gcc warning

[Keith Bostic]

Subject:      Re: gcc warning
From:         mrs@wrs.com (Mike Stump)
Date:         1998/01/24
Newsgroups:   gnu.gcc.bug

>> Date: Thu, 22 Jan 1998 12:59:40 -0500 (EST)
>> From: Keith Bostic <bostic@bostic.com>
>
>>       cc1plus: warning: -fhandle-exceptions
>>           has been renamed to -fexceptions (and is now on by default)
>
>> I'd like to convince the gcc maintainers that this message
>> should go away.
>
> This is your warning to fix your makefiles now.  In the next major
> release (or so), this flag will not be present.  Better to autoconf it
> now, that way, you'll have a year to get the new code out into the
> field, before someone notices that it won't compile anymore.
>
> The other choice we had was to break your code now, and not support
> -fhandle-expcetions, then you would have to fix the code.  We decided
> that you'd rather have some notice to fix your makefiles (thanks
> Jason)...  Which route do you prefer?  No notice, and a wholesale
> breakage, or notice in the form of a warning, or notice in the form of
> relnotes?
 
You're ignoring a third choice: don't delete the flag, leave it
in place, and add a line to the man page that says:
        
        "-fhandle-exceptions is now the default behavior".

By deleting this flag, you require that application writers
all add autoconf configuration to optionally supply the flag,
and then deal with bug reports for the next N years as sites
that have upgraded gcc, but not the application, notice the
warnings (or fatal error messages -- at some point, all of my
previous releases are going to stop compiling!)

I wouldn't mind if the flag had to change in meaning, or if the
specified behavior was no longer available.  That's okay, I
could understand that, software gets upgraded and modified over
time.  What frustrates me about this one is that I can't think
of any reason to drop support for the flag.

Keith Bostic
bostic@bsdi.com