GMP and MPFR (Was: GCC does not build gfortran !!)

[Martin Krischik]

Am Freitag 07 Dezember 2007 schrieb Ian Lance Taylor:

> Martin Krischik <krischik@users.sourceforge.net> writes:
> > In the past The GNU Ada Project created Fortran just for the fun of it
> > - but we have given up on it - not because we don't like Fortran or
> > compiling Fortran is troublesome.
> >
> > No it's because of GMP and MPFR. Fortran now needs those two libraries
> > to be installed. And those two are a real pain in the arse. If your
> > distribution hasn't got them I pity you.
>
> Note that in gcc 4.3, all languages will require GMP and MPFR, not
> just Fortran.

That is extremely bad news for anybody trying to create GCC on a 
non-mainstream (i.E. Linux) platform.

Honestly: It took our team [1] month to create a working GCC/Ada for MinGW and 
it is still not repeatable (as in: change version number start script and 
done).

Making GMP and MPFR a prerequisite is a mistake! The GMP team with there need 
for speed made creating GMP a pain in the arse. See my other post on this 
thread. I created GMP but the resulting lib is worthless. Unproven best guess 
why: a 64 bit lib where a 32 bit lib is needed.

And expect an outcry son. Why? Well have a look at my build script:

	if test -e "%{Prefix}/lib/libgmp.so"  &&
	   test -e "%{Prefix}/lib/libmpfr.so" ;
	then
		Enables="--enable-gmp --enable-mpfr"
		Languages="${Languages},fortran";
	fi;

And another thing just struck me: We from the Ada community use cross 
compilers for embedded targets a lot. Targets which might not even have an 
operating system. How is this supposed to work in future?

Or not quite a drastic: Cross compiling on Windows for VMS. Do GMP and MPFR 
cross compile for VMS. Do they compile for VMS at all. Or for Symbian to name 
a new and hip OS for contrast.

You are going to loose many mon mainstream or cross compile platforms that 
way - they will stay with 4.2.x which will be at least "createable" for there 
needs. And all this all for some multi precision stuff which most people 
won't need. I at at least know more GCC users using exotic targets then MP 
math.

Martin

[1] http://gnuada.sf.net

-- 
Martin Krischik
mailto://krischik@users.sourceforge.net
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