Re: Beyond GCC 3.0: Summing Up

[Mark Mitchell <mark at codesourcery dot com>]

--On Monday, July 09, 2001 11:21:27 AM -0700 Joe Buck <jbuck@synopsys.COM> 
wrote:

>>     An alternative is that the person can write to the gcc list,
>>     describe the latent bug in reload that is found, and ask for help
>>     with it.  Maybe a volunteer can be found to fix the latent bug, and
>>     then the improved combine.c can go in.  But breaking the compiler
>>     isn't an option, as it stops all work.
>>
>> "breaking" isn't binary.  Clearly, if a patch makes the compiler not
>> bootstrap on a major target, we have a problem that needs urgent fixing.
>> But the standard for patch correctness is much stricter: if a patch
>> breaks a handful of test cases on one or two targets, it's hardly the
>> case that it "stops all work", but we do consider that "broken".
>
> OK, I agree with you that such a standard is too severe.  We can't break
> bootstrapping, but if the latent bug just causes a few testcases to fail,
> then the best thing to do would be to leave it in, unless we're about to
> release.

I agree -- as long as someone is actively working on a patch.  If
nobody is working on a patch, then by what mechanism are we going to
ensure that we fix the problem before the release?  The only choices
are that we agree not to release until the problem is fixed, or we
agree to release with the problem -- as David pointed out we cannot
force anyone to do anything.

-- 
Mark Mitchell                mark@codesourcery.com
CodeSourcery, LLC            http://www.codesourcery.com