[ros-dev] ReactOS official compatibility target and the new build system

[Colin Finck]

Ged Murphy <gedmurphy at gmail.com> wrote:
> Kernel targets 2k3 (additionally with any newer architecture if possible
> / applicable.
> Usermode targets the latest version of Windows.

This means that we always need to ensure that applications properly 
detect ReactOS as NT 5.2 all the time and don't expect features of newer 
Windows versions. Otherwise they could make false assumptions about the 
kernel capabilities.

Unfortunately, this isn't always the case as demonstrated e.g. by 
r39384. For some reason, the VMware Tools Installer (which of course 
supports NT 5.x), tried to import NT6-specific functions like wcsncpy_s 
from msvcrt.dll.
It's most-likely related to the fact that our msvcrt.dll still had the 
version number 42.4.0.0 at that time, but shows a problem that can arise 
if we mix targets.

The version number of msvcrt.dll has been changed to that of the 
corresponding DLL in 2k3 SP1 later on, but let's assume that we had 
implemented all NT6-specific functions in msvcrt.dll and changed the 
version number to that of the Vista DLL.
Some poorly written application might assume that it runs on Vista now 
and expect much more from the whole system: Other DLLs should be the 
Vista versions as well, some Vista-specific features might be requested 
and it might even attempt to use the NT6 version of a bundled driver.
This is of course a very specific case, but we cannot reliably say that 
no such Windows application exists.
We can only prevent these problems by providing an OS targetting a 
single Windows version from kernel-mode up to user-mode.

Therefore I appreciate Jérôme's option 3) for targetting a single 
Windows version (NT 5.2) while at the same time enabling us to add code 
for a later target change.

Most of our DLLs still have that 42.4.0.0 version number by the way, so 
this should be another thing to fix to ensure compatibility.

Cheers,

Colin