Revised release criteria for GCC 4.0

[Benjamin Kosnik]

hi mark. thanks for the update.

i must say, the clarification is really nice, but puzzling. 

if these two are compared:

http://gcc.gnu.org/gcc-4.0/criteria.html
vs.
http://gcc.gnu.org/gcc-3.4/criteria.html

a couple of differences are obvious. 

1) platform support 
any chance you could elaborate on the rationale used
to pick the primary platforms? the decision is cool, but the process
behind it would be nice to understand. 

it doesn't seem to be popularity, since i'd think the gcc user base is
x86-linux>powerpc-darwin>=x86-cygwin>any proprietary unix>= any
embedded. 

it doesn't seem to be number of maintainers, as powepc-darwin has more
maintainers than either hpux or aix. 

is it people volunteering to test?

perhaps historical reasons?

note, i don't really care what is primary as long as it includes
x86/linux, just curious.

2) complete dropping of code quality, applications
WTF?? Why drop the glibc and kernel baselines?? I think these have
helped in the past to keep initial releases from being of the
brown-paper bag variety.

it is weird to drop the  codegen requirements right before the release
that introduces the new optimization infrastructure. maybe just me??

3) drop compile time performance as a factor. 
granted this has been dropped de facto from every 3.x series release. so
maybe this is just caving in to reality? i understand this, but it is
sad to see, as it seems to be the #1 complaint from users right now.
dropping it makes the gcc project look like it is ignoring feedback.

help!

benjamin