Re: changing the SPARC default

[Jiri Gaisler <jiri at gaisler dot com>]

There is a large installed based of V7/V8 Sparc devices,
and it is in fact growing. This is because of the
adoption of the LEON SPARC V8 processor, which is used
in a growing number of embedded devices. As an example,
the Nemerix NJ1030A GPS receiver contains a LEON SPARC
cpu and was shipped in 1.5 million pieces in 2005 alone.
Other LEON products include the Infrant Network Storage
Processor (IT3102/IT3107) and the ATMEL AT697.

I would therefore suggest that the gcc defaults for
sparc-elf and sparc-linux stays as is (V7) while the
solaris 10+ can safely be modified to V9.

Jiri.

Ralf Corsepius wrote:
> On Wed, 2006-03-15 at 20:10 -0800, Alexey Starovoytov wrote:
>
> > Hi,
> >
> > The default architecture for GCC SPARC is V7.
> > What do gcc sparc developers think about changing it to V8PLUS?
> >
> > Few things to consider:
> > - v7 is legacy
> >    . used in old Sun's sun4c systems
> >    . 32-bit only
> >    . no integer mul/div insns
>
>
> AFAICT, v7's are still in use in embedded platforms.
>
>
> > 1st choice (the best):
> > - change the default for all sparc platforms
>
>
> This is likely to break toolchains targetting embedded targets. I am
> almost 100% sure it would break sparc-rtems).
>
>
> > 2nd:
> > - change the default for Solaris 7+ and linux
> >
> > 3rd (100% safe):
> > - change the default for Solaris 10+
> >
> > Also 64-bit Linux doesn't have to mean 64-bit (v9) gcc compiler,
> > so at the same time it would be good to change it to v8plus as well.
> >
> > All that changes can be done by easily tweaking gcc/config.gcc
> > by adding with_cpu=v9
>
> I don't have an opinion on Solaris or Linux.
>
> Ralf
>
>
> .