Ned Konz <ned at bike-nomad.com> wrote:
> Also, there's no guarantee that these numbers (error codes, flag values, etc.)
> have predictable values between operating systems; there should probably
> be a lookup table on one side or another (that is: either don't return raw C
> return
> values, or be able to decode them on the Smalltalk side).
> 
> Hmm... what about making a primitive that just returns a lookup table
> that can be made into a Dictionary? It could be returned in a Smalltalk-supplied
> buffer, as a series of:
> 
> 	name (NUL terminated string), value (4-byte integer value)
> 
> pairs.
> 

I've not followed all of this discussion, but I suggest that the
dictionary be left inside the VM.  After all, a major purpose of a
virtual machine is that it's the same no matter what the underlying
platform is.  If you really want, eg, a *Linux* error code, how about
having a separate primitive that's only defined on Linux?


-Lex