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Re: GCC 4.1: Buildable on GHz machines only?


Jonathan Wakely wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 27, 2005 at 08:05:39AM -0700, Matt Thomas wrote:
> 
> 
>>David Edelsohn wrote:
>>
>>
>>>	GCC now supports C++, Fortran 90 and Java.  Those languages have
>>>extensive, complicated runtimes.  The GCC Java environment is becoming
>>>much more complete and standards compliant, which means adding more and
>>>more features.
>>
>>That's all positive but if GCC also becomes too expensive to build then
>>all those extra features become worthless.
> 
> 
> Worthless to whom?

To users of that platform that can no longer afford to build GCC.

> The features under discussion are new, they didn't exist before.

And because they never existed before, their cost for older platforms
may not have been correctly assessed.  If no one builds natively on
older platforms, the recognition that the new features maybe a problem
for older platforms will never be made.

> If you survived without them previously you can do so now.
> (i.e. don't build libjava if your machine isn't capable of it)

Yes, you can skip building libjava.  But can you skip building GCC?
Will GCC 3.x be supported forever?  If not, your compiler may have
to rely being cross-built.  Being able to do a bootstrap is useful
and is part of the expected GCC testing but when it can only be
done one or two a week, it becomes a less practical test method.

> But claiming it's "worthless" when plenty of people are using it is
> just, well ... worthless.

Depends on your point of view.
-- 
Matt Thomas                     email: matt@3am-software.com
3am Software Foundry              www: http://3am-software.com/bio/matt/
Cupertino, CA              disclaimer: I avow all knowledge of this message.


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