Re: Switching to Linux and C

From: silverdr_at_wfmh.org.pl
Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2017 10:03:27 +0200
Message-Id: <13C714F8-19E5-414A-A3C9-AB0A4743F82C@wfmh.org.pl>
> On 2017-08-23, at 09:20, Baltissen, GJPAA (Ruud) <ruud.baltissen@apg.nl> wrote:
> 
> Hallo Ethan,
> 
>> Session with my D9090
>> 
>> $ cbmctrl reset
>> $ cbmctrl status 12
>> ...
> 
> So far I haven't been able to use my ZoomFloppy to access any IEEE device under Windows 7 or XP. I acquired two PCs, a P4-3 GHz - 2 GB RAM and a dual-core - 4 GB RAM, that I want to use with Linux. I want to ask you what kind of Linux you use.

You are risking to open a can of worms with such questions :-)

Basically all of the ripe distributions are OK these days. I was a long-term Debian user but switched practically everything to Ubuntu once it got enough momentum. For today I rather recommend Ubuntu for practically all GNU/Linux applications from server to desktop. It's both mature and actively developed at the same time. I also find the TUX[*] among the best for any GNU/Linux distribution. I am close to certain that people using Suse/Redhat/Gentoo/.... will say the same about their distribution of choice so you'll have plenty of responses to choose from :-))

> One thing I want to be able to do is to compile VICE one day. So the question: on what LINUX version does VICE compile and run best?

Any and every mature one. It's not related to Linux. It's mostly GNU tools, which are available for all major distributions. Obviously Ubuntu does that perfectly too.

Another factor is how well your hardware is supported so that you get correct sound / hardware graphics acceleration, etc. Here YMMV but again I had more success with Ubuntu out of the box than I had with some other ones, where I had to do more tweaking at times. Not that I never do any tweaking with Ubuntu, obviously :-)

> Another thing: so far I program in Free Pascal for non-DOS applications like my (dis)assemblers. I have tried several times to switch to C. But what put me off so far several times was that if I wrote a program that would compile under compiler A, it wouldn't under compiler B or C. I have seen the huge list of available C compilers for Linux so the first idea is just to stick to the one used for compiling VICE (gcc AFAIK ?). But any good argument is welcome!

At this stage I'd say simply don't bother about anything else than gcc (which is - BTW - for some time no longer a "Gnu C Compiler" but a "Gnu Compiler Collection"). Just use gcc, write portable code (trying to avoid highly gcc specific extensions if possible) and you'll be all fine even if at some point you'll find a need to compile your code with something else (like clang on LLVM for example).


* - TUX is the mascot of Linux and my self-invented unit of measuring GNU/Linux "Total User Experience" :-)

-- 
SD! - http://e4aws.silverdr.com/


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Received on 2017-08-23 09:00:02

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