On Mon, Mar 11, 2019 at 12:47 PM Måns Rullgård <m...@mansr.com> wrote: > > Linus Torvalds <torva...@linux-foundation.org> writes: > > > On Mon, Mar 11, 2019 at 11:08 AM Måns Rullgård <m...@mansr.com> wrote: > >> > >> The latest version I have is 5.1, and that uses ECOFF. > > > > ECOFF _is_ a.out as far as Linux is concerned. > > > > So Linux basically treats ECOFF as "regular a.out with just some > > header extensions". > > > > We don't have any specific support for ECOFF. > > > > I _think_. Again, it's been years and years. > > Right, which is why killing a.out entirely would have the unfortunate > effect of also removing the OSF/1 compatibility on Alpha. > > If we are to support Alpha as an architecture at all, it makes sense to > support the things people actually use it for.
I agree. I was not aware that a.out was effectively the same as ECOFF.
