Dynamically linking against GMP and MPFR

[Brooks Moses]

Dave Korn wrote:
> On 25 May 2007 15:34, Eric Botcazou wrote:
>>> It's no different than any other library used by any other program.
>>> I wouldn't object to configure support to request static gmp/mpfr for
>>> developer convenience, but GCC is a perfectly normal dynamically
>>> linked program and should behave like one IMO.
>> How a compiler can be "a perfectly normal dynamically linked program",
>> especially if it's the system compiler?  IMHO the less dependencies the
>> better in this case.
> 
>   Yes, hasn't this been one of the design goals of gcc for as long as any of
> us can remember?  It wants to be able to bootstrap the GNU world on non-free
> systems from scratch and part of that is not requiring anything other than the
> standard headers and libraries distributed with the system - isn't that an
> important qualification in terms of the GPL?

That seems like a different issue, though.

Bootstrapping GCC on a system is something that would be solved by 
placing GMP and MPFR in the build tree (as has been proposed), and once 
they are built as part of the usual bootstrap, it is irrelevant whether 
they are linked statically or dynamically.  On the other hand, when one 
is distributing pre-built binaries of GCC (as in the present discussion) 
it irrelevant whether GMP and MPFR are built separately or as part of 
the bootstrap, but the question of whether they are dynamically or 
statically linked is a significant question.

- Brooks