INF: MASM 6.0 Programmer's Guide Errors: Chapters 7-10

ID Number: Q74173

6.00 | 6.00

MS-DOS | OS/2

docerr

Summary:

The following is a list of documentation additions and corrections for

Chapters 7 through 10 of the "Microsoft Macro Assembler Programmer's

Guide" for version 6.0. The section and page numbers are listed first,

followed by a description of the addition or correction.

Section 7.1.2.3, Page 174

-------------------------

The note in the margin states:

"pairs of operands cannot be both registers or both memory

locations."

This is incorrect. The TEST instruction is able to take two registers

as operands.

Section 7.2.1, Page 178

-----------------------

The summary of the action for the ".REPEAT,.UNTILCXZ" directive is

incorrect. It specifies this directive will compare a label to an

expression. However, this is not the case.

The correct description is as follows:

The .UNTILCXZ directive can be used with expression1 ==

expression2 or expression1 != expression2 to generate a LOOPE

or LOOPNE instruction. The .UNTILCXZ directive also decrements CX

and exits the loop if CX = 0. If <condition> is omitted, the

.UNTILCXZ directive generates a LOOP instruction.

Section 7.2.1, Page 182

-----------------------

Line number eight of the sample program is incorrect. It should be:

.CONTINUE .IF (al < '0') || (al > '9')

Section 7.3.3.2, Page 191

-------------------------

The syntax description for parameters has a "single" closing square

bracket rather than a "double" closing square bracket. It must have a

"double" closing square bracket.

Section 7.3.3.2, Page 192

-------------------------

The last sentence of the third paragraph should end with the

following:

"...--the first MOV gets the address of the parameter, and the

second MOV gets the parameter."

Section 7.3.4, Page 195

-----------------------

The fourth portion of the diagram in this page does not show where SP

is located. This is misleading. SP should be shown at the same

location as BP-2.

Section 7.3.8.2, Page 206

-------------------------

The first sentence on this page is incorrect. It should read:

"Therefore parmbytes is not always equal to the bytes occupied

by the parameters."

Section 8.2.1, Page 217

-----------------------

Midway through the second paragraph the sentence should read:

Multiple /I options can be used to specify that multiple

*directories* be searched in the order they appear on the command

line.

Section 8.2.2.1, Page 219

-------------------------

In figure 8.1, there are three files and MOD2.ASM contains the

following line:

mov ax, array[12]

This line should be changed to:

mov al, array[12]

Also, the last sentence in this section states:

You can also use EXTERNDEF to make code labels global.

This means EXTERNDEF can make code labels global between files so that

another module can access that label. However, the code label must

have global scope within the file where it is defined. For example:

File 1

------

EXTERNDEF codelabel:near

.model small

.code

firstproc proc

codelabel:: mov ax,1

firstproc endp

File 2

------

EXTERNDEF codelabel:near

.model small

.code

secondproc proc

jmp codelabel

secondproc endp

In the first file, it is important that the label codelabel is defined

with two colons (::). With the OPTION SCOPED turned on by default, the

double colon allows the variable to be seen globally in the first

file. The EXTERNDEF statement makes codelabel public so that it can be

seen by file 2.

Section 8.3.1, Page 224

-----------------------

In figure 8.3, the file MOD2.ASM should read:

.model small, pascal

EXTERN Var:BYTE, BuildTable:NEAR

.code

.

.

.

mov al,Var

call BuildTable

.

.

.

Section 8.4.2, Page 226

-----------------------

Change the example line of code from

EXTERN init(dummy)

to the following:

EXTERN init(dummy):PROC

Section 9.3.2, Page 239

-----------------------

Page 239 states that the following line should work:

work MACRO arg:=%07h

This is incorrect. The line above will produce a syntax error when

trying to assemble. It was not implemented in MASM 6.0.

Section 9.4.3, Page 245

-----------------------

In the sample at the bottom of page 245, the following line should be

change from

FOR arg, arglist

to the following:

%FOR arg, arglist

Section 9.5, Page 249

---------------------

The first sentence on this page should read:

The string in the SUBSTR syntax, as well as in the syntax for the

other string directives and predefined functions, can be any

textItem where textItem can be text enclosed in angle brackets

(<>), the name of a text macro, or a constant expression preceded

by a percent sign (%) such as %constExpr or %(constExpr).

Section 9.5, Page 249

---------------------

The first paragraph in the description for SIZESTR states:

Although the length is always a positive number, it is assigned as

a string of digits in the current radix rather than as a numeric

value.

The above statement is incorrect. The SIZESTR directive assigns a

number to a variable like a numeric equate. For example

stringsize SIZESTR <hello>

makes stringsize a numeric equate, setting it equal to 5.

Section 9.5, Page 250

---------------------

Change the following

RestoreRegs MACRO

LOCAL regs

%FOR reg,regpushed

pop reg

ENDM

ENDM

to the following:

RestoreRegs MACRO

LOCAL regs

%FOR regs,regpushed ; reg s/b regs...

pop regs ; " " " "

ENDM

ENDM

Section 9.7.2, Page 257

-----------------------

The Macro Assembler 6.0 README.DOC has the following correction for

the table on the top of page 257:

Option Description

------ -----------

ASSUMES Saves segment register information

LISTING Saves listing and CREF information

CPU Saves current CPU and processor

RADIX Saves current default radix

ALL All of the above

Section 10.3.1.5, Page 268

--------------------------

The following is the example shown in section 10.3.1.5:

project.exe:*.obj

LINK $*.obj;

The documentation states that this description block links all files

having the .OBJ extension in the current directory. This should be

written as:

project.exe:*.obj

LINK $**;

Section A.1.4, Page 555

-----------------------

The list of new directives at the bottom of this page is missing the

directive .ENDIF.

Section A.2.3, Page 583

-----------------------

There is a comma missing from the encoding example at the bottom of

the page. The line should be:

"MASM 6.0 uses this encoding instead: rm16/32,imm8."

Additional reference words: 6.00