From: Alan Modra <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [PATCH] Silence gas warning about "*"
Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 15:36:35 +1000 (EST)
> from required syntax. However, it's dangerous to do this without giving a
> warning, as code not meeting simple syntax rules indicates that the
> programmer is not familiar with the language. For instance, did the
> programmer mean "jmp *%ebx" or "jmp *(%ebx)" when he wrote "jmp (%ebx)"?
> Either translation of this example could logically be argued as correct.
Thanks for your information. I completely agree with you.
> As far as binutils-2.9.1 goes, I think it was only certain of H.J. Lu's
> releases that gave an error on "call *(%ebx)" I don't think anyone should
> be at all worried about backwards compatibility with these assemblers.
Unfortunately, we must be worried, because a significant number of
people are still using binutils-2.9.1.0.x. I don't want to force
people to update their binutils packages, even if that is the Right
Thing, since I remember how severely I was blamed when we decided that
we would only support binutils-2.9.1.0.x and higher. Generally
speaking, it is not a Good Thing to press users to replace core system
tools (such as binutils), regardless of the right and wrong, I've
realized. So I'll add a test into configure and satisfy both 2.9.1
users and 2.9.5 ones.
Thanks,
Okuji
