From owner-freebsd-current Tue Sep 29 01:44:34 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id BAA11891 for freebsd-current-outgoing; Tue, 29 Sep 1998 01:44:34 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from allegro.lemis.com (allegro.lemis.com [192.109.197.134]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id BAA11865 for ; Tue, 29 Sep 1998 01:44:21 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from grog@freebie.lemis.com) Received: from freebie.lemis.com (freebie.lemis.com [192.109.197.137]) by allegro.lemis.com (8.9.1/8.9.0) with ESMTP id SAA11935; Tue, 29 Sep 1998 18:13:40 +0930 (CST) Received: (from grog@localhost) by freebie.lemis.com (8.9.1/8.9.0) id SAA14210; Tue, 29 Sep 1998 18:13:38 +0930 (CST) Message-ID: <19980929181337.S15172@freebie.lemis.com> Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1998 18:13:37 +0930 From: Greg Lehey To: Chan Yiu Wah , current@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: what is the difference between aout & elf References: <199809290419.MAA09433@b1.hkstar.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 0.91.1i In-Reply-To: <199809290419.MAA09433@b1.hkstar.com>; from Chan Yiu Wah on Tue, Sep 29, 1998 at 12:19:12PM +0800 WWW-Home-Page: http://www.lemis.com/~grog Organization: LEMIS, PO Box 460, Echunga SA 5153, Australia Phone: +61-8-8388-8286 Fax: +61-8-8388-8725 Mobile: +61-41-739-7062 Sender: owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Tuesday, 29 September 1998 at 12:19:12 +0800, Chan Yiu Wah wrote: > Hello, > > I am newbie to aout and elf format. I would like to know there differences. ELF is a more extensible file format than a.out, which goes back 25 years. In those days, dynamic libraries were unknown, and it was enough to have three segments (text, data and bss). When dynamic libraries came along, *BSD was at first not able to use them. Then somebody introduced some kludges which did some of the things that were needed, but not all. ELF is a much newer format which allows arbitrary segments, in particular for dynamic libraries. > Why FreeBSD is trying to go elf ? Well, FreeBSD isn't just trying, it's there in 3.0 (due to be released in a little over two weeks). Greg -- See complete headers for address, home page and phone numbers finger grog@lemis.com for PGP public key To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-current" in the body of the message