Criteria for GCC 4.0

[Phil Edwards]

On Wed, Jun 02, 2004 at 09:17:41PM +0200, Steven Bosscher wrote:
> On Wednesday 02 June 2004 21:09, Phil Edwards wrote:
> > > > The results of the Acovea project need to be studied carefully and
> > > > taken into account. Perhaps -O2 should turn on a reasonably good set
> > > > of optimizations for the platform at hand, rather than a static set.
> > >
> > > And again, this change is no more user-visible than tree-ssa, so by
> >
> > I disagree; turning optimizations on and off can and does make a change.
> 
> So turning on and/or off optimizations is more visible to the user than
> roughly 20 new ones enabled by default? ;-)

Yes, actually.  Because you don't have to actually explain to the users
what's changed, you may not see things as confusing.  Altering an /existing/
set of parameters will confuse people more than stuff that's silently
turned on by default.  (Not just "will confuse," but "does confuse."
This happens already, with every release.  I'm dreading the next release
already and having to explain more stuff again.)  The folk that hang out
in #gcc are /not/ the normal audience; they/we are aware of what's going
on and know what to expect.

You've stated your opinion, I've stated mine, and since the majority of
developers feel we should call the next release 4.0 no matter what gets
included, I'm sure that's what'll happen.  (My expectations of the users are
low enough that I think they'll be confused, no matter what gets included,
so perhaps helping the user is a moot point.)


-- 
America may be unique in being a country which has leapt
from barbarism to decadence without touching civilization.
  - John O'Hara