure) executables.
• More C99 support and more optimizes math functions (thanks Matt Hey).
• New target for Kickstart 1.x programs, using the original Commodore 1.3 headers.
• New target for Atari Jaguar consoles.
• Many bug fixes and enhancements.

We are happy to announce that iComp GmbH (www.icomp.de) has decided to sponsor the 68k-AmigaOS version of vbcc. This does not only help us to continue supporting and improving this port but it also allows us to relax the terms of use for the Amiga-68k community. Everyone may now freely use vbcc to develop 68k-AmigaOS code for commercial as well as non-commercial usage (for details please refer to the license in the documentation).


We thank iComp GmbH for the confidence in vbcc and hope that this step will help in the creation of new software for the Amiga-68k.

[ross]

Great news!

[alpine9000]

Originally Posted by phx

Hightlights:

• Possibility to create residentable (pure) executables.
• More C99 support and more optimizes math functions (thanks Matt Hey).
• New target for Kickstart 1.x programs, using the original Commodore 1.3 headers.
• New target for Atari Jaguar consoles.
• Many bug fixes and enhancements.

We are happy to announce that iComp GmbH (www.icomp.de) has decided to sponsor the 68k-AmigaOS version of vbcc. This does not only help us to continue supporting and improving this port but it also allows us to relax the terms of use for the Amiga-68k community. Everyone may now freely use vbcc to develop 68k-AmigaOS code for commercial as well as non-commercial usage (for details please refer to the license in the documentation).


We thank iComp GmbH for the confidence in vbcc and hope that this step will help in the creation of new software for the Amiga-68k.

Congratulations!

Can't wait to try it out.

Was the no commercial use on previous versions due to bundled libraries?

[kgc210]

That's really good news on the sponsorship.
Makes a nice change seeing so much development in the Amiga world.

[Schoenfeld]

Originally Posted by alpine9000

Was the no commercial use on previous versions due to bundled libraries?

Previous releases had an unclear license, and nobody really thought of commercial environments.

I've been looking for development tools for quite some time, as I wanted to support as many people as possible by making the first steps in development as easy as possible. While I've found a few Pascal dialects, pretty much everyone convinced me that C is the way to go. I've tried to free the SAS/C compiler for the Amiga, but did not get the required answers.

One of my employees confirmed that vbcc produces very good code quality, and Volker was so kind to accept my offer for a sponsorship of the m68k-AmigaOS port.

Please don't get me wrong on the priorities: The only reason why I've tried to free SAS/C in the first place was that I wasn't aware of the high code quality that vbcc produces. So for any new project - commercial or not - vbcc is the way to go now.

Jens

https://icomp.de/shop-icomp/en/33/it...sors-vbcc.html

[alpine9000]

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

Previous releases had an unclear license, and nobody really thought of commercial environments.

I've been looking for development tools for quite some time, as I wanted to support as many people as possible by making the first steps in development as easy as possible. While I've found a few Pascal dialects, pretty much everyone convinced me that C is the way to go. I've tried to free the SAS/C compiler for the Amiga, but did not get the required answers.

One of my employees confirmed that vbcc produces very good code quality, and Volker was so kind to accept my offer for a sponsorship of the m68k-AmigaOS port.

Please don't get me wrong on the priorities: The only reason why I've tried to free SAS/C in the first place was that I wasn't aware of the high code quality that vbcc produces. So for any new project - commercial or not - vbcc is the way to go now.

Jens

https://icomp.de/shop-icomp/en/33/it...sors-vbcc.html

Looking at the documentation it seems the commercial exception also applies to vasm and vlink, so if that is also a result of your sponsorship, then it's not just C coders that will benefit.

Thanks to all involved.

[Schoenfeld]

Sorry if that was not clear - I use "vbcc" as a synonym for the whole package of vbcc, vasm, vlink and PosixLib, as this is what we've been discussing via eMail since april 2017. Note that PosixLib didn't even have any license file previously, and is now clearly under a BSD license.

vasm has several modules that also have the new exception for commercial use for m68k-AmigaOS: Motorola-Syntax module, M68k CPU module and the Hunk format output module.

Jens

[gulliver]

Thank you.

[matthey]

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

I've been looking for development tools for quite some time, as I wanted to support as many people as possible by making the first steps in development as easy as possible. While I've found a few Pascal dialects, pretty much everyone convinced me that C is the way to go. I've tried to free the SAS/C compiler for the Amiga, but did not get the required answers.

C has been the default language of the Amiga. It was the efficiency of C which allowed the AmigaOS to become as good as it was back in the day. SAS/C's professional support of the Amiga was important as well. Vbcc has the potential to become the next SAS/C for the Amiga and your kind support could help make it happen. I am impressed at your recognition of the importance of improving Amiga compilers.

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

One of my employees confirmed that vbcc produces very good code quality, and Volker was so kind to accept my offer for a sponsorship of the m68k-AmigaOS port.

Please don't get me wrong on the priorities: The only reason why I've tried to free SAS/C in the first place was that I wasn't aware of the high code quality that vbcc produces. So for any new project - commercial or not - vbcc is the way to go now.

I wouldn't say the vbcc code generation quality is that great yet but sponsoring it and making it a priority should help the situation. SAS/C code generation was average and I think vbcc has the potential to do much better if Dr. Volker Barthelmann is encouraged to give a little TLC to the 68k backend .

[tygre]

Hi all!

Very nice news, thank you all for supporting VBCC!

Cheers

[wawa]

its a good news i guess. congrats!

[Hedeon]

I'm getting a

"warning 2064: "load" directive was replaced by an instruction with the same name"

in one of my 68k sources. No idea what it means?

[phx]

You have enabled code generation for the 68080 (Apollo Core)? It defines a new instruction LOAD for loading a vector register.

But there is also a LOAD directive for compatibility with old PhxAss, AsmOne, Seka sources, which has no effect in vasm anyway (vasm will never output code directly into memory), so it is safe to ignore it.

But I thought it would be fair to inform the user about it.

[fstltna]

Any examples of using this to compile regular C code? I am trying to compile a 5 .c file and 2 .h file console app... Just plain c, not amiga specific. Tried crosscompiling on ubuntu but get a missing file error. Would love to get it going on amigaos native! Can someone point me in the right direction?

[Leffmann]

Originally Posted by phx

Hightlights:

• Possibility to create residentable (pure) executables.
• More C99 support and more optimizes math functions (thanks Matt Hey).
• New target for Kickstart 1.x programs, using the original Commodore 1.3 headers.
• New target for Atari Jaguar consoles.
• Many bug fixes and enhancements.

Thanks a lot for the update.

Originally Posted by fstltna

Any examples of using this to compile regular C code? I am trying to compile a 5 .c file and 2 .h file console app... Just plain c, not amiga specific. Tried crosscompiling on ubuntu but get a missing file error. Would love to get it going on amigaos native! Can someone point me in the right direction?

What program is it, do you have an URL to it? If it's just plain C with no specific requirements, then you should only have to run

vc *.c

to compile it. It could be an installation problem, have a look in the user manual to see how to install the tools and the m68k-amiga targets correctly.

[fstltna]

Originally Posted by Leffmann

What program is it, do you have an URL to it? If it's just plain C with no specific requirements, then you should only have to run

vc *.c

to compile it. It could be an installation problem, have a look in the user manual to see how to install the tools and the m68k-amiga targets correctly.

I can run the vc tool itself, I just get compile errors complaining about definitions. You can get my source here: https://AmigaCity.xyz/sstsrc.zip

Thanks for any help!

Marisa

[phx]

Please specify your precise problem. All files can be compiled without any warning, except osx.c, which includes a Unix/POSIX header file sys/ioctl.h. Probably you have to adapt that for AmigaOS.

You can compile osx.c with -DWINDOWS, but then the linker is missing min, max and getch (see above). The source is not portable. Support code for AmigaOS is missing.

[emufan]

so many vbcc posting, so i put that here:

#1) "//" is not recognized as a comment line, why is it so?

$ vc -sc -sd -O2 Decimate.c -o Decimate.o
error=0
>//
error 0 in line 1 of "Decimate.c": declaration expected
aborting...
1 error found!

// $Id: decimate.cxx,v 1.5 1997/10/01 14:07:25 garland Exp $

#include ...

#2)

want link some object files, some made with gcc, others from sas/c, using vlink:

INTERNAL ERROR: aout_symbols(): Symbol ___CTOR_LIST__ in Matrix.o has type 22,
which is currently not supported.
Aborting.
make: *** [Makefile:23: qemloss.p] Error 1

is there a way to prevent gcc from creating "type 22", or convince vlink accepting that type?

[plasmab]

Originally Posted by emufan

so many vbcc posting, so i put that here:

#1) "//" is not recognized as a comment line, why is it so?

$ vc -sc -sd -O2 Decimate.c -o Decimate.o
error=0
>//
error 0 in line 1 of "Decimate.c": declaration expected
aborting...
1 error found!

// $Id: decimate.cxx,v 1.5 1997/10/01 14:07:25 garland Exp $

#include ...

// is part of the c99 spec not c89. Add the -c99 switch to the command line and you should be good.

From the vbcc manual

-c99 Switch to the 1999 ISO standard for C /ISO/IEC9899:1999). Currently the
following changes of C99 are handled:
− long long int (not supported by all backends)
− flexible array members as last element of a struct
− mixed statements and declarations
− declarations within for-loops
− inline function-specifier
− restrict-qualifier
− new reserved keywords
− //-comments
− vararg-macros
− _Pragma
− implicit int deprecated
− implicit function-declarations deprecated
− increased translation-limits
− designated initializers
− non-constant initializers for automatic aggregates
− compound literals
− variable-length arrays (incomplete)

[emufan]

Originally Posted by plasmab

// is part of the c99 spec not c89. Add the -c99 switch to the command line and you should be good.

thanks, that did the trick.

#1) some patch for next vbcc version:

if user uses "//" and option !=c99
 printf ("looks like a comment  --> use -c99 command line option\n");
endif