Title: A wander through the C library

Author: Martin Moene

Date: 20 June 2010 08:55:00 +01:00 or Sun, 20 June 2010 08:55:00 +01:00

Summary: How the library is organised, what it will cost you, and what's in it

Body: 

The C source Code library is in its early days at the moment but already there is some interesting material that has been submitted. In this article I will draw your attention to some of the things new in the library that you may like to try out. I do not claim to have any extensive knowledge of any of the programs that I mention below. What we need is for people who have put in the effort to understanding something about specific programs, such as the EMACS editor, to share that knowledge by writing a review for C Vu about it.

Well here goes with some of the things that I think may interest you in the initial library offerings.

Library volume 1 is a good place to start. It's a collection of software tools to aid in the job of writing other C programs. What follows is an annotated form of what the MS-DOS DIR command lists the disk as. The number is the size in bytes of the file.

CCHK	C	4356	A bracket & comment checker - very simple 'lint' type program.
FAULTY	C	104	A small faulty C program to demonstrate cchk
ABOUT	C	3667	A help lookup program
ABOUT	DAT	7424	with a database of C function call usage.
CFLOW	C	26750	This is a C program structure analyser
CFLOWX	C	25084	extended features for cflow.
CFLOWX	H	2688	required header for cflow & cflowx
CFLOW	DOC	2944	Docs for cflow & cflowx.
XC	C	20149	Three variants of the xc C cross referencer
XC1	C	22483	These were once the same program but got here
XC2	C	27095	by different routes!
XC	DOC	1536	Docs for xc.
DUMP	C	2877	A simple
DUMP2	C	6412	and a more lavish hex dump program.
MEMCLEAN	DOC	3712	a program for cleaning memory on a PC.
MEMCLEAN	C	6096
SNAP	C	2987	takes a memory snapshot for debug purposes.
ZAPLOAD	C	13349	A hex loader - see document.
ZAPLOAD	DOC	8832
HD	C	2439	Hex dump of a file.
HDR	C	3305	Displays .exe file header info.
TIMER	C	1778	timed execution of a command.
WHAT	C	2120	finds and prints module id strings.
HEXBIN	C	5721	converts hex dump to binary file.
HEXCNV	C	4961	converts hex dump to rom images.

HDR C 3305 Displays .exe file header info. TIMER C 1778 timed execution of a command. WHAT C 2120 finds and prints module id strings. HEXBIN C 5721 converts hex dump to binary file. HEXCNV C 4961 converts hex dump to rom images.

As you can see this is all material of use to any C programmer (if you don't get similar tools with your system anyway). If you are keen on the UNIX system and the sort of software tools available under it the Library disk 6 will be of interest. It contains public domain versions of three important UNIX system utilities. First is a version of the Make program maintainer. Many C compilers come with a 'make' program nowadays but if yours does not or you are just curious about how make works then this will be useful.

Also on the disk is a version of the UNIX 'AWK' pattern matching language called BAWK. The AWK language has been called a '4th generation language' and is very good at jobs involving complex text manipulations. The third major program on disk 6 is a version of the UNIX 'stream editor' sed. In some respects this program is similar to BAWK. Its use is for non- interactive editing tasks. The program comes with a useful example 'sed script' for converting a Pascal source file into C. Disk 6 also contains several other minor UNIX style utilities and is certainly well deserving of further comment in future issues of C Vu!

Library volume 8 is another area of interest to people interested in UNIX. It contains not one but two attempts to provide a UNIX like 'shell' under MS-DOS. Each of these is a lot of source code for common UNIX style utilities. Sadly neither 'shell' can cope with multi tasking background processes but otherwise both give a 'feel' of a real UNIX shell. The programs seem to be quite MS-DOS specific but may be adaptable to other machines - why not give it a try!

Library volume 11 deals with the twin subjects of serial communications & library management. It contains several comms protocols (kermit & SEAlink) and several library managers including ARC, LUMP and SQUEEZE.

SEALINK	C	20716	The SEAlink comms protocol functions
ARCSRC	<DIR>		Source for the ARC archiver
LAR	C	16963	LU format library manager
LUMP	C	1680	LUMPS several files into 1
UNLUMP	C	2017	Undoes the effect of lump
SQ	C	22142	Squeezes (compresses) files
TYPESQ	C	6281	Types a squeezed file
USQ	C	6785	Unsquezes a file
LDIR	C	10792	Gives a directory of a .LBR library
LDIR	DOC	325
LTYPE	C	3809	Types a member of a .LBR library
BSPLIT	C	3607	Splits one big file into many small ones
BCOMBINE	C	2813	Combines many small files into one big one
PC_COM	ASM	14464	Low lev support for IBM PC serial comms
CASYNC	ASM	10544	Low lev support for IBM PC serial comms
IBMTTY	C	16691	Terminal program for IBM PC
COMM	MNU	640
CRC	C	6374	Functions for CRC calculation.
KERMITPC	C	31882	Kermit program for IBM PC
KERMITPC HLP	4864

Last in our short tour through the library is volume 14 This volume contains sources of the UNIX Dungeons & Dragons game of Larn. Files are supplied SQUEEZED to fit onto the volume and the source of squeeze & unsqueeze is provided. This really is a jam packed volume, the Larn game should work under UNIX systems and also MS-DOS. There should be few problems in getting it to work on other machines though. One word of warning - it needs lots of memory to run!

Contents of CUG Library volume 14

SQ	C	22142	Squeeze program that prepared these squeezed files
USQ	C	6756	Program needed to UNSQUEEZE the larn files
README		741	Instructions for getting larn off the disk
UNPACK	BAT	421	Batch file for unsqueezing all larn sources
LARN	LQK	385	Instructions to MS-DOS linker for larn
LTERMCAP	LQB	4858	Library needed for DOS larn version

The following are the larn source files:

BILL	CQ	4199	CONFIG	CQ	1585	CREATE	CQ	9828
DATA	CQ	19305	DIAG	CQ	7583	DISPLAY	CQ	8991
FORTUNE	CQ	1608	GLOBAL	CQ	11575	HEADER	HQ	9352
HELP	CQ	1763	IO	CQ	16016	IO	IQ	9460
MAIN	CQ	18133	MAIN	IQ	10321	MONSTER	CQ	29332
MOREOBJ	CQ	6411	MOVEM	CQ	7529	NAP	CQ	2060
OBJECT	CQ	18384	PWD	HQ	1168	REGEN	CQ	2783
SAVELEV	CQ	1373	SCORES	CQ	14987	SEX	LQ	329
SGTTY	HQ	1880	SIGNAL	CQ	3872	STORE	CQ	15053
TOK	CQ	4013

Notes: 

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