JA> I tried Watcom, and sent it back. At the office, we use both 

 MB> That's obviously true.  What is most maddening about Watcom
 MB> is that it looks like it would be a really nice compiler if
 MB> they could make the OS/2 support as solid as the Windows
 MB> support. 

 JM> Ugh!  I just purchased the Watcom compiler and was 
 JM> wondering what other bugs were in there that cause you 
 JM> and Jim to send it back?

I should clarify that Jim sent it back, but I kept it.  I do a lot of work
with 16-bit OS/2 code, especially device drivers for which the standard
compiler is still Microsoft C 6.  Watcom would be a nice compiler for this
if it worked, since the Watcom run-time has a lot of fully re-entrant and
OS-independent functions, while MS C 6 does not even let you call strlen()
when inside a device driver.

I have not yet been able to do anything useful for OS/2 device drivers with
Watcom, but I really have not put too much effort into it.  IBM is
distributing a royalty-free package written by the guy who does the Gravis
Ultrasound that he claims will allow the Watcom compiler to be used with
Watcom.

There is also a set of some GNU GPL tools written by Andreas Kaiser that
replicate a large part of the OS/2 DDK.  He officially targets the Zortech
compiler, but the necessary pieces to use Watcom should be there.

Watcom claims direct support for making OS/2 device drivers, but this is
totally broken and non-functional.

 JM> Were there patches available? 

Patch level A has been released, but not yet B, I believe.  Peter
Fitzsimmons will probably comment some more.

 JM> Is there a list of bugs available?  

Not that I know of.  Patches sometimes list bugs fixed.

 JM> The reason I bought it was the student pricing and the 
 JM> fact that it supported so many platforms - mainly OS/2 
 JM> though....

Watcom is not bad for the sort of thing you would usually want a compiler
to do when building OS/2 applications.  For specialized purpose such as
OS/2 device drivers, it has serious problems.

-- Mike


--- Maximus/2 2.02