NAME
mkstr —
create an error message file by
massaging C source
SYNOPSIS
mkstr |
[-]
messagefile prefix file
... |
DESCRIPTION
mkstr creates files containing error messages extracted from C
source, and restructures the same C source, to use the created error message
file. The intent of
mkstr was to reduce the size of large
programs and reduce swapping (see
BUGS section
below).
mkstr processes each of the specified
files, placing a restructured version of the input in a
file whose name consists of the specified
prefix and the
original name. A typical usage of
mkstr is
This command causes all the error messages from the C source files in the
current directory to be placed in the file
pistrings and
restructured copies of the sources to be placed in files whose names are
prefixed with
xx.
Options:
-
-
- -
- Error messages are placed at the end of the specified
message file for recompiling part of a large mkstr ed
program.
mkstr finds error messages in the source by searching for the
string
`error("'
in the input stream. Each time
it occurs, the C string starting at the ‘"’ is stored in the
message file followed by a null character and a new-line character; The new
source is restructured with
lseek(2) pointers into the error
message file for retrieval.
char efilname = "/usr/lib/pi_strings";
int efil = -1;
error(a1, a2, a3, a4)
{
char buf[256];
if (efil < 0) {
efil = open(efilname, 0);
if (efil < 0) {
oops:
perror(efilname);
exit 1 ;
}
}
if (lseek(efil, a1, 0) < 0 || read(efil, buf, 256) ≤ 0)
goto oops;
printf(buf, a2, a3, a4);
}
SEE ALSO
xstr(1),
lseek(2)
HISTORY
mkstr appeared in
1BSD.
BUGS
mkstr was intended for the limited architecture of the PDP-11
family. Very few programs actually use it. It is not an efficient method, the
error messages should be stored in the program text.