a question about pageable a.out

[jemarch at gnu dot org]

Hi,

I read in the Linker Book, about the ZMAGIC (pageable a.out) format:

"On systems with 4K pages, the a.out header is expanded to 4K, and the
text segment's size is rounded up to the next 4K boundar. There's no
need to round up the size of the data segment, since the BSS segment
logically follows the data segment, and is zeroed by the program
loader anyway."

I dont understand the last phrase. Why there is no need to align the
data segment? It is because it is aligned at load-time, taking care
the BSS size?

Thanks in advance.


--
Jose E. Marchesi <jemarch at es dot gnu dot org>
GNU Spain        http://es.gnu.org
GNUs Not Unix!   http://www.gnu.org
--
"And if cynics ridicule freedom, ridicule community... if 'hard nosed
realists' say that profit is the only ideal...just ignore them, and
use copyleft all the same." -- RMS
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