Re: GNAT version 3.09 public release

Re: GNAT version 3.09 public release

[Stephen Leake]

yeah! I just downloaded the NT version, and it works under Windows 95.
The download file is dated on my birthday - a nice present!

I do have one question; gnat 3.09 for NT uses the cygwin32 dll; which
version? I currently have version 16 and 17.1, and I'd like to add bash
and diff to my path for use with gnat, but I need to know which version
to use. You might want to put this in the /winnt/README.

-- 
- Stephe

Re: GNAT version 3.09 public release

[Richard Kenner]

In article <32ED00D8.5B8A@gsfc.nasa.gov> Stephen.Leake@gsfc.nasa.gov writes:
>I do have one question; gnat 3.09 for NT uses the cygwin32 dll; which
>version? 

17.1.

GNAT version 3.09 public release

[Robert Dewar]

GNAT 3.09 is now available for multiple targets on cs.nyu.edu (including
OS/2, NT, Solaris, SunOS, HPUX, Sinix, DecUnix, SGI Irix, MachTen).
Versions for additional targets, including DOS, will appear shortly.

GNAT 3.09 fixes many bugs, and also contains the following new features
and capabilities:

Latest features in GNAT version 3.09
====================================

   (see complete list for 3.08, since for all cases except NT, 3.08 was
    skipped in the version sequencing)

   A new pragma Pure_Function allows an individual function to be specified
   as Pure, see documentation in the GNAT reference manual for full details.

   Address clauses now are much more flexible. In previous versions, GNAT
   rejected any address clause not required to be implemented, in accordance
   with the implementation permission in section 13.1(22) of the RM. Now
   far more cases are accepted and correctly processed as follows:

      1. All address clauses for variables of any elementary type (i.e.
         scalars and access types) are permitted.

      2. All address clauses for non-initialized variables are permitted

      3. An address clause for an initialized variable of a composite
         type is accepted if any calls to operators or functions are to
         pure subprograms (i.e. either declared in a pure unit, or declared
         pure using the pragma Pure_Function), and all operands are literals,
         or constants defined prior to the variable to which the address
         clause applies.

   In practice this should mean that nearly all address clauses are now
   accepted. Note that To_Address is a pure function.

   For the VMS version only, pragma AST_Entry and the corresponding
   attribute are now fully implemented.

   Exception_Message now returns the name of the exception, together with
   the exception message if there is one (in previous versions of GNAT,
   this function yielded a null string).

Latest features in GNAT version 3.08
====================================

   Unchecked conversion is now allowed for all definite types, including
   discriminated records with default discriminants. In addition, it is
   now permissible to convert from an unconstrained array type (but still
   not allowed to convert to an unconstrained array type, since no bounds
   information would be available).

   The storage management in the compiler has been considerably improved
   allowing larger programs to compile in a given virtual memory size.

   The pragmas Linker_Alias, Linker_Section and Weak_External have been
   added that give full access to the corresponding gcc features. With these
   additions, GNAT has all the capabilities of GNU-C with regard to specifying
   implementation dependent attributes.

   The attributes Large and Safe_Large now apply to fixed-point types as well
   as to floating-point types. With these additions, GNAT now implements the
   full set of Ada 83 attributes.

   The pragma Complex_Representation specifies that a record of two floats
   is to be laid out the same way as a complex value in Fortran.

   Biased representation is implemented for all discrete types. This means
   that values are stored with the lower bound value subtracted. For instance
   the range 10 .. 13 can be fit into 2 bits, with 10 .. 13 represented as
   0 .. 2. Biased representation can be specified for subtypes, using the
   Size or Value_Size attribute to specify a size that requires biasing, or
   for objects, by specifying size, or for components, by specifying the
   component size using a component clause, and finally for array components
   by specifying a component size for the array. Biased representation is
   never selected by default. The only way that biased representation is used
   is if a size specification would otherwise have been rejected, but a biased
   representation can allow the specified size to be honored.

   The binder has been enhanced to generate more a more friendly binding
   order, i.e. one more likely to avoid access before elaboration. In
   addition a new switch -h for the binder (-h for horrible) chooses a
   deliberately bad elaboration order, which can be useful for testing
   code that is supposed to be portable.

   The Version and Body_Version attributes are no longer based on time stamps,
   but rather on the contents of the source files themselves. This has two
   important advantages. First the values are the same on different targets,
   facilitating heterogenous distribution. Second, trivial changes (changes
   in layout, capitalization of keywords/identifiers, or comments) do not
   affect the version number.

   The binder now uses version numbers as well as time stamps. This means
   that the binder will not force recompilation for trivial changes (as
   described above), giving a limited form of smart recompilation.

Robert Dewar
Ada Core Technologies

As always, ACT can provide commercial support for any of these versions of GNAT.For details, send email to info@gnat.com.

Although we cannot offer individual assistance to unsupported users of GNAT,
we are happy to receive bug reports at report@gnat.com. Please follow the
directions in the documentation for submission of bug reports.