PDP-11 LDA BFD backend for gnu binutils

[Fritz Mueller]

> On Feb 24, 2019, at 10:16 AM, Paul Koning <paulkoning at comcast.net> wrote:
> What LDA do you have in mind?  Absolute loader binary, for bare metal execution?

I had in mind absolute loader binary for bare metal as a starting point.

Most of the coding I’ve had to do on my restoration adventure has been standalone tests and utilities.  To date I’ve been using the RT-11 tool chain under SIMH, and copying things in and out via the simulated paper tape reader/punch, but that’s a little cumbersome.  I’m now contemplating developing a few more significant standalone utilities that will have both PDP-11 server components and modern PC client components, and it would be nice to be able to build all the parts together in one place using the conventional gnu tooling.

I am mostly interested in assembly development for my purposes, but it looks like others have been having pretty good luck with recent gcc on the pdp11-aout target as well.

I think I’m most interested in this level of development because it’s what is needed to repair and troubleshoot the machines.  After they are up and running, it’s way more fun to do self-hosted development using the real thing (though it does run up the power bill, and I wish I had a better editor under V6 :-))

Cheers,
  —FritzM.