This is the mail archive of the egcs@egcs.cygnus.com mailing list for the EGCS project. See the EGCS home page for more information.


[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
[Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]

Re: `--syntax-only' after error



On Thu, 18 Feb 1999, Marc Espie wrote:

> >Let's be serious. Either the feature should be on by default (and than
> >adding an option to turn it off makes sense) or it shouldn't be integrated
> >into the compiler at all.
> You're trying to force the issue, one way or another. This is definitely 
> cleaner, but it looks like it won't be please everyone. So the option may
> get dropped completely. Why ? It looks to me like a user's choice.

I don't think users should be given choice on issues like this one.
Options should provide users with new, important features. This option
would not provide any feature at all, whether important or not. It would
be just a little tweak for wizards.

The issue is a minor one, therefore, it does not deserve an option. If
EGCS starts adding options for such issues, we will soon have hundreds of
them, as if we already didn't have too many. Many people dislike UNIX for
its dozens of cryptic, mostly useless command line options. Let's not make
the situation worse.

Basically, the reason some people are advocating for an option is that
there is no unanimity among the developers, "so let's make it an option".
Options should not be added on such basis. It is simply not fair to put
additional burden on plain users just because developers couldn't reach an
agreement.

> Some people prefer getting all the errors in one bunch, whereas others
> prefer to first fix one error, then re-run the compiler.  
> 
> I fail to see why one of these ways to work should be `better'.

I agree. But I wasn't talking about this option, but rather about the
syntax-only option. I do agree with you that having an option to abort
after the first error might be useful to have, even though I personally
will probably never use it.

/ Kamil Iskra    AmigaOS  Linux/i386  Linux/m68k               \
| GeekGadgets m68k-amigaos GCC maintainer                      |
| iskra@student.uci.agh.edu.pl  kiskra@ernie.icslab.agh.edu.pl |
\ kamil@dwd.interkom.pl   http://student.uci.agh.edu.pl/~iskra /