Re: IRIX 6 configuration sets MD_EXEC_PREFIX

[Jeffrey A Law <law at cygnus dot com>]

  In message <199809171844.LAA08035@smtp.earthlink.net>you write:
  > >>>>> "Jeffrey" == Jeffrey A Law <law@cygnus.com> writes:
  > 
  >     Jeffrey> The MIPS is not particularly special in this regard.
  >     Jeffrey> Other ports define MD_EXEC_PREFIX so that gcc can find
  >     Jeffrey> the assembler, linker, crt0.o, etc.
  > 
  > But not *all* ports.  Should they, in your opinion?  That wouldn't be
  > my first choice, but I would prefer that to the present situation.
  > I'm looking for a policy decision on this issue that we can document
  > and implement. 
MD_EXEC_PREFIX is generally set only when we need a special path to
find stuff (ie, they're not in /usr/bin).

It can (and should) also be used to force finding "as", "ld", etc
when systems typically have bogon versions lying around.

This is often the case on irix systems because gas/binutils coverage
is spotty.  One could argue that gas/binutils should be smarter about
what tools get installed on each particular version of irix to avoid
these kinds of problems.

While we can run into these kinds of problems on any port, it is rarely 
the case that the problems presented by using gnu-as or gnu-ld are
as serious in nature as they are often on irix ports.

  > their path that were not good assemblers or linkers.  But, this
  > problem exists on, say, Linux, too.  So, both platforms should be
  > handled in the same way, I think.
Na, I don't  particularly see the need to make this work the same on
all ports.

jeff