Re: Moving Linux-specific stuff out of i386-tdep.c

[DJ Delorie <dj at delorie dot com>]

Kevin Buettner wrote:
> Here's what Stan had to say about the matter:
> 
>     Names need to be 8.3 unique so djgpp works.  The critical files...
>     The 14-char thing is an old System V limitation, and is...

The key thing to note is that 8.3 filesystems truncate the *base*
name, not the whole file name.  So, verylongfile.c becomes verylong.c
and the object file is verylong.o.  With SYSV filesystems,
verylongfilename.c becomes verylongfilena and the object file
is *also* verylongfilena, and it overwrites the source.

So, "8.3" means 8.3 *unique*, but longer is OK (like the old FORTRAN
rules that variables could be long, but had to be unique in the
first six letters) as long as it gets safely truncated.

Also note that ftp.gnu.org has a package called "doschk" that
checks for 8.3-unique and sysv-14 problems.  It's trivial
to build and use (ls -1R | doschk) and may prevent problems
down the road.