Date: Tue, 29 Mar 2005 10:08:59 -0600 From: Dan Nelson <dnelson@allantgroup.com> To: Michael Hopkins <michael.hopkins@hopkins-research.com> Cc: "freebsd-amd64@freebsd.org" <freebsd-amd64@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Cross-compiling/porting to Linux Message-ID: <20050329160858.GB72462@dan.emsphone.com> In-Reply-To: <BE6EFB45.36AB4%michael.hopkins@hopkins-research.com> References: <BE6EFB45.36AB4%michael.hopkins@hopkins-research.com>
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In the last episode (Mar 29), Michael Hopkins said: > On a related topic - I can see that there are ports for converting > binaries between different formats (e.g. ELF to a.out). As there is > already a runtime compatibility established, how easy would it be to > build something that reads in a FreeBSD binary or library and outputs > a linux one? Just a thought. That would be near impossible. The elf2aout program in ports has a specific purpose: to convert static elf binaries to a.out format so simple bootloaders can execute them. The binary format is the least of your worries when trying to run under a different OS. You've got structure changes (FILE for example), constant changes (ioctls, signals, errnos), syscall number changes (even the method to invoke syscalls is different), possibly different reserved registers, etc. -- Dan Nelson dnelson@allantgroup.com
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