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MZ EXE help
Posted: Wed Aug 06, 2008 4:10 pm
by renovatio
Well, now that my kernel is written, i would like to boot it. I know i can boot it because i didn't used functions that needed DOS interrupts. My kernel is an MZ EXE created by Turbo C++ 3.0. I had been googling for a long time, and found the MZ EXE header format, and a lot of boot sectors that loaded EXEs, but there are not good information about how to load them. Really i don't know anything about EXE files. Can anyone explain me how to load them?
Thanks for helping me and sorry for my bad english
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Re: MZ EXE help
Posted: Wed Aug 06, 2008 9:55 pm
by eddyb
your kernel is exe?
if you want to can boot it with a common bootloader(eg:grub), it should be in ELF or BIN format.
you can use exe, but it's not so used, and are a few bootloaders that support it.
Re: MZ EXE help
Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 2:28 am
by Combuster
First of all, use google. You can get the MZ format off there easily.
Basically, what you need to do is copy the binary part of the exe into memory, then jump to the entry point as specified in the header (compute the starting CS:IP depending on where the app was put in memory)
Re: MZ EXE help
Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 6:25 am
by renovatio
I googled for a long time. I can't understand, for example, what is a paragraph, a block, the overlay number?
Code: Select all
RelocateEXE:
mov ds, ax
add ax, [ds:08h] ; ax = image base
mov cx, [ds:06h] ; cx = reloc items
mov bx, [ds:18h] ; bx = reloc table pointer
jcxz RelocationDone
ReloCycle:
mov di, [ds:bx] ; di = item ofs
mov dx, [ds:bx+2] ; dx = item seg (rel)
add dx, ax ; dx = item seg (abs)
push ds
mov ds, dx ; ds = dx
add [ds:di], ax ; fixup
pop ds
add bx, 4 ; point to next entry
loop ReloCycle
RelocationDone:
mov bx, ax
add bx, [ds:0Eh]
mov ss, bx ; ss for EXE
mov sp, [ds:10h] ; sp for EXE
add ax, [ds:16h] ; cs
push ax
push word [ds:14h] ; ip
Run:
mov dl, [cs:bsDriveNumber] ; let program know boot drive
sti
retf
Code: Select all
00-01 0x4d, 0x5a. This is the "magic number" of an EXE file. The first byte of the file is 0x4d and the second is 0x5a.
02-03 The number of bytes in the last block of the program that are actually used. If this value is zero, that means the entire last block is used (i.e. the effective value is 512).
04-05 Number of blocks in the file that are part of the EXE file. If [02-03] is non-zero, only that much of the last block is used.
06-07 Number of relocation entries stored after the header. May be zero.
08-09 Number of paragraphs in the header. The program's data begins just after the header, and this field can be used to calculate the appropriate file offset. The header includes the relocation entries. Note that some OSs and/or programs may fail if the header is not a multiple of 512 bytes.
0A-0B Number of paragraphs of additional memory that the program will need. This is the equivalent of the BSS size in a Unix program. The program can't be loaded if there isn't at least this much memory available to it.
0C-0D Maximum number of paragraphs of additional memory. Normally, the OS reserves all the remaining conventional memory for your program, but you can limit it with this field.
0E-0F Relative value of the stack segment. This value is added to the segment the program was loaded at, and the result is used to initialize the SS register.
10-11 Initial value of the SP register.
12-13 Word checksum. If set properly, the 16-bit sum of all words in the file should be zero. Usually, this isn't filled in.
14-15 Initial value of the IP register.
16-17 Initial value of the CS register, relative to the segment the program was loaded at.
18-19 Offset of the first relocation item in the file.
1A-1B Overlay number. Normally zero, meaning that it's the main program.
Re: MZ EXE help
Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 6:36 am
by Solar
Google search for "MZ exe" turned up the Wikipedia entry for "DOS executable", which links to
http://www.delorie.com/djgpp/doc/exe/, where I find - among other things - that table you posted.
And at the top of that page: "One block is 512 bytes, one paragraph is 16 bytes."
Re: MZ EXE help
Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 6:49 am
by renovatio
and what is the overlay number?
Re: MZ EXE help
Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:04 am
by Solar
A nasty remnant from RealMode times. Unless a RealMode OS with MS-DOS compatibility is what you want, you can ignore that number.