I recently wrote a patch that enables the ptrace(2) system call to
support floating point registers for Linux/i386 (like in any normal
operating system). This patch (or an equivalent one) is vital for the
people that develop numerical programs under Linux. For example, Absoft
Fortran compiler includes their own kernel patches.
That patch is available at ftp://jl1.quim.ucm.es/pub/ramon.
Patches for Linux 2.0.x, 2.1.x, and gdb are included.
After the neccesary testing, I sent it to torvalds@transmeta.com
but received no reply.
I know that Linux is a volunteer project. I acknowledge that this
unpaid effort takes its time. Probably Linus is very busy.
But the scientific comunity needs a solution that makes posible to
debug numerical programs. I also have little time. Imagine if everytime
that I have to develop a program in a new machine I have to ask the
administrator to install a non-standard kernel.
If there is any solution better than mine, please feel free to use
it.
Therefore, I ask you to consider including these patches in Linux
2.0.31 and Linux 2.1.
Thank you very much for your time.
Regards,
Ramon