Re: build status for cross builds?

["Joseph S. Myers" <jsm28 at cam dot ac dot uk>]

On Fri, 4 Jan 2002, Joe Buck wrote:

> > I"m not sure how meaningful it is to attempt to keep track of
> > cross-build successes.  Right now there is no useable documentation of
> > how to do cross-builds.  There are fragmentary and years-out-of-date
> > pieces of folklore; combined with large amounts of effort and luck
> > those may sometimes produce working cross-builds.
> 
> This is a bit of an exaggeration.

Not much.  I've many times asked for someone to deal with updating the
cross-compilation documentation and merging that part of the old install
manual into the new, with no-one doing anything on it.

http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-03/msg01143.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-06/msg00076.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-patches/2001-06/msg00332.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-06/msg00333.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-06/msg00807.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-patches/2001-06/msg01521.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-06/msg01617.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-07/msg00087.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-07/msg00143.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-09/msg00148.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-10/msg01463.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-11/msg01125.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-patches/2001-12/msg00272.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-patches/2001-12/msg00830.html

Given that no-one understanding building cross-compilers has done the work
to improve the install manual in this area, I think the above
characterisation is fairly reasonable - certainly those who could create a
better impression by improving the docs have not done so.  I still support
Phil Edwards's suggestion
<URL:http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2001-05/msg00612.html> of a complete freeze
on all code checkins until the docs are much improved.

Recipes for specific cases, such as simtest-howto.html, are useful for
those cases, but not a substitute for proper documentation in the install
manual that thoroughly covers all cases and describes the documented
interfaces for installation that will work if used as documented rather
than giving scripts for one case (e.g., unified source tree and doing a
simple cross to a newlib-based target).

-- 
Joseph S. Myers
jsm28@cam.ac.uk