Today i hacked binfmt_misc, a generic binfmt that is used to start an
interpreter to execute a binary.
This work should obsolete binfmt_java and binfmt_em86, as they can easily
be emulated.
binfmt_misc works as follows:
- it maintains an array of structs, that contain a description of a binary
format, including a magic with size, offset and mask, and the
interpreter name.
- on request it invokes the given interpreter with the original program
as argument, as binfmt_java and binfmt_em86 and binfmt_mz do.
- binfmt_misc does not define any default binary-formats
- one must actually register an additional binary-format via a sysctl-call
(pls read the source for more information or see enablejava.c on the
web-site mentioned below)
- operating as module is not supported, since you would have to be awared
of too many module-requests to kerneld to support this properly
Please make comments on this scheme and also on the patch (which is not
really tested, but compiles) that can be found on:
http://www.anatom.uni-tuebingen.de/~richi/linux.html
Richard Guenther