From owner-freebsd-questions Fri Jan 5 6:32: 3 2001 From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Jan 5 06:32:00 2001 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from guru.mired.org (okc-65-26-235-186.mmcable.com [65.26.235.186]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 1B79737B400 for ; Fri, 5 Jan 2001 06:32:00 -0800 (PST) Received: (qmail 66666 invoked by uid 100); 5 Jan 2001 14:31:59 -0000 From: Mike Meyer MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-ID: <14933.56031.736924.150622@guru.mired.org> Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2001 08:31:59 -0600 (CST) To: 01031149@3web.net Cc: questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: system management In-Reply-To: <133951769@toto.iv> X-Mailer: VM 6.75 under 21.1 (patch 10) "Capitol Reef" XEmacs Lucid X-face: "5Mnwy%?j>IIV\)A=):rjWL~NB2aH[}Yq8Z=u~vJ`"(,&SiLvbbz2W`;h9L,Yg`+vb1>RG% *h+%X^n0EZd>TM8_IB;a8F?(Fb"lw'IgCoyM.[Lg#r\ Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Duke Normandin <01031149@3web.net> types: > On 4 Jan 01 at 10:34, Mike Meyer wrote: > >> But, can we really in FreeBSD update a 3.X release to an 4.X or 5.X > >> doing a CVSUP and then a make world ? > >Yes. If you're going from an a.out system to an elf system, you'll > >need to do a "make ugprade" as well. > I've waited a long time for an opportunity to ask about what the "a.out" / > "elf" systems are all about. Would you be so kind....? Tia! Two different formats for executables - among other things. a.out was the original (well, it dates back to v6) Unix executable format. Those were just loaded and executed. The "magic number" they started with was a branch around the executable header information. ELF provides a lot more flexibility (for instance, both link and shared libraries and core files can be stored as ELF files), but requires more support from the kernel exec call. http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/ Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message