Re: Putting C++ code into gcc front end

[Mike Stump <mrs at apple dot com>]

On Tuesday, March 4, 2003, at 11:16 PM, Gabriel Dos Reis wrote:
> Zack Weinberg <zack at codesourcery dot com> writes:
> | | C++ compilers and runtime libraries that implement the full 
> language
> | as it was standardized are still rare.  Compilers that implement a
> | language called "C++" that is incompatible with standard C++ are 
> still
> | common.
>
> I think that is too negative to reflect reality.

As do I.  g++ can be ported to almost any machine that needs to have 
C++, or already has been.  g++ put simply, is widely available.  It is 
usually no less widely available than gcc.  You can take a poll, but I 
suspect you'll find that 99.99% of our users _can_ use gcc/g++ to 
compile gcc.  Now, the question is how much pain and suffering should 
the other 0.01% cause us, the FSF answer is, they exist at our 
pleasure.  You may have a different opinion.

Also, we tend to focus on distributors more than end-users, and 
distributors I don't think are put off by having to have gcc/g++ to 
build.  Most users tend to take up the compiler with binary packages, 
in this case, the issue is very moot, as it is the same exact command 
to them either way.  The most major impact for them would be, we would 
need a stable libstdc++.so that won't break and cause the compilers to 
become non-functional.