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This file was generated automatically from faq.texi. DO NOT CHANGE THIS FILE MANUALLY! The GNU Pascal Frequently Asked Questions List, Edition 0.9, August 2000 ************************************************************************ This document is a part of the GPC documentation. To make, copy and distribute modified versions of this document please see the GPC documentation. This is the Frequently Asked Questions List (FAQ) for GNU Pascal. If the FAQ and the documentation do not help you, you have detected a *bug* in it which should be reported, *Note Mailing List::. Please really do it, so we can improve the documentation. 1 GNU Pascal ************ 1.1 What and why? ================= The purpose of the GNU Pascal project is to produce a Pascal compiler (called GNU Pascal or GPC) which * combines the clarity of Pascal with powerful tools suitable for real-life programming, * supports both the Pascal standard and the Extended Pascal standard as defined by ISO, ANSI and IEEE (ISO 7185:1990, ISO/IEC 10206:1991, ANSI/IEEE 770X3.160-1989), * supports other Pascal standards (UCSD Pascal, Borland Pascal, Pascal-SC) in so far as this serves the goal of clarity and usability, * may be distributed under GNU license conditions, and * can generate code for and run on any computer for which the GNU C compiler can generate code and run on. Pascal was originally designed for teaching. GNU Pascal provides a smooth way to proceed to challenging programming tasks without learning a completely different language. The current release implements Standard Pascal (ISO 7185, level 1), a large subset of Extended Pascal (ISO 10206, aiming for full compliance), is highly compatible to Borland Pascal (version 7.0) with some Delphi extensions, and provides a lot of useful GNU extensions. 1.2 What is the current version? ================================ Prior to July 2000 releases were several months apart. Since then there has been a new release every few days, available as a source archive or from a CVS server from the GPC web site, `http://home.pages.de/~GNU-Pascal/'. For details about new features, see the section `News' on the web site. On bugs fixed recently, see the `Done' section of the To-Do list (on the same web site). GPC uses GCC as a back-end. Patches for GCC 2.8.1 and GCC 2.95.x are provided but it is recommended that you use GCC 2.95.x. 1.3 Is it compatible with Turbo Pascal (R)? =========================================== GPC is not a drop-in replacement for Borland's Turbo Pascal (R). Almost all BP language features are supported. Notable exceptions are the string format (as discussed below), or the `Mem' and `Port' pseudo arrays, though replacement functions for the latter on x86 platforms exist in the `Ports' unit. Almost all of BP's run time library is supported in GPC, either by built-in compiler features or in units with the same names as their BP counterparts. For details about the compatibility, the few remaining incompatibilities and some useful alternatives to BP features, see the `Borland Pascal' chapter in the GPC Manual. 1.4 Which platforms are supported by GNU Pascal? ================================================ GPC uses the GCC backend, so it should run on any system that is supported by GNU CC. This includes a large variety of Unix systems, MS-DOS, OS/2 and Win32. A full list of platforms supported by GCC can be found in the file `INSTALL' of the GCC distribution. Not all of these have actually been tested, but it is known to run on these platforms: ix86-linux (Linux 2.x, ELF) i486-linuxaout i486-linuxoldld i386-freebsd1.2.0 AIX 4.2.1 AIX 4.3 DJGPP V2 (Dos) EMX 0.9B (OS/2, Dos) Cygwin32 beta20 and higher (MS-Windows95/98, MS-Windows NT) Mingw32 (MS-Windows95/98, MS-Windows NT) mips-sgi-irix5.3 sun-sparc-sunos4.1.4 sparc-sun-solaris2.x sun-sparc-solaris 2.5.1 sun-sparc-solaris 2.6 sun-sparc-solaris 7 alpha-unknown-linux alphaev56-dec-osf4.0d *OK people - send us your success stories, with canonical machine name!* 2 Installing GPC **************** You find the most up-to-date installation instructions in the GPC Manual or the file `INSTALL' in source distributions, or on the GPC web site. The following sections describe things you might need or want to install besides GPC itself. 2.1 What to read next ===================== After installing GPC, please check the files in the directory `/usr/local/doc/gpc': `README' General Information about GPC `FAQ' This FAQ :-) `NEWS' Changes since the last release `LIBS' Libraries used by some GPC units `BUGS' How to report bugs, about the Test Suite `AUTHORS' List of GPC authors `COPYING' The GNU General Public License 2.2 Which components do I need to compile Pascal code? ====================================================== A complete Pascal compiler system should at least have: 1. The actual compiler, GPC. 2. An editor, assembler, linker, librarian and friends. 3. A C library. If you have a working C compiler, you already have this. 4. A debugger, if you want to debug your programs. For most people, the GNU binutils and GNU debugger (`gdb') are a good choice, although some may prefer to use vendor specific tools. 2.3 How do I debug my Pascal programs? ====================================== To debug your programs, (a) GNU Pascal must be able to generate executables with debug info for your platform, and (b) you must have a debugger which understands this. * If `gpc -g -o hello hello.p' says: gpc: -g not supported for this platform then GPC is unable to generate debugging info. Usually, installing `gas' (part of GNU binutils) instead of your system's assembler can overcome this. When you configure the GCC used for GPC, specify `--with-gnu-as', and possibly `--with-gnu-ld' and/or `--with-stabs'. More information can be found in the `INSTALL' file in the GNU CC source directory. * Your system's debugger may not understand the debug info generated by GNU tools. In this case, installing `gdb' may help. The bottom line: if you can debug GCC compiled programs, you should be able to do this with GPC too. The GNU debugger (`gdb') currently does not have a "Pascal" mode, so it is unable to display certain Pascal structures etc. When debugging, please note that the Initial Letter In Each Identifier Is In Upper Case And The Rest Are In Lower Case. If you want to display variable `foo' in the debugger, type `show Foo' or `display Foo' instead. Although `gdb' is an excellent debugger, it's user interface is not everybody's preference. If you like to debug under X11, please refer to the comp.windows.x FAQ: "Where can I get an X-based debugger?" at: `http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/x-faq/part6/faq-doc-2.html' Some useful frontends include: XXGDB, tGDB and XWPE. See: `http://www.ee.ryerson.ca:8080/~elf/xapps/Q-IV.html' Very nice, but resource consuming is the Motif based DDD: `http://sol.ibr.cs.tu-bs.de/softech/ddd/' Furthermore, RHIDE (*note IDE::) contains built-in debugging suport, similar to the IDE of BP. 2.4 What additional libraries should I have? ============================================ You will need certain additional libraries when you compile some of the units. These can be found in the directory `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/gnu-pascal/libs/'. Currently, there are the following libraries: gmp Arithmetic for integers, rationals and real numbers with arbitrary size and precision. Used by the GMP unit. rx Regular expression matching and substitution. Used by the RegEx unit. ncurses PDCurses Screen handling. Used by the CRT unit. Depending on your system, you have the following choices: Unix: You can compile terminal applications with ncurses and applications that run in an X11 window with PDCurses (though terminal applications can, of course, also run in an xterm under X11). ncurses is used by default. If you want to use PDCurses (a.k.a. XCurses), give the option `-DX11' when compiling CRT. Dos with DJGPP and MS-Windows with mingw: Only PDCurses is available and will be used by default. MS-Windows with Cygwin: PDCurses and ncurses are available. PDCurses is used by default. If you want to use ncurses, give the option `-DUSE_NCURSES' when compiling CRT. Other systems: Please see the `README's and installation instructions of PDCurses and ncurses to find out which one(s) can be built on your system. See the conditionals at the end of crt.inc and crtc.h (and change them if necessary) on which library is used by default. ElectricFence This library is not used by any GPC unit. It is a debugging tool to assist you in finding memory allocation bugs. To use it, just link it to your program, either on the command line (`-lefence') or in the source code (`{$L efence}') which you might want to put into an `{$ifdef DEBUG}' or similar since using libefence is only recommended for debugging. The source code of the libraries is available in the main `libs' directory. Most libraries come with one or several patches which should be applied before compiling them. Binaries for some platforms are available in the `binary/PLATFORM' subdirectories. If you compile the libraries for other platforms, be invited to make the binaries available to us for distribution on the FTP site. There are also the following files: `terminfo-linux.tar.gz' This is a patch to enable ncurses programs to make use of the ability of Linux 2.2 and newer kernels to produce a block cursor when needed. The present patch can be installed without recompiling anything, just by copying some files into place. More details can be found in the `README' file included in this archive. The patch will not do any harm on older kernels. Please note that *not* only on Linux machines it is useful to install the patch. Installing them on any other machine will allow users who telnet in from a Linux console to profit from the block cursor capability. Besides, some Unix systems have installed older Linux terminfo entries or none at all, so it's a good thing, anyway, to give them a current version. The patch is included in the terminfo database of ncurses 5.0, so if you install ncurses 5.0 (source or binary), you don't need to get the patch separately. But you can install it on a system with an older ncurses version if you don't feel like upgrading ncurses altogether. `tsort-2.9i.zip' A little utility (extracted from util-linux-2.9i, but not Linux specific), needed for the configuration of the rx library. You need it only if you compile rx yourself (and if it's not already present on your system), not when using a rx binary. 2.5 Contributed units ===================== Several people have contributed units for GPC. They are usually announced on the mailing list, *Note Mailing List::. Here's a selection: * Nicola Girardi wrote a unit which you can use to interface Svgalib. You can read a mini-FAQ about it at `http://ages.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~nicola/', complete with links to download the unit via http or ftp. If you want to download the unit directly, get `svgalib-gpc-20000216.tar.gz' from `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/home/nicola/'. * Prof. Abimbola A. Olowofoyeku ("The African Chief") wrote a Delphi-compatible (though a few routines are still missing) `SysUtils' unit. It has been tested under Cygwin, Mingw, Linux (Mandrake 7.0), and Solaris 7. It can be downloaded from `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/home/chief/sysutils-20000725.zip'. * Eike Lange wrote units to access MySql, GNU DBM and PostgreSQL data bases. As of this writing (Aug 2000), they are in Alpha stage. They can be downloaded from `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/home/lange/'. 2.6 Can you recommend an IDE? ============================= Users of Borland Pascal may wonder if there's a replacement for the IDE (Integrated Development Environment). Here's a few suggestions: * (X)Emacs. Some people think it's the answer to the question of Life, the Universe and Everything, others decide it's uGNUsable. Available from your friendly GNU mirror and most distributions. * RHIDE. DJGPP users might want to try RHIDE. The latest (beta) release is compatible with GNU Pascal and allows stepping, tracing and watching like Borland's IDE. It can be downloaded from `http://www.tu-chemnitz.de/~sho/rho/rhide/rhide.html'. * PENG. It's not free software, but it was written with GPC. It's very similar to Borland's IDE, but with many extensions. Binaries for DJGPP, Linux and Solaris can be downloaded from `http://fjf.gnu.de/peng.html'. * XWPE is another imitation of the Borland IDE, so users of Borland Pascal may find it a good alternative. 3 GNU Pascal on the DJGPP (MS-DOS) platform ******************************************* This chapter discusses some potential problems with GNU Pascal on MS-DOS, using DJGPP. 3.1 What is DJGPP? ================== The following paragraph is from the site `http://www.delorie.com/djgpp/': DJGPP is a complete 32-bit C/C++ development system for Intel 80386 (and higher) PCs running DOS. It includes ports of many GNU development utilities. The development tools require a 80386 or newer computer to run, as do the programs they produce. In most cases, the programs it produces can be sold commercially without license or royalties. 3.2 If you need more information ================================ GPC/DJGPP is a DJGPP V2 application, and most of the DJGPP documentation applies for GPC too. A great source of information is the DJGPP FAQ: `http://www.delorie.com/djgpp/v2faq/230b.zip' Another place to look for DJGPP documentation is the DJGPP Knowledge Base, at this URL: `http://www.delorie.com/djgpp/doc/kb/' 3.3 What do I download? ======================= As discussed in *Note Components::, other than GPC itself, you need an assembler, linker and friends, a C library and possibly a debugger. The site `http://www.delorie.com/djgpp/' recommended the following files and they will help you find a mirror: `v2/djdev203.zip' (C library) `v2gnu/bnu2951b.zip' (assembler, ....) `v2gnu/gcc2952b.zip' (gcc) `v2gnu/gdb418b.zip' (debugger) `v2gnu/mak379b.zip' (make) `v2gnu/txi40b.zip' (texi) This list is about 10 MB not counting GPC. You can use a binary version of GPC from agnes. 3.4 How do I install the compiler? ================================== If you don't have DJGPP installed on your harddisk, create a directory for GNU Pascal (`c:\gpc'), and unzip the archives. Make sure you preserve the directory structure (use `pkunzip -d'). Now, add the directory where `gpc.exe' lives (`c:\gpc\bin') to your path and set the DJGPP environment variable to point to your `djgpp.env' file: set DJGPP=c:\gpc\djgpp.env Then, add this to your `djgpp.env' file: --------------------------------------------------------- [gpcpp] C_INCLUDE_PATH=%/>;C_INCLUDE_PATH%%DJDIR%/lang/pascal;%DJDIR%/include [gpc] COMPILER_PATH=%/>;COMPILER_PATH%%DJDIR%/bin LIBRARY_PATH=%/>;LIBRARY_PATH%%DJDIR%/lib;%DJDIR%/contrib/grx20/lib --------------------------------------------------------- The binary distribution should come with a `djgpp.env' which is already modified, so you may not have to do this. The GPC online documentation is in GNU info format; you need the Info reader (`txi390b.zip') to read it, or use the built-in Info reader of the RHIDE or PENG IDE. To add the GPC documentation to the info directory file, edit the `c:\gpc\info\dir' file, and locate this section: --------------------------------------------------------- * GCC: (gcc.inf). The GNU C, C++, and Objective-C Compiler * GDB: (gdb.inf). The GNU Debugger (gdb and gdb-dpmi). --------------------------------------------------------- To add GPC, change it to look like this: --------------------------------------------------------- * GCC: (gcc.inf). The GNU C, C++, and Objective-C Compiler * GPC: (gpc.inf). The GNU Pascal Compiler * GDB: (gdb.inf). The GNU Debugger (gdb and gdb-dpmi). --------------------------------------------------------- Specific information for low-memory conditions and more can be found in the DJGPP FAQ and documentation. 3.5 I cannot read the Info documentation! ========================================= To read the Info documentation, you need the `info' program from `txi390b.zip' or an IDE like RHIDE or PENG. 3.6 GPC says: no DPMI ===================== You don't have a DPMI server installed, and DJGPP v2 requires it to run. You can either use one of the commercial DPMI servers (e.g., run `gpc' in a DOS box under MS-Windows) or download and install CWSDPMI (`csdpmi3b.zip') which is a free DPMI server written for DJGPP. 3.7 I have troubles with assembly code ====================================== The GNU Assembler (`as.exe'), or `gas', called by GCC accepts "AT&T" syntax which is different from "Intel" syntax. Differences are discussed in section 17.1 of the DJGPP FAQ. A guide is available which was written by Brennan Mr. Wacko Underwood <brennan@mack.rt66.com> and describes how to use inline assembly programming with DJGPP, at this URL: `http://www.rt66.com/~brennan/djgpp/djgpp_asm.html' There's also a GPC assembler tutorial at `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/gnu-pascal/contrib/gpcasm.zip' Section 17.3 of the DJGPP FAQ discusses some methods to convert "Intel" syntax to "AT&T" syntax. 3.8 Tell me how to do DPMI, BIOS and other DOS related things. ============================================================== DPMI, BIOS and other functions are no different than other system functions. Refer to the GPC Manual on how to access your system's C-library. This small example shows how to use DPMI, copying some structures and function prototypes of `<dpmi.h>': program DPMIDemo; { Only for DJGPP } {$X+} { `Byte' is `unsigned char' in C, `ShortCard' is `unsigned short' in C, `MedCard' is `unsigned long' in C, `Word' is `unsigned' in C, etc. (all these types are built-in). } type TDpmiVersionRet = record Major : Byte; Minor : Byte; Flags : ShortCard; CPU : Byte; Master_PIC : Byte; Slave_PIC : Byte; end; type TDpmiFreeMemInfo = record Largest_Available_Free_Block_In_Bytes, Maximum_Unlocked_Page_Allocation_In_Pages, Maximum_Locked_Page_Allocation_In_Pages, Linear_Address_Space_Size_In_Pages, Total_Number_Of_Unlocked_Pages, Total_Number_Of_Free_Pages, Total_Number_Of_Physical_Pages, Free_Linear_Address_Space_In_Pages, Size_Of_Paging_File_Partition_In_Pages, Reserved1, Reserved2, Reserved3 : MedCard; end; function DpmiGetVersion (var Version: TDpmiVersionRet): Integer; asmname '__dpmi_get_version'; function DpmiGetFreeMemoryInformation (var MemInfo: TDpmiFreeMemInfo): Integer; asmname '__dpmi_get_free_memory_information'; var Version: TDpmiVersionRet; MemInfo: TDpmiFreeMemInfo; begin if DpmiGetVersion (Version) = 0 then begin WriteLn ('CPU type : ', Version.cpu, '86'); WriteLn ('DPMI major : ', Version.Major); WriteLn ('DPMI minor : ', Version.Minor); end else WriteLn ('Error in DpmiGetVersion'); if DpmiGetFreeMemoryInformation (MemInfo) = 0 then WriteLn ('Free DPMI memory : ', MemInfo.Total_Number_Of_Free_Pages, ' pages.') else WriteLn ('Error in DpmiGetMemoryInformation'); end. 3.9 I got an exception when accessing an `array [1 .. 4000000] of Byte'. ======================================================================== Per default, the maximum stack size of a DJGPP application is 256K. If you need more, you have to adjust it with the stubedit program, i.e.: stubedit your_app.exe minstack=5000K Another way is to add the following code to your program to define a minimum stack size (here: 2 MB). This value will be honored even if a user sets a lower value by using stubedit, so this method might be a little safer. Note: The syntax given here is valid for GPC releases of May 2000 and newer. {$ifdef DJGPP} const MinStackSize : Cardinal = $200000; asmname '_stklen'; {$endif} Still, it might be a good idea to use pointers for large structures, and allocate the memory at runtime. 4 Strings ********* 4.1 What's this confusion about strings? ======================================== Turbo Pascal strings have a length byte in front. Since a byte has the range 0 .. 255, this limits a string to 255 characters. However, the Pascal string schema, as defined in section 6.4.3.3.3 of the ISO-10206: 1990 Extended Pascal standard, is a schema record: type String (Capacity : Integer) = record Length : 0 .. Capacity; String : packed array [1 .. Capacity + 1] of Char end; The `+ 1' is a GPC extension to make it feasible to automatically add the `#0' terminator when passing or assigning them to CStrings. Thus at the expense of a little added complexity (must declare capacity, don't use `GetMem' without explicit initialization of the `Capacity' field, and the additional space requirement) you can now have very long strings. 4.2 Overlaying strings in variant records ========================================= Q: Should the different variants in a variant record overlay in the same memory? Previous Pascals I have used have guaranteed this, and I've got low-level code that relies on this. The variants are not the same length, and they are intended not to be. A: No, this is intentional so that the discriminants are not overwritten, and they can be properly initialized in the first place. Consider: record case Boolean of False: (s1 : String (42)); True: (s2 : String (99)); end; If the strings would overlay, in particular their discriminants would occupy the same place in memory. How should it be initialized? Either way, it would be wrong for at least one of the variants... So, after a discussion in comp.lang.pascal.ansi-iso where this topic came up concerning file variables (which also require some automatic initialization and finalization), we decided to do this in GPC for all types with automatic initialization and finalization (currently files and schemata, in the future this might also be Delphi compatible classes and user-defined initialized and finalized types), since the standard does not guarantee variants to overlay, anyway... There are two ways in GPC to get guaranteed overlaying (both non-standard, of course, since the standard does not assume anything about internal representations; both BP compatible), `absolute' declarations and variable type casts. E.g., in order to overlay a byte array `b' to a variable `v': var b: array [1 .. SizeOf (v)] of Byte absolute v; Or you can use type-casting: type t = array [1 .. SizeOf (v)] of Byte; then `t (v)' can be used as a byte array overlayed to `v'. 4.3 Why does `s[0]' not contain the length? =========================================== Q: In standard Pascal you expect `s[1]' to align with the first character position of `s' and thus one character to the left is the length of `s'. Thus `s[0]' is the length of `s'. True? A: This holds for UCSD/BP strings (which GPC does not yet implement, but that's planned). The only strings Standard Pascal knows are arrays of char without any length value. GPC also supports Extended Pascal string schemata (*note String schema::), but they also don't have a length byte at "position 0", but rather a `Length' field (which is larger than one byte). 4.4 Support for BP compatible short strings =========================================== Q: Two different kinds of strings with the same name - `String' - does make a bit of confusion. Perhaps the oldstyle strings could be renamed `short string' ? A: When we implement the short strings, we'll have to do such a distinction. Our current planning goes like this: `String (N)': string schema (EP compatible) `String [N]': short string (UCSD/BP compatible, where N must be <= 255) `String': dependent on flags, by default undiscriminated schema, but in BP mode (or with a special switch) short string of capacity 255 (UCSD/BP compatible). Q: So when will these short strings be available? A: It's been planned for over a year. The delay has been caused by more pressing problems. 4.5 What about C strings? ========================= A C string (`char *') is an array of char, terminated with a `#0' char. C library functions require C, not Pascal style string arguments. However, Pascal style strings are automatically converted to C style strings when passed to a routine that expects C style strings. This works only if the routine reads from the string, not if it modifies it. E.g., this is how you could access the `system()' call in your C library (which is not necessary anymore, since `Execute' is already built-in): program SysCall; function System (Name : CString): Integer; asmname 'system'; var Result : Integer; begin Result := System ('ls -l'); WriteLn ('system() call returned : ', Result) end. You could use the type `PChar' instead of `CString'. Both `CString' and `PChar' are predefined as `^Char' - though we recommend `CString' because it makes it clearer that we're talking about some kind of string rather than a single character. A lot of library routines in Pascal for many applications exist in the GPC unit and some other units. Where available, they should be preferred (e.g. `Execute' rather than `system()', and then you won't have to worry about `CString's.) Do *not* pass a C style string as a `const' or `var' argument if the C prototype says `const char *' or you will probably get a segfault. 5 Getting Help ************** Please read the GPC Manual (info files or other formats) as well as the `README' and `BUGS' files that come with GPC (usually installed in directory `/usr/local/doc/gpc'), plus other docs that might help (the DJGPP FAQ if you use DJGPP, etc.) before you send email to the maintainers or mailing list. In particular, the `BUGS' file contains information on how to submit bug reports in the most efficient way. The `Support' chapter of the GPC Manual tells you where to find more information about GPC and how to contact the GPC developers. The following information is from this chapter. 5.1 The GPC Mailing List ======================== There is a mailing list devoted to GNU Pascal. You can write to the mailing list, e.g. if you have problems installing GPC or if you found a problem with GPC (please see *Note Reporting Bugs::). You can also use it to discuss suggestions for improving GPC and, most welcome, to offer your help or contribute code, documentation or other work. Mails to the list should be in English. To subscribe to the mailing list, send the command subscribe gpc your@email.address in the body of a mail to <majordomo@gnu.de> (*not* to `gpc@gnu.de'!). The subject is ignored. (Please replace `your@email.address' with your real email address.) For more info, send a line `help' to <majordomo@gnu.de>. You can send a message to the mailing list by sending email to the list address <gpc@gnu.de> as if it were a person. To leave the mailing list, send the command unsubscribe gpc your@email.address to <majordomo@gnu.de>. There is also a (low-traffic) announce list, <gpc-announce@gnu.de> that you can subscribe to stay up-to-date. To subscribe to the list, write an email with subscribe gpc-announce your@email.address in the body to <majordomo@gnu.de>. If you like to announce a contribution, a service or an event related to GPC, you are invited to post to this list rather than `gpc@gnu.de', but please don't use the announce list for questions or discussions. Please note that all mail sent to the announce list is forwarded to the regular list, so you won't have to subscribe to both lists if you don't want to miss anything. 5.2 The GPC Mailing List Archives ================================= Perhaps your problem was already discussed on the list. There is a searchable archive of the mailing list on the WWW. It can be browsed or searched at `http://www.gnu.de/archive/wilma.cgi/gpc'. The archive of the GPC announcement list is at `http://www.gnu.de/archive/wilma.cgi/gpc-announce'. _Note:_ Currently, the search option is working fine. If you find it broken, please email me at <anja@drewitz.de>. Please don't mail a copy to the GPC list because I let procmail move all mails with `To: gpc...' and `Cc: gpc...' to a separate folder and would not see your mail for a long time. -- Anja This archive starts in June 1999. For older messages, see: `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/gnu-pascal/misc/gpc-list-1998.gz' (513 kB) `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/gnu-pascal/misc/gpc-list-1997.gz' (995 kB) `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/gnu-pascal/misc/gpc-list-1996.gz' (154 kB) `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/gnu-pascal/misc/gpc-list-1995.gz' (42 kB) There is also a HTML version of these older archives at `http://www.iula.upf.es/altres/pub/gpc/list2html/gpclist.htm'. 5.3 Newsgroups relevant to GPC ============================== To get support, you can also ask the Usenet newsgroups for help. There are several Pascal related newsgroups, but none is dedicated just to GNU Pascal, so use the one which is most appropriate for your problem. For general Pascal questions, we recommend the following one: `news://comp.lang.pascal.misc' Pascal in general and ungrouped Pascals. Pascal syntax related questions may be appropriate in: `news://comp.lang.pascal.ansi-iso' Pascal according to ANSI and ISO standards. The next newsgroup is a haven for beginners, answering questions that would apply to almost any Pascal. However, if you have a GPC-specific question don't post there - use the GPC mailing list. And when in doubt use the GPC mailing list. `news://comp.lang.pascal.borland' Borland Pascal questions. Don't forget to give back what you have obtained. None of us is getting money for answering your questions (unless you pay us by yourself). Please do your part by answering the questions of others instead. 5.4 Where to get individual support for GPC =========================================== GPC is free software and comes *without any warranty*. If you want to get professional support, you can hire an individual or a company for providing such a service. G-N-U GmbH (http://www.g-n-u.de) is doing large parts of the development of GNU Pascal. This company offers special support for GPC and can be contacted at <info@g-n-u.de>. More generally, to find a company or an individual who offers support and other consulting services for free software, look into the GNU Service Directory (http://www.gnu.org/prep/service.html). 5.5 If the compiler crashes... ============================== If the compiler crashes, you have discovered a bug. A reliable compiler never crashes. To help the maintainers fix this bug, it is important that you send us a problem report. If you're on Unix, you can find out where the compiler crashed if you enable coredumps, then load the compiler (`gpc1') plus the core file in the debugger (`gdb /your_path_here/gpc1 core'), then type `backtrace' to get a stacktrace. Include this stacktrace in your bug report. 5.6 How to report GPC bugs ========================== If you encounter a bug with GPC, please check whether it is one of the known bugs. If not, please report it to the GNU Pascal mailing list (*note Mailing List::). That way, they always reach the maintainers. Please note the following points. * Please send a description of the problem. Try to give as much information as possible, with the full text of any error messages encountered, or a description of how some output varies from the expected output. Always specify the operating system type with version and the machine type (try `uname -a' if unsure) as well as the version of GPC as printed by `gpc -v'. * A good article on submitting bug reports can be found at either `http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/bugs.html' or `http://freshmeat.net/news/2000/02/26/951627540.html' If the problem is with the compiler itself, not an installation problem or something like this, please provide a test program to reproduce the problem, and note the following hints. You can also contribute test programs for features that are working in GPC to ensure they will not break in future releases. * The test program should be as short as possible, but *by all means*, please send a *complete* program and *make sure* that it still reproduces the problem before you send it. Too often, users have sent code which contained obvious syntax errors far before the actual problem, or just code fragments we could only make wild guesses about. This is unproductive for us and doesn't help you get your problem solved. 6 Miscellaneous *************** 6.1 I want to contribute; where do I start? =========================================== If you want to contribute, please write to the mailing list, *Note Mailing List::. 6.2 Where is the GNU Pascal FTP site? WWW? ========================================== The GPC homepage on the web is `http://home.pages.de/~GNU-Pascal/'. For now, this same page appears at `http://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~gnu-pascal/'. The master FTP site for GNU Pascal is `agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de'. GNU Pascal related files can be found in `ftp://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/gnu-pascal/'. GPC To-Do list, latest features, fixed bugs: `http://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~gnu-pascal/todo.html' 6.3 About this FAQ ================== Current Maintainer: Russ Whitaker <russ@ashlandhome.net> This is the second incarnation of the GNU Pascal FAQ list. Comments about, suggestions for, or corrections to this FAQ list are welcome. This FAQ is based on GNU Pascal Frequently-Asked Questions List, Edition 0.4, for GPC version 2.0, November 1996 by J.J. van der Heijden <j.j.vanderheijden@student.utwente.nl>. Please make sure to include in your mail the version number of the document to which your comments apply (you can find the version at the beginning of this FAQ list). Many people have contributed to this FAQ, only some of them are acknowledged above. Much of the info in, and inspiration for this FAQ list was taken from the GPC mailing list traffic, so you may have (unbeknownst to you) contributed to this list.