masm general history

[FORTRANS]

Hi,

   Yah, thanks Dave.  Saw that on the Wiki thing.  Oopsie.

   Win32s was a software package for Windows 3,1, 3.11.  It
supplied support for Windows NT/(95) 32-bit programs for the
16-bit Windows.  Win32s programs _should_ run okay on later
Windows systems.  Win32s programs were Win32 (NT) programs
with a strict set of restrictions on what functions you could use.
I encountered Win32s with OS/2 so I used the versions on Hobbes,
the OS/2 support site.

http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/h-search.php?key=win32s&pushbutton=Search

   Microsoft soon made Win32s incompatible with the Windows
emulation with OS/2, after Win32s 1.25a.  The SDK (or whatever it
was called) was not free at first (IIRC).  But later it was freed up as
Microsoft let their SDK's become free.  But, I don't think I found a
free one specifically for Win32s development?  So I went searching
Microsoft's support sites for information.  Again (IIRC), you used a
set of rules with a normal SDK for Windows NT/95/98 unless you
bought the Win32s package from Microsoft.  (Don't really know
how that turned out as I did not not write Windows programs back
then...)  Hope this isn't completely wrong and helps a bit.

Probably an oops,

Steve N.

[watlers world]

thanks for the help

the masm32 example dlls seem to work under win32s
but the programs seem to cause format errors

since masm32 can produce code that will work with win32s

it just makes me still more curious
of the min/max vers required to create win32s type exe files

[hutch--]

If you can find them you would need to look up the specs for Win32s and test it on the Win3.? versions that supported it. As a matter of fact MASM32 cannot create Win32s, it will produce COFF format object modules which can be built into 32 bit PE executables, proper Win32, not Win32s which only ran in an emulation layer under 16 bit Windows.

[watlers world]

its hard to belive win32 and masm are over 20 years old

the history of win32 is interesting
http://www.bearwindows.boot-land.net/win31x.htm

no idea about coff files
but I did locate a win32 masm example that might work


thanks for the help

[dedndave]

i had some general success with google
the trick was to surround win32s with doube quotes - this prevents all the win32 stuff from popping up
so - i googled things like:
"win32s" functions
"win32s" programming

on msdn, i found a number of articles (many in the form of knowledge base articles)
most of them have to do with installing and using win32s, but a number of them deal with programming
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/search/en-us?query=win32s&x=0&y=0
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/83520
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/121093
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/131896

this page looks promising   :P
http://www.digitalmars.com/ctg/win32programming.html

[GregL]

i don't know what happened to 7 - i don't think i've ever seen a v 7

MASM 7.0 is from Visual Studio 2002 and MASM 7.1 is from Visual Studio 2003.

[dedndave]

ahh - thanks Greg

[sinsi]

Win32s let you run 32-bit exes from Win95 and WinNT in Win31x.
Because Win98 and NT4 added lots of APIs, exes built using the new API won't work in Win32s. If it runs in 95 it will run in win32s.

I would imagine any version of masm that builds PE files will build a win32s PE.

[watlers world]

I'm just getting started with masm
so I'm still not shure about all the terms

I did locate the info I need
win32s programs are Win32 PE files with relocation information
to create them you add /FIXED:NO to the linker

not yet shure what the first masm version was that could do this
or the last

thanks to every one for the help in getting started