[DotGNU]Portable.NET 0.3.2 released

[Rhys Weatherley]

Portable.NET 0.3.2, pnetlib 0.1.6, and treecc 0.0.8 have been released:

Web Page: http://www.southern-storm.com.au/portable_net.html
Download: http://www.southern-storm.com.au/download/pnet-0.3.2.tar.gz
Library:  http://www.southern-storm.com.au/download/pnetlib-0.1.6.tar.gz

Treecc:   http://www.southern-storm.com.au/download/treecc-0.0.8.tar.gz

The major changes to pnet in this release are to the C#
compiler, which is getting more useful by the day as a real
compiler for GNU/Linux.  It can now compile the metadata
within pnetlib (i.e. the class, field, and method definitions,
but not the method bodies).

The library, pnetlib, is also moving along again.  Many thanks to
Gopal V, Peter Minten, Stephen Compall, Carlie Carnow,
Abhaya Agarwal, and Gerard Toonstra (I hope I didn't forget
anyone).  Keep up the good work everyone.

Other changes are detailed in the appended NEWS entries.

Cheers,

Rhys.

pnet 0.3.2 (27 March 2002)

Runtime engine:

* InternalCall methods for "Platform.FileMethods" (Gopal.V, Charlie.C,
  and Rhys.W).
* Add binfmt registration and unregistration code.

C# Compiler:

* Remove a floating-point recognition case from the lexer because
  it was confusing the parser, and because it wasn't standard.
* Always favour non-params cases of methods when resolving candidates.
* Coerce the "this" parameter to method invocations properly.
* Rearrange the "cscc" directory to separate common code, plug-in
  handling, and the C#-specific pieces of the compiler.
* Implement Java-style labelled loops and switches in the code
generator.
* Collect up static constructor fragments for each class.
* Add non-literal field initializers to static constructors.
* Array initializers.
* Detect duplicate definitions of methods and properties.
* Type gathering for nested types.
* Check for interface implementation errors in source programs.
* Set the "override" flag on finalizers.
* Modify name resultion so that a field declaration of the form
  "T T" will be treated propertly.
* Check for correct use of "abstract" and "extern".
* Fix line numbers on declaration nodes so that errors are reported
  for the first line of a declaration, not the last.
* Always look for declared types in the program before the libraries,
  just in case the program overrides a library type.
* Add the "-fmetadata-only" option to the compiler.
* Implement builtin operators for enumerated types.
* Pass "-ftarget-assembly-name" and "-fstdlib-name" to all tools.

Documentation:

* Updates to "engine/HACKING" (Gopal.V).
* Document the location of CVS snapshots in "HACKING".
* New "csdoc2stub" program to generate C# stub classes (Gopal.V).

Assembler:

* Syntax changes to support Java bytecode.
* Implement the ".data" directive to support array initializers.
* Handle classes with no explicit parent correctly.

Disassembler:

* Java method body support.

Linker:

* Add the missing "--no-stdlib" option.
* Bug fixes to attribute linking.

Loader and Metadata:

* Improve the Java class loader.
* New functions to support interface method searches.
* New functions for accessing user data on "ILClass" objects.

Other:

* Type comparison fixes in "ildiff" (Gopal.V).
* New "ilcheck" program for checking for missing InternalCalls
(Gopal.V).
* Csant fixes to make it capable of building pnetlib.

pnetlib 0.1.6 (27 March 2002)

* System.Net (Peter Minten, Gerard Toonstra, Gopal V).
* System.Uri* (Stephen Compall).
* Build logic for the "System" assembly (Rhys Weatherley).
* Bug fixes to System.Version, System.TimeSpan (Peter Minten).
* Updates to System.Threading.Timer* (Abhaya Agarwal).
* Partial implementation of String.Format (Abhaya Agarwal).
* Convert the build system to csant (Rhys Weatherley).

treecc 0.0.8 (27 March 2002)

* ANSI C compatiblity fixes.
* Only build "expr_cpp" if bison is being used because "byacc"
  does not understand the options used in the C++ grammar.
* Polish the Texinfo documentation a little.
* Fix the C++ skeleton to use "size_t" in the declaration of "alloc".
* Implement the "strip_filenames" option to improve the predictability
  of code generation in Portable.NET's C# compiler.
* Add the "auto_gen.sh" and "conf_fix.sh" scripts.
* Add the "essay.html" file to the documentation directory.