<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"><title>Chapter 1. Introduction</title><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.76.1"><meta name="keywords" content="assembly, assembler, asm, inline, 32-bit, IA-32, i386, x86, nasm, gas, as, as86, yasm, fasm, shasm, osimpa, OS, Linux, Unix, kernel, system, libc, glibc, system call, interrupt, small, fast, embedded, hardware, port, macroprocessor, metaprogramming, preprocessor"><link rel="home" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html" title="Linux Assembly HOWTO"><link rel="up" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html" title="Linux Assembly HOWTO"><link rel="prev" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html" title="Linux Assembly HOWTO"><link rel="next" href="doyouneed.html" title="Chapter 2. Do you need assembly?"></head><body bgcolor="white" text="black" link="#0000FF" vlink="#840084" alink="#0000FF"><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">Chapter 1. Introduction</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center"> </th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="doyouneed.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr></div><div class="chapter" title="Chapter 1. Introduction"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title"><a name="s-intro"></a>Chapter 1. Introduction</h2></div></div></div>
<div class="note" title="Note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title">Note</h3>
<p>
You can skip this chapter if you are familiar with HOWTOs, or just hate to
read all this assembly-unrelated crap.
</p>
</div>
<div class="simplesect" title="Legal Blurb"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="idp58032"></a>Legal Blurb</h2></div></div></div>
<p>
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the
terms of the GNU <a class="ulink" href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html" target="_top">Free
Documentation License</a> Version 1.1; with no Invariant Sections, with no
Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover texts. A copy of the license is included
in the <a class="xref" href="fdl.html" title="Appendix D. GNU Free Documentation License">GNU Free Documentation License</a> appendix.
</p>
<p>
The most recent official version of this document is available from the
<a class="ulink" href="http://asm.sourceforge.net/howto.html" target="_top">Linux Assembly</a>
and <a class="ulink" href="http://tldp.org/docs.html" target="_top">LDP</a> sites. If you are
reading a few-months-old copy, consider checking the above URLs for a new
version.
</p>
</div>
<div class="simplesect" title="Foreword"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="idp62272"></a>Foreword</h2></div></div></div>
<p>
This document aims answering questions of those who program or want to program
32-bit x86 assembly using <span class="emphasis"><em>free software</em></span>, particularly
under the Linux operating system. At many places Universal Resource Locators
(<acronym class="acronym">URL</acronym>) are given for some software or documentation
repository. This document also points to other documents about non-free,
non-x86, or non-32-bit assemblers, although this is not its primary goal. Also
note that there are FAQs and docs about programming on your favorite platform
(whatever it is), which you should consult for platform-specific issues, not
related directly to assembly programming.
</p>
<p>
Because the main interest of assembly programming is to build the guts of
operating systems, interpreters, compilers, and games, where C compiler fails
to provide the needed expressiveness (performance is more and more seldom as
issue), we are focusing on development of such kind of software.
</p>
<p>
If you don't know what <a class="ulink" href="http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/" target="_top">
<span class="emphasis"><em>free software</em></span></a> is, please do read
<span class="emphasis"><em>carefully</em></span> the GNU
<a class="ulink" href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html" target="_top">
General Public License</a> (<acronym class="acronym">GPL</acronym> or
<acronym class="acronym">copyleft</acronym>), which is used in a lot of free software, and is
the model for most of their licenses. It generally comes in a file named
<code class="filename">COPYING</code> (or <code class="filename">COPYING.LIB</code>). Literature
from the <a class="ulink" href="http://www.fsf.org" target="_top">Free Software Foundation</a>
(<acronym class="acronym">FSF</acronym>) might help you too. Particularly, the interesting
feature of free software is that it comes with source code which you can
consult and correct, or sometimes even borrow from. Read your particular
license carefully and do comply to it.
</p>
</div>
<div class="simplesect" title="Contributions"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="idp71584"></a>Contributions</h2></div></div></div>
<p>
This is an interactively evolving document: you are especially invited to ask
questions, to answer questions, to correct given answers, to give pointers to
new software, to point the current maintainer to bugs or deficiencies in the
pages. In one word, contribute!
</p>
<p>
To contribute, please contact the <a class="link" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html#lnoor">maintainer</a>.
</p>
<div class="note" title="Note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title">Note</h3>
<p>
At the time of writing, it is <a class="link" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html#lnoor">Leo Noordergraaf</a>
taking over from <a class="link" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html#konst">Konstantin Boldyshev</a> (since
version 0.6) and <a class="link" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html#fare">Francois-Rene Rideau</a> (since
version 0.5).
</p>
</div>
</div>
<div class="simplesect" title="Translations"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="idp77696"></a>Translations</h2></div></div></div>
<p>
Korean translation of this HOWTO is avalilable at
<a class="ulink" href="http://kldp.org/HOWTO/html/Assembly-HOWTO/" target="_top">
http://kldp.org/HOWTO/html/Assembly-HOWTO/</a>.
Turkish translation of this HOWTO is available at
<a class="ulink" href="http://belgeler.org/howto/assembly-howto.html" target="_top">
http://belgeler.org/howto/assembly-howto.html</a>.
</p>
</div>
</div><div class="navfooter"><hr><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"> </td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="doyouneed.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">Linux Assembly HOWTO </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="Assembly-HOWTO.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> Chapter 2. Do you need assembly?</td></tr></table></div></body></html>