status of gcj

[Johannes Klarenbeek]

2008/9/16 David Daney <ddaney@avtrex.com>:
> Please keep java@gcc.gnu.org CCed.
>
> Johannes Klarenbeek wrote:
>>
>> 2008/9/15 David Daney <ddaney@avtrex.com>:
>>
>>>
>>> Johannes Klarenbeek wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> hi there,
>>>>
>>>> i looked at the excellent gcj project, but was a little confused about
>>>> the status of the project. for example...
>>>>
>>>> last gcj news flash is at march 30, 2007
>>>> last cni update is october 22, 2000
>>>> last classpath update is june 6 of 2008
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> The GCJ News is not keep very current.  But there is still work being
>>> done
>>> on GCJ and libgcj.
>>>
>>
>> what parts are not very current at the very moment concerning the byte
>> code implementation of java in gcj?
>>
>
> I was talking about the web site.  I'm not sure what your question was
> though.

oh sorry. i was wondering if the compiler (and interpreter)
implementation is up to date with the current java sun implementation.
not referening to the Classpath implementation. for example: does gcj
implement generics (or what are they called ... templates like
c++?)... is the java byte code generation by gcj after source code
compilation equal to the latest java specs etc...

>>
>>  i was reading about the gnu compiler collection on wikipedia and
>> found that the gnu compiler is separeted in two parts (3 really); a
>> front-end and a back-end. the front-end parses languages like C, C++,
>> java, ADA, fortran and more. the back-end should support multiple
>> processor architectures. i guess that gcj is the front-end part in gcc
>> isn´t it?
>>
>>
>
> Correct.

ok, how big is the gcj specific front-end part compared to for example
c++... did the developers copy a lot of code from the c++ project and
changed it to fit the java requirements?

since the back-end of gcj produces java byte code as well, does that
mean one can write c++ programs and compile it to java byte code?

>
>>>> where is project going too? how is the libgcj doing... is it already
>>>> obsolete and replaced by classpath?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> For the last several years libgcj has been based on classpath.  So it is
>>> not
>>> being replaced by classpath, for the most part it *is* classpath adapted
>>> to
>>> work with gcj.
>>>
>>
>> is libgcj a library that implements VMObject, VMString and some calls
>> for AWT for example? so classpath can call the methods on these native
>> objects whereas libgcj calls methods on the operating system to draw a
>> windows for example?? if that is true, does libgcj support besides
>> xlib also win32?
>>
>>
>
> That is the basic idea, but the specifics are slightly different.  For the
> case of Object, String, Class, and several other classes in the java.lang
> package, libgcj completely replaces the classpath implementation.  For some
> of the I/O classes libgcj does implement the VM* interfaces.  The majority
> of the code in classpath does not have VM dependencies, so the gcj specific
> parts of libgcj are a small percentage of the total code.

sorry, i lost you there... the gcj specific parts of libgcj are a
small percentage of the total code? what do you mean? leaving
Classpath out of the story, the code generated from source by gcj
links to libgcj isn´t it?

another question, maybe a little off topic since its a classpath
related question. just out of curiousity, can a bsd licensed java
compiler use the classpath library?

regards,
johannes

>
> David Daney
>
>