From: news-1326478115@discworld.dascon.de   
      
   On 2015-10-09, Francois LE COAT  wrote:   
   > I'll add that GNU/GCC 3 is suitable to build ATARI ST softwares.   
   > GNU/GCC 4 is not, because it is too restrictive with its syntax,   
   > but furthermore it doesn't implement 16bits libraries required   
   > for ATARI ST softwares.   
      
   Those are not *required*. Operating system calls do not need a special "int"   
   size from the compiler - they should use uint16_t/uint32_t in the C library   
   syscall implementation, which works just fine with any gcc version, and most   
   OS calls I remember actually use 32-bit ints, not 16 bit. After all, the 68k   
   CPU is (by architecture) a 32-bit machine.   
      
   Good, *portable* C code should work as well when compiled with 32-bit ints,   
   although it may run a bit slower and use more memory - how that is offset by   
   the better optimizations of the new compiler would need to be checked in   
   every case.   
      
   > Thanks for your answers. The OS maintainers are making very strange   
   > decisions breaking the backward compatibility with the ATARI ST !   
      
   Which OS maintainers? The last OS version that was maintained was TOS 4.08.   
      
   You are talking about one gcc package - you are free to take the source code   
   and compile your own version with 16-bit integer support.  You are also free   
   to take the 16 bit libraries and adapt them to compile with gcc4 (or better   
   gcc5) - it can be done, I use gcc4 on 16-bit targets (avr) regularly.   
      
   If noone stepped up and did just that until now, it does not mean it is   
   impossible or someone decreed that 16-bit support should be dropped - just   
   that noone wanted it enough to invest their own time.   
      
   cu   
   Michael   
      
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