Ezm3: An Easier Modula-3 Distribution

Ezm3 1.2 is now available! This new release includes an updated code generator (based on gcc 3.2.3) which is a big step toward supporting amd64 platforms. (Sorry, they're not supported quite yet in this release.)

A few bugs have been fixed, of course. It should be easier now to build Ezm3 on the newer Linux distributions.

You must use CVSup 16.1h or later with this version of Ezm3. Earlier versions of CVSup will not build properly with Ezm3 1.2. You can get CVSup 16.1h from ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/development/CVSup/snapshots/.

The following old platforms, which were supported in the original Ezm3 release, are no longer supported: BSDI4, FreeBSD2, FreeBSD3, and SPARC (SunOS 4.x). If you have one of these platforms, you will need to stick with Ezm3 1.0.

What Is Ezm3?

Ezm3 is a simpler, more portable distribution of the Modula-3 compiler and runtime libraries. It is designed for people who would like to install CVSup on their systems as quickly and as painlessly as possible. Ezm3 is derived from the robust and comprehensive PM3 release of Modula-3. Only the components and features which are needed by CVSup were retained. Features which made the package harder to port and install were removed.

The goal of Ezm3 is for you to be able to install Modula-3 on your system in one try, without any patching or false starts.

What is Ezm3 Not?

Ezm3 is not a full release of the entire Modula-3 source base. It contains only those components which are required for building and running CVSup. If you are interested in using Modula-3 for anything except building CVSup, you might be better off using a more complete distribution such as PM3 or CM3.

Ezm3 does not bother building shared library versions of the Modula-3 runtime libraries. This means that CVSup and other programs you build with Ezm3 will be self-sufficient. They will run on systems which don't have Ezm3 installed.

Ezm3 does not bother trying to support Modula-3's incremental garbage collection feature. This feature is the leading cause of portability and installation problems in other distributions of Modula-3. It does not benefit CVSup, so it has been removed. As a lucky side-effect, removing the incremental GC reduces dynamic memory usage by about 25%.

Ezm3 does not try to support Windows. It is for Unix variants only.

What platforms are supported?

Ezm3 should install easily on the following platforms.

Ezm3 Target	Hardware	Operating System	Bootstrap Distribution
ALPHA_OSF	Alpha	Digital Unix 4.0 and later, Compaq Tru64	ezm3-1.1-ALPHA_OSF-boot.tar.bz2
FBSD_ALPHA	Alpha	FreeBSD 4.1 and later	ezm3-1.1a-FBSD_ALPHA-boot.tar.bz2
FBSD_SPARC64	SPARC-V9	FreeBSD 5.0 and later	ezm3-1.2-FBSD_SPARC64-boot.tar.bz2
FreeBSD4	ix86	FreeBSD 4.x and later	ezm3-1.2-FreeBSD4-boot.tar.bz2
LINUXLIBC6	ix86	Red Hat 7.1 and later, SuSE, CRUX, and others	ezm3-1.1-LINUXLIBC6-boot.tar.bz2
NetBSDi386	ix86	NetBSD 1.6 and later	ezm3-1.1-NetBSDi386-boot.tar.bz2
OpenBSD_386	ix86	OpenBSD 3.2 and later	ezm3-1.1-OpenBSD_386-boot.tar.bz2
SOLgnu	SPARC	Solaris 2.x / SunOS 5.x, with GCC installed	ezm3-1.1-SOLgnu-boot.tar.bz2

Prerequisites

To install Ezm3 you will need:

• The Ezm3 bootstrap distribution for your platform, from the table of supported platforms above.
• The Ezm3 source distribution: ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/development/CVSup/ezm3/ezm3-1.2-src.tar.bz2.
• The bzip2 file compression package for decompressing the distribution files.
• GNU make installed as "gmake".

Platform-specific Notes

Linux (LINUXLIBC6)

• Some distributions of Linux don't install GNU make under the name gmake. If the command "which gmake" doesn't display a pathname such as /usr/bin/gmake, you must create the appropriate link yourself. Typically this is done with the command "ln /usr/bin/make /usr/bin/gmake".

Solaris (SOLgnu)

• Make sure the system directory /usr/ccs/bin is at the front of your execution PATH. If the command "which as" does not print "/usr/ccs/bin/as" then the build will fail.
• You must have GCC installed on the system. Almost any version will do.

Installation

1. Unpack the two Ezm3 distribution files. This will create a subdirectory "ezm3-1.2" containing all of the source files. Make sure you unpack the platform-specific bootstrap distribution in addition to the source distribution. If you cannot find a Makefile, you forgot the platform-specific bootstrap distribution.
2. Get into the "ezm3-1.2" subdirectory.
3. By default Ezm3 will install into "/usr/local" in subdirectories named "bin", "lib", and "man". If you want to change that, edit "m3config/src/${TARGET}", where ${TARGET} is replaced by the name of your Ezm3 target from the table of supported platforms above. Find the definition of INSTALL_ROOT and change it to your desired installation directory. Create the directory if it doesn't exist.
4. Also in the "m3config/src/${TARGET}" file, check the definition of X11ROOT to make sure it is correct for your system. If X11 is not installed on your system, do not worry about this. You do not need to have X11 installed to build Ezm3, but if you do have it then you should set X11ROOT correctly. It should reference the directory which contains the X11 libraries, and which has a subdirectory named "X11".
5. Check the platform-specific notes above and follow any special instructions for your platform.
6. Become root.
7. Type "gmake". This will build and install Modula-3. It is not possible to separate the build from the installation, and the installed files will not work if you move them to a different location. That is why you have to do this as root.
8. Wait for the build to complete. It takes 10 minutes or more, depending on the speed of the build platform.
9. That's all! Get out of the "ezm3-1.2" directory and remove it, if you wish.

Problems?

If you run into any problems installing Ezm3 on a supported platform, please report them! To find out the e-mail address, visit http://www.cvsup.org/contact.html.