Date: Tue, 16 Apr 2002 12:13:08 +1000 From: Greg Lehey <grog@FreeBSD.org> To: Tom Rhodes <trhodes@FreeBSD.org> Cc: cvs-committers@FreeBSD.org, cvs-all@FreeBSD.org Subject: bss (was: cvs commit: src/share/man/man5 a.out.5) Message-ID: <20020416121308.E40110@canberra.worldwide.lemis.com> In-Reply-To: <200204150205.g3F256861556@freefall.freebsd.org>; from trhodes@FreeBSD.org on Sun, Apr 14, 2002 at 07:05:06PM -0700 References: <200204150205.g3F256861556@freefall.freebsd.org>
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On Sunday, 14 April 2002 at 19:05:06 -0700, Tom Rhodes wrote: > trhodes 2002/04/14 19:05:06 PDT > > Modified files: > share/man/man5 a.out.5 > Log: > a.out.5 states that nobody seems to agree on what bss stands for. This is > incorrect, however, as Dennis Ritchie states ``Actually the acronym is "block > started by symbol." It was a pseudo-op in FAP (Fortran Assembly Program), an > assembler for the IBM <models> machines. It identified its label and set > aside space for a given number of words.'' BSS is one of a number of similar directives for old assemblers, not just IBM. I've seen it on CDC as well (3200/3400 and 3600/3800). The reason for the name is that there was also another directive, BES (block ending with symbol) which reserved space and returned the address of the last word (because this was convenient for some repeated instructions). Greg -- See complete headers for address and phone numbers To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe cvs-all" in the body of the message
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