I wrote:
Suppose you're trying to market a PC clone. How
successful will you be
if some piece of popular software for the PC won't run on your clone,
because that software depends on direct calls into the ROM, or direct
access to tables in the ROM (e.g., the character generator)? Back in
those days, *lots* of software did wacky things like that.
Jim wrote:
Yes, but *why*? I am getting to be what I consider a
pretty decent
"Why" doesn't matter. The fact is that if you're a company trying
to sell a BIOS to clone makers, and it doesn't work with some even
modestly popular software, the clone makers aren't going to buy it.
It's a business issue, not a technical issue. You could decry the
practice of using unsupported entry points until you were blue in
the face, but it wouldn't convince anyone to buy your BIOS.
Eric