Re: MATH_EMULATE

[Alan Barrett <apb%cequrux.com@localhost>]

On Sun, 13 Jan 2008, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
> > When did /rescue come in?
> > (And which math library is /rescue linked with?)
> 
> Rescue is almost certainly linked against the x87 libm, though I'd
> have to check.

I haven't checked how rescue is linked, but I think that it would be
more useful if it were linked against libraries that worked with the
least-capable hardware we support.  In the particular case of the i386
port and FPU support, this implies that it should use the soft float
version of libm.  The same applies to programs in install ramdisk
images.

On a related issue, it might make sense to avoid floating point
operations in rescue and in install ramdisk images.  In the particular
case of ping, the floating point code could be made conditional
on #ifdef SMALLPROG or the like, or (with a lot more effort) the
calculations could be done in integer arithmetic.

--apb (Alan Barrett)